Optimal Sizing and Scheduling of LOHC-Based Generation and Storage Plants for Concurrent Services to Transportation Sector and Ancillary Services Market

Hydrogen-powered vehicles have recently attracted significant attention from both the private sector and the governmental organizations as an alternative to the conventional fossil-fueled vehicles. In addition, the liquid organic hydrogen carrier (LOHC) technology now offers a promising solution for the reliable and safe storage of hydrogen. The proliferation of hydrogen-based vehicles depends heavily on the economic viability of the LOHC-based hydrogen generation and storage plants. This paper demonstrates how such plants should be sized and operated for joint applications, in order to enhance the system rate of return. To that end, a new model is proposed for optimal sizing and scheduling of the LOHC-based generation and storage plants for concurrent services to both the transportation sector and ancillary services market. The ancillary service signals are incorporated into the optimal scheduling model, in order to prepare the LOHC-based plant for the successful contribution to the market. The efficacy of the model is numerically evaluated using historical operating data, and the results are discussed. It is demonstrated that the proposed model can alleviate the gap between the present and the expected rate of return of the LOHC-based plants via joint scheduling for multiple services.