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Not too long ago I’ve been reviewing research associated to hydrogen trucking, because it’s one of many few locations the place severe transportation analysis organizations nonetheless maintain out hope for the vitality provider. I’ve checked out research from a number of international locations in Europe and North America again so far as 2010 now.

Most lately I’ve been a part of the peer-review group of a European examine doing one other whole price of possession simulation throughout hydrogen, battery electrical and electrical street techniques, biofuels and diesel because the baseline. One factor that leapt out at me was that assumptions of upkeep of hydrogen autos appeared too low, with the examine displaying it might barely be greater than battery electrical.

I used to be conscious of anecdotal proof of upper fleet upkeep prices and first ideas associated to excessive pressures, excessive temperature ranges, air purity necessities and the traits of hydrogen instructed it needs to be extra as nicely. So I regarded for extra information.

California fleet upkeep experiences confirmed that hydrogen gas cell buses throughout three transit organizations and a mixed eight years of operation had upkeep prices over 50% larger than diesel buses on common for a similar distances traveled. Whereas researching and writing that up, I briefly puzzled whether or not the complicated refueling stations had related upkeep challenges, however left that for an additional day. As we speak is seemingly that day.

After publication, a chemical engineer acquaintance informed me that upkeep prices had been often introduced in whole price of possession research as being 3% of capital expenditure per 12 months, however that quotes from refuelers he had obtained whereas contemplating a 350 atmospheric stress refueling resolution had been indicating that it needs to be 10% of capital expenditures as an alternative. Sadly, he wasn’t in a position to share them.

Certain sufficient, once I went to take a look at the Worldwide Council on Clear Transportation’s assumptions about hydrogen refueling stations, I discovered this:

We assume the annual fastened operational price of upkeep and labor to be 4% of the system capital price, much like earlier research (Brynolf et al., 2018; Matute et al., 2019).

Anecdotally it seems that that is one other thumb on the size that advantages hydrogen truck refueling whole prices of possession that’s systemic. However is it really true? Is there information that’s obtainable that the ICCT and others needs to be contemplating?

It took some time to trace down a supply, however but once more California and the US NREL got here by. I discovered a 2022 report, Subsequent Technology Hydrogen Station Evaluation, introduced as a part of the DOE Hydrogen Program at an Annual Benefit Assessment and Peer Analysis Assembly. It included six years of upkeep information on the gas cell pumps within the state. The information ended after Q2 of 2021, however that was adequate to see a rise submit COVID and naturally there was pre-COVID information.

The information coated 55 retail stations, principally for mild autos, pumping hydrogen at 700 atmospheres into Toyota Mirais, Hyundai Nexos and the like. Many have solely a single pump as a result of there’s no demand for extra. There have been additionally a few heavy automobile stations in there, however they weren’t cut up out individually, which is unlucky because the added complexity undoubtedly provides to the upkeep prices. 110 new stations that the state supposed to construct by no means materialized, and the present depend stays 55 a few years later.

Why added complexity? Properly, refueling pumps for mild autos are gradual, dishing out on common 0.93 kg of hydrogen per minute per the NREL report on precise charges, that means it takes about 5 minutes to replenish a Toyota Mirai from empty. That compares to fuel pumps which run at of 10 gallons per minute within the USA, with a gallon being the vitality equal of a kilogram of hydrogen. Gas cell vehicles are extra environment friendly than inside combustion vehicles, so it’s extra like ten gallons equal for a automobile in 5 minutes.

That is, in fact, utterly insufficient for heavy vehicles, which might require 50 to 100 kilograms or extra of hydrogen when refueling, resulting in refueling instances longer than charging instances for battery electrical vehicles, as much as 90 minutes. And it’s insufficient for mid-sized supply autos as nicely, as a result of these mild automobile stations are optimized to ship about 5 kilograms earlier than having to undergo a prolonged recompression cycle. That’s a part of the report from a examine on a mid-sized supply van’s trial within the UK, the place refueling took thrice as lengthy, about quarter-hour, simply to get 10 kilograms of hydrogen.

So a bunch of further tools of upper grade and higher price is added to heavy automobile refueling stations to make them considerably higher. Nonetheless not nice. NREL in a check atmosphere has managed to approximate diesel pump charges with pressurized hydrogen, however that’s a bespoke check facility and there’s no assure that it might be remotely financial or commercializable.

The charts on web page eight of the report make it clear that there’s a robust, moderately predictive, linear correlation between the quantity of hydrogen pumped and upkeep necessities, one thing that’s the identical as with fuel station research I checked out. Pump 4 instances as a lot hydrogen, do 4 instances as a lot upkeep.

However they don’t make it clear how a lot upkeep hydrogen refueling stations required. That wanted math with numbers introduced on completely different pages of the report.

The primary quantity was the kilograms of hydrogen pumped. I selected the primary half of 2021, six months of information after COVID, when pumped hydrogen tonnages had been the best within the historical past of this system, and 5 years of enhancements to hydrogen pumps and operational excellence applications had time to run their course.

Throughout the 55 stations, 540,000 kilograms of hydrogen had been distributed to the over 13,000 hydrogen autos in California. Sure, that US state has extra hydrogen autos on its roads than another nation on the earth, together with China. However that’s nonetheless solely 236 autos per station on common.

Some stations had been dishing out as a lot as 300 kilograms a day, which is to say, a tiny fraction of the variety of gallons of gasoline the typical pump delivers day by day. In fact, they took 10 instances longer to ship these kilograms, so the stations look busier than they’re.

55 stations and 540,000 kilograms within the final two quarters of information is just 54 kilograms per station per day on common. Assuming 3 kilograms — 60% — refueling per automobile, every station solely sees 18 autos a day. That signifies that they’re refueling each 13 days on common. That signifies that the typical gas cell automobile is being pushed about 15 miles a day, a great distance underneath the 37 miles per day common for the USA.

Over the identical interval, there have been 3,250 upkeep occasions recorded, between scheduled and unscheduled occasions, preventative upkeep and fixing issues that went improper. The report doesn’t have upkeep hours per occasion for that interval, however has the historic imply of 5 years of three.6 hours per occasion on one other web page.

Little or no math signifies that the 55 stations seem to have seen 11,700 hours of upkeep in six months, about 212 per station or about 1.2 hours a day. So far as I can inform, none of that is day by day inspection and bolt tightening, however scheduled and unscheduled upkeep occasions which take the pump out of service. 27% of upkeep occasions took an hour or much less to deal with, with the median being a fairly excessive 2.5 hours and plenty of occasions taking up a dozen hours and even 24 to repair.

Is that prime? It appeared so. I went to search for equal information for fuel stations. I discovered a 2013 examine, Evaluation and Scheduling of Upkeep Operations for a Chain of Fuel Stations, with information for 570 pumps in 40 stations. It discovered that medium failure stations had 0.002 failures per hour per dispenser. With a mean of 14 pumps per station, these weren’t low quantity dusty stations however very busy. I wasn’t in a position to decide if ‘hours’ was hours actively used or whole hours, however even an order of magnitude distinction wouldn’t be plenty of failures per hour.

The examine was centered on imply time between failures requiring upkeep and the advantages of preventative upkeep, so it didn’t have period of upkeep actions, however made it clear that with common preventative upkeep, a station with 14 pumps noticed a failure each 550 hours or so, or any given pump simply sitting there and dealing for a 3rd of the 12 months with out greater than inspection, wiping and tightening of bolts.

So what does it appear to be for California’s hydrogen refueling stations? Keep in mind, most of them have just one or two pumps on a fuel station’s lot.

Properly, given the 0.93 kilograms common movement price, these stations appeared to require 3.6 hours of upkeep for each 46 kilograms of hydrogen that they pumped.

Complete upkeep hours — as soon as once more derived from said imply period and the variety of occasions however not said explicitly within the NREL report — was 11,700 hours over the 55 stations over the primary six months of 2021. 

Complete time pumping hydrogen on the 0.93 movement price was 9,677 hours.

California’s hydrogen refueling stations spent 2,000 extra hours being fastened and maintained than they spent pumping hydrogen within the first half of 2021.

If I had written this report, this primary discovering would have been entrance and heart in large screaming letters. As an alternative, I needed to dig exhausting to seek out it. However what about prices?

On condition that we’re coping with 700 ambiance pressures, equal to being over 4 miles underneath the floor of the ocean, we aren’t speaking low cost technicians from Joe’s Fuel Station Upkeep.

On web page 14 of the report it pronounces, with out context, that the associated fee per upkeep was over $10,000 per station per quarter, or over $40,000 per 12 months. I dug into that additional and located their underlying information set which confirmed upkeep prices had been rising linearly with utilization, and utilization remained very low. The final 4 quarters of their information was displaying about $50,000 per station per 12 months.

For 2 quarters for the 55 stations then, the entire expenditure was $1,375,000. That places the hourly price of upkeep at $118. 

How low is the utilization in comparison with fuel stations? The common pump is designed to maneuver over 300,000 gallons a 12 months in regular utilization, about 900 gallons a day. The common fuel station within the report on fuel stations had 14 pumps, so over 10,000 gallons per day. The 300 kilograms per day for the largest hydrogen refueling station is a homeopathic quantity, with the very excessive capital prices, ranging between $1,200 and $3,000 per kilogram of hydrogen distributed per day per a 2020 DOE Hydrogen Program report, not being amortized throughout plenty of kilograms.

That report indicated that stations being acquired had been able to 770 kg/day to 1,620 kg/day when the busiest stations in all of California had been simply hitting 300 kg. To be clear, the present refueling stations had been able to delivering extra hydrogen, they simply weren’t being referred to as upon to take action as a result of there are so few hydrogen autos they usually had been being pushed so little.

Let’s make some price assumptions. The examine on hydrogen prices made it clear that prices had come down. Let’s assume that the present 55 stations had been on the very excessive finish of the vary, $3,000 per kilogram of hydrogen distributed. Let’s assumed that they had been sized for lots greater than they’re delivering, and clearly over 300 kilograms a day. Let’s assume the underside finish of the vary of 770 kg/day. That makes the capital prices of the typical station at $2.3 million, with 55 of them costing about $130 million.

The upkeep expense of 4% of capex means that they’d be spending about $5 million per 12 months, however they’re solely spending $1,375,000 a 12 months. Appears good.

However they’re solely pumping 54 kilograms per station per day and because the information reveals, upkeep rises linearly with kilograms delivered. Scaling the 54 kilograms averaging to 770 kilograms means that the precise upkeep price if the stations had been operating at deliberate capability could be $20 million per 12 months.

That’s 15% of capex, not 4% of capex. And it’s not 10% of capex which is seemingly what hydrogen refueling station gross sales individuals are promising. Clearly what they’re doing in bids is making ready consumers for the even worse actuality of hydrogen refueling.

Let’s take a short digression into Reference Class Forecasting. It’s the estimation technique that Professor Bent Flyvbjerg and his crew devised over the virtually 30 years they’ve spent gathering information on megaprojects.

Right here’s RCF in a nutshell. Get all the information you’ll be able to concerning the factor you are attempting to do. Discover the typical. Use that in your estimations. In case you are constructing a bridge, get the entire precise prices of bridges which have been constructed you will discover. Common it out. Begin with that. Alter upward or downward solely when you have a very robust cause to consider you might be particular.

When you’ve learn Flyvbjerg and co-author Dan Gardner’s e-book, How Huge Issues Get Carried out, which is on each greatest enterprise books of 2023 listing, usually on the prime, you’ve examine RCF and how you can apply it. And if you happen to haven’t learn Huge Issues, achieve this now.

What does this imply for trucking whole price of possession research? If they’re costing the stations, and they need to, they need to price the upkeep at 15% of capex, not 4% of capex.

If I had been reporting the DOE annual assembly and had been presenting the report I discovered, this might have been slightly below the two,000 hours extra upkeep than pumping discovering, in even greater letters.

Okay, what number of excuses can we make for this information to elucidate it away? That is in help of pre-loading the arguments.

#1: The expertise isn’t mature and issues will get higher! 

Hydrogen refueling stations have been being deployed globally for over 25 years, California has extra of them than another nation, and that is the final couple of quarters of six years of information, so there’s been time to ditch the lemons and optimize upkeep.

#2: Scaling up the precise upkeep prices isn’t honest!

The curve becoming on kilograms pumped vs upkeep occasions is linear from their very own information and supported by fuel station pumping upkeep research. I gave them the good thing about the doubt on prices and capability to get down to fifteen%. Preliminary numbers had been worse, so I’ve been triple checking and redoing them. Counsel a greater methodology and apply it to the information.

#3: This information is for mild automobile stations and heavier automobile stations shall be extra dependable!

No, the added complexity and necessities for high-speed hydrogen switch make it more durable to realize reliability, not much less. The chances are this 15% discovering is simply too low for vehicles. As a reminder the ten% anecdotal information was for 350 ambiance stress pumping techniques..

#4: It doesn’t matter as a result of we’ll be utilizing liquid hydrogen as an alternative!

No, storing and pumping hydrogen at 20° above absolute zero is rather more complicated than 700 ambiance stress fuel. The challenges with thermal and stress administration are multiplied, as are the hazards. Liquid hydrogen is so exhausting to make use of that the house trade is transferring to methane and away from liquid hydrogen.

#5: They’re simply falling aside as a result of nobody is utilizing them, and shall be higher with extra use!

That doesn’t actually make some extent a hydrogen advocate actually needs to make, and see level #2.

#6: The information is dangerous, simply cooked up by the writer!

The information is all from NREL hydrogen program experiences about precise findings in precise fuel stations.

#7: I noticed an immaterial error, so am giving myself permission to invalidate the complete evaluation!

Don’t be that particular person.

#8: I don’t just like the outcomes!

In that case, you actually need to take a seat with this different article of mine — Seeing Local weather Options Clearly By means of Biases & Lacking Information Is Difficult — for some time and mirror in your life decisions.

So, to sum up, hydrogen refueling stations within the largest public information set, masking 55 stations over six years with tens of millions of kilograms of hydrogen having been delivered, present that hydrogen stations are out of service 20% extra time than they’re pumping hydrogen and that annual upkeep prices are 15% of capex, not 4%.

Do I anticipate the ICCT, Daimler, hydrogen refueling distributors and the US DOE to now begin utilizing 15%? No, I anticipate them to recreate the examine I’ve simply accomplished utilizing California’s information and extra actual information on capital expenditures, and provide you with a quantity that’s rather more practical than 4%. Personally, I’m comfy with 15% and shall be utilizing it and recommending to teams I interact with that they use it.