Toyota announces opening of first pipeline-fed hydrogen station in the US adjacent to its campus; plans H2 use for combined heat and power on campus as well
10 May 2011
Toyota Motor Sales, USA, Inc. (TMS) celebrated the opening of the first hydrogen fueling station in the US fed directly from an active industrial hydrogen pipeline. The station is a collaborative effort between Toyota, Air Products, Shell, South Coast Air Quality Management District (SCAQMD) and the Department of Energy (DOE). The facility will provide hydrogen for the Toyota fuel cell hybrid demonstration program vehicles as well as other manufacturers’ fuel cell vehicle fleets in the Los Angeles area.
The station is located adjacent to the TMS sales and marketing headquarters campus. As landowner, Toyota leases the land to Shell for a nominal fee. As station owner/operator, Shell works directly with Air Products who provides onsite equipment and station maintenance. The station is fed by Air Products’ hydrogen pipeline located less than 50 feet from the station and connected to Air Products’ Wilmington and Carson, Calif. hydrogen production facilities.
In addition to the hydrogen for the fuel cell vehicles, Air Products’ hydrogen compression, storage and dispensing technology are also integral components in the fueling station. The station includes several technology advancements, among them the ability to fuel simultaneously four hydrogen fuel cell vehicles from the four dispensers at the site. The station currently has the requested fueling capacity of 50 kilograms of hydrogen per 12-hour day (or the equivalent of 50 gallons of gasoline per day), has the technical capability to reach 100 kilograms per day, and is expandable.
Building an extensive hydrogen re-fueling infrastructure is a critical step in the successful market launch of fuel cell vehicles. We plan to bring a fuel cell vehicle to market in 2015, or sooner, and the infrastructure must be in place to support our customers’ needs.
—Chris Hostetter, group vice president, product and strategic planning, TMS
This project marked the first time Shell worked closely with a vehicle manufacturer to develop a demonstration station, according to Julian Evison, general manager of operations for Shell alternative energies.
Air Products also worked with Toyota and other fuel cell vehicle manufacturers to develop the Hydrogen Vehicle Authorization System (HVAS), another first for the industry and unique to the Torrance station. The HVAS wireless vehicle recognition system allows station-to-vehicle recognition to facilitate quick and convenient fueling for customers.
The station also will feature a learning center onsite to provide hydrogen and station information to local students and the general public. Shell and Toyota will work together to populate the learning center.
With this new station, the City of Torrance will become part of the California Hydrogen Highway initiative, which aims to create clean air solutions and develop new technology jobs across the state.
The close proximity of the hydrogen pipeline to TMS campus led Toyota to think beyond vehicles to consider additional ways to use hydrogen. In 2010, Toyota partnered with Ballard Power Systems to install a one-megawatt hydrogen fuel cell generator to offset peak electricity demand on campus. The fuel cell generator will be fed directly from the hydrogen pipeline through an existing tap on the TMS property. Pipeline hydrogen used on campus will be offset with the purchase of landfill generated renewable bio-gas.
The system is scheduled for installation in 2012 and is estimated to reduce CO2 emissions by 10,000 tons with emission-free fuel cell technology. Plans include using heat created by the fuel cell system to provide hot water and space heating in the Toyota employee fitness center and in the Lexus headquarter building within the TMS headquarters campus. Use of this heat will offset natural gas consumption on campus, thereby avoiding an estimated additional 28 tons of CO2 emissions annually.
Toyota’s fuel cell hybrid vehicle fleet has logged several million miles since hitting the road in 2002, with significant technological improvements along the way. The first generation fuel cell hybrid vehicles (FCHV) estimated range was 130 miles. In 2009, the latest generation vehicle, Fuel Cell Hybrid Vehicle - Advanced (FCHV-adv), achieved an estimated range of 431 miles on a single fill of hydrogen.
In addition to fuel cell stack efficiency and range improvements, durability and cold temperature operation have greatly improved along with significant reductions in manufacturing and materials costs. Toyota’s current FCHV-adv nationwide demonstration program is placing more than 100 vehicles with demonstration partners by 2013, providing one of the largest fleets of active fuel cell vehicles in the country. The primary goal of the demonstration program is to spur infrastructure development prior to fuel cell vehicle market introduction in 2015. Successful infrastructure development will require collaborative efforts between manufacturers, government regulators, and business, similar to the partnerships formed to open the Torrance Shell hydrogen demo station, Toyota says.
How much CO2 is released to the air for each gallon of gasoline equivalent hydrogen used from the pipeline?
??HG?? ..HG..
Posted by: Henry Gibson | 10 May 2011 at 05:16 PM
"As station owner/operator, Shell works directly with Air Products who provides onsite equipment and station maintenance."
WoooooHoooooo!!! We can keep being slaves to Big Oil FOREVER!!!! Keep pushing this guys, but as far as I'm concerned Shell and the rest of them can kiss my A$$.
When is everyone going to get that Big Oil is behind this and all the marketing BS that says this is good and ignores all the realities that don't work (price, lack of infrastructure, storage, transport, compression, the inefficiency of H2 compared to just using the bloody natural gas, etc, etc)???
All the EVs and PHEVs being announced, and shipping, by every major manufacturer and people getting 1000 mpg from their Volts in the real world.
H2 is a joke. Keep going folks.
I'm going electric.
Posted by: DaveD | 10 May 2011 at 05:20 PM
That area has refineries which produce hydrogen. This might have something to do with that Ballard contract for stationary PEMs. They are going to use this instead of reforming natural gas, but the refineries reform natural gas, so this is already done for them.
To answer HG's question...lots. They have been doing this for a long time and it is a way of using capacity they have. This does not make it all any better, but it is one explanation. If they used solar panels and hydrolysis people would be complaining that they should just put the power on the grid or charge cars with it.
Posted by: SJC | 10 May 2011 at 05:24 PM
@DaveD,
Big Oil should invest a lot more into H2 infrastructure and into renewable energy development. After all, it's Big Oil who have the most money and who have the most expertise in the energy business.
The beauty of H2, though, is that H2 can be produced also from waste biomass, wind, hydro, and sun energy, and H2 can be produced anywhere by anyone with the right equipment. No one will be able to have a monopoly on H2 supply, and thus energy security for any country. These renewable energy sources are available everywhere in the world.
For bigger vehicles, H2 is a good alternative to petroleum. Smaller vehicles probably should stick with battery electricity.
Posted by: Roger Pham | 10 May 2011 at 06:43 PM
Yes SJC solar power should definitely not be used for making hydrogen it is already too expensive. If solar electricity is available for the grid, less natural gas should be fed to the turbo-generators.
But if a solar panel is on the grid or is anywhere near natural gas service, it is a waste of public incentives and private money to build it. Co-generation with micro turbines operating on natural gas is a cheaper way to reduce carbon releases. This is even true of the engine cogenerators.
Never should a large building, with natural gas availability, be built without combined-power-heating- and-cooling equipment. With modern electronics, flywheels and batteries a connection to the grid is not necessary or even desirable.
OTAG has the interesting steam cogenerator the LION.
ORMAT should have made an organic Rankine small turbine hermetic cogenerator long ago.
Infinia has worked with partners for over a decade for a Stirling cogenerator, but tried to branch off to solar parabola collectors without cogeneration.
As far as most of the west US is concerned, the HONDA unit does not exist but there must be about 100,000 of them in Japan which have some idled for lack of grid power.
Linde has a hydrogen compressor that is simple and uses ionic salt liquids, but it does not reduce the cost of compressed hydrogen sufficiently to make it a valuable fuel.
There is a patented organism and process that takes hydrogen and CO or perhaps CO2 and ferments ethanol out of it. It is bio-ethanol only because it is made by organisms. CO and H20 can be made from hydrogen and CO2.
Somewhere along this pipe someone should build an ethanol production facility. They could use the CO2 produced by the making of wine or bio-ethanol from grain.
I might be in favor of getting rid of natural gas pipes and having hydrogen piped into the homes and factories, but it seems to cost more, even with a pipe, to force the same amount of energy to the user in the form of hydrogen. Any excess hydrogen is better used to make ethanol or methanol or methane natural gas with recycled CO2.
Hydrogen is far more explosive than natural gas.
The military has the good idea of a standard fuel, jet fuel for everything. Jet fuel can be used in many diesel engines, including the Centurion small aircraft diesel engine.
Toyota has to keep up face for forcing the CARB to abandon the ZEV standards in favor of fuel cells. They also have to keep up face for not having a plug in Prius. ..HG..
Posted by: Henry Gibson | 10 May 2011 at 06:43 PM
At least some one is considering a clean source of energy. Hydrogen fuel cell powered cars are not new but the cost of producing them commercially is more. The fuel cell technology is not new but the cost is the main concern.
rvs for sale
Posted by: Account Deleted | 08 August 2011 at 09:40 PM