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• Techno-economic analyses show competitiveness of battery and fuel cell cars. • Long-term invest similar for many concepts, including plug-ins and range extenders. • Total cost of ownership of battery and fuel cell cars is below conventional ones. • Break-even of battery cars is already possible in the second half of this decade. • Cost increase for conventional cars is primarily caused by rising fuel costs. For passenger cars, various powertrains compete in terms of reducing environmentally-harmful emissions, smooth integration into future energy systems and economic performance. Developing a sound long-term projection of the total cost of ownership (TCO), however, remains challenging. Highlights of our present assessment, include a detailed, component-based manufacturing and operating cost analysis, as well as simulation-based component scaling and fuel consumption analysis. We apply this methodology to eight passenger car concepts based on batteries, fuel cells and combustion engines, spanning four passenger car segments and five different market development scenarios through 2050. With respect to the TCO, our analysis reveals that fully-electric powertrains utilizing batteries (BEVs) and fuel cells (FCEVs) offer the lowest-cost solutions. FCEVs exhibit small but robust benefits compared to BEVs. BEVs will undergo the earliest break-even point with internal combustion engine vehicles (ICEVs), already before 2030. Different market development scenarios would not significantly affect the long-term results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highly efficient energy conversion systems with fuel cells for vehicles and stationary applications are currently being discussed all over the world as a technology which will be able to reduce primary energy demand and emissions of limited and climate-relevant pollutants. The high flexibility of fuel-cell systems with respect to energy carriers opens up possibilities of modifying the energy market in the long term. New environmental legislation, above all in the USA, stipulating the introduction of emission-free cars from 2003, has led in the transport sector to an intensified search for alternatives to conventional drive concepts. In stationary applications, numerous demonstration plants and some field tests already implemented reflect the developmental stage of fuel-cell systems. In Germany, a new combined heat and power (CHP) plant modernisation law has been enacted. This act is of special significance for the market launch of fuel cells.A major milestone on the road to market success for all the above-mentioned systems—in order to compete with conventional technologies—is the reduction of costs. In this contribution systems analyses for mobile and stationary applications of fuel-cell systems are presented as well as economic analyses for different fuel-cell systems for stationary applications. In particular, CHP generation based on natural gas as the energy carrier is performed. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Renewably produced hydrogen offers a solution for mobility via fuel cell electric vehicles without emissions during driving. However, the hydrogen supply chain, from hydrogen production to the fueling station – incorporating seasonal storage and transport – varies in economic and environmental aspects depending on the technology used, as well as individual conditions, such as the distance between production and demand. Previous studies have focused on the economic aspects of varying technologies and elaborated application areas of each technology, while environmental issues were not specifically considered. To address this shortcoming, this paper presents a life cycle assessment of three supply chain architectures: (a) Liquid Organic Hydrogen Carriers (LOHCs hereinafter) for transport and storage; as well as (b) compressed hydrogen storage in salt caverns, together with pipelines; and (c) pressurized gas truck transport. The results of this study show that the pipeline solution has the least environmental impact with respect to most of the impact categories for all analyzed cases. Only for short distances, i.e., 100 km, is truck transport better in a few impact categories. When considering truck transport scenarios, LOHCs have higher environmental impacts than pressurized gas in seven out of 14 impact categories. Nevertheless, for longer distances, the difference is decreasing. The seasonal storage of hydrogen has almost no environmental influence, independent of the impact category, transport distance or hydrogen demand. In particular, strong scaling effects underlie the good performance of pipeline networks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The substantial expansion of renewable energy sources is creating the foundation to successfully transform the German energy sector (the so-called ' Energiewende'). A by-product of this development is the corresponding capacity demand for the transportation, distribution and storage of energy. Hydrogen produced by electrolysis offers a promising solution to these challenges, although the willingness to invest in hydrogen technologies requires the identification of competitive and climate-friendly pathways in the long run. Therefore, this paper employs a pathway analysis to investigate the use of renewable hydrogen in the German passenger car transportation sector in terms of varying market penetration scenarios for fuel cell-electric vehicles (FCEVs). The investigation focuses on how an H 2 infrastructure can be designed on a national scale with various supply chain networks to establish robust pathways and important technologies, which has not yet been done. Therefore, the study includes all related aspects, from hydrogen production to fueling stations, for a given FCEV market penetration scenario, as well as the CO 2 reduction potential that can be achieved for the transport sector. A total of four scenarios are considered, estimating an FCEV market share of 1–75% by the year 2050. This corresponds to an annual production of 0.02–2.88 million tons of hydrogen. The findings show that the most cost-efficient H 2 supply (well-to-tank: 6.7–7.5 €/kg H2) can be achieved in high demand scenarios (FCEV market shares of 30% and 75%) through a combination of cavern storage and pipeline transport. For low-demand scenarios, however, technology pathways involving LH 2 and LOHC truck transport represent the most cost-efficient options (well-to-tank: 8.2–11.4 €/kg H2). • Pathway analysis to investigate the hydrogen use in fuel cell electric vehicles. • Hydrogen infrastructure design for production and distribution at lowest cost. • Systems investigation for a fuel cell electric vehicle market by the year 2050. • Cost-efficient high-demand hydrogen supply with gas caverns and pipelines. • Cost-efficient low-demand hydrogen supply with truck transport. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]