Design and Prototyping of an Ionic Liquid Piston Compressor As a New Generation of Compressors for Hydrogen Refueling Stations
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Design and prototyping of an ionic liquid piston compressor as a new generation of compressors for hydrogen refueling stations PhD Thesis Nasrin Arjomand Kermani DCAMM Special Report No. S229 May 2017 Design and prototyping of an ionic liquid piston compressor as a new generation of compressors for hydrogen refueling stations Nasrin Arjomand Kermani PhD Thesis Department of Mechanical Engineering Technical University of Denmark Kongens Lyngby 2017 Preface The present thesis is submitted as a partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Philosophiae Doctor (Ph.D.) at the Technical University of Denmark (DTU). The thesis was completed at the Section of Thermal Energy, Department of Mechanical Engineering. The work was carried out from 1st of December 2012 to 31st of May 2017 (including 1 year maternity leave and 5 month research assistant) under the supervision of Associate Professor Masoud Rokni, and the co-supervision of Associate Professor Brian Elmegarrd. The Ph.D. study was funded by the Technical University of Denmark and Innovation Fund Denmark through the Hyfill-Fast International Research Project in collaboration with H2Logic as the industrial partner. The thesis is written in the form of a monograph and includes all the relevant publications produced in the time frame of the present research study. Copenhagen, May 31st, 2017 Nasrin Arjomand Kermani i Acknowledgment I would like to take this opportunity to express my sincere gratitude to my supervisor Associate Professor Masoud Rokni for all his support, encouragement and guidance during my PhD studies. I would also like to thank Associate Professor Irina Petrushina for all her support and guidance in my PhD project. I am also very grateful to my co-supervisor Associate professor Brian Elmegaard for his guidance, discussions and the inspiring and friendly working environment he has created in our section. I am especially grateful for the wonderful collaboration and discussions with all the members of the Hyfill-Fast International Research Project, including Associate professor Jens Oluf Jensen from DTU, Associate professor Torben René Jensen from Arhus University, Dr. Martin Dornheim from HelmHoltz Zentrum, and Michael Sloth from H2Logic. My stay in HelmHoltz Zentrum would not have been possible without the support of Dr. Martin Dornheim who has accepted me in his group and Dr. Anna-Lisa Chaudhary whose help was fundamental to the success of our collaboration. The support and encouragement of my colleagues at Thermal Energy Section has been vital, and I would like to extend my deepest gratitude to all of them. Many thanks go to Arne Jørgensen Egelund for his valuable comments and assistance in translation of the thesis abstract. I owe heartfelt appreciation to the section secretary, Mette Rasmussen, for her love and efforts on creating and inspiring positive atmosphere in our section. Especial thanks goes to my colleagues and friends in Denmark and abroad: Dr. Anna-Lisa Chaudhary, Dr. Aleksey Nikiforov, Dr. Karsten Agersted, Dr. Lars Nilausen Cleemann and Associate professor Anders Ivarsson for their contribution to my PhD project and all their help in the experimental parts of my project, and Larisa Seerup, Claus Burke Mortensen, and Steen Blichfeldt for the excellent technical assistance. I also wish to acknowledge Mr. Ingolf Christian Hviid Jönsson from Fritz Schur Teknik A/S and Dr. Joe Lambert from Parr Instrument Company for all the fruitful discussions and their valuable advices. Their help has been of great value. Last but not least, I am enormously grateful to my husband, Abbas, without whose love, encouragement, and understanding, I could not have finished my PhD studies. I would like to thank my parents and lovely sisters for the help and support they have provided me throughout my entire life and finally, my little lovely son, Daniel, for all his beautiful smiles and patience, while counting the last days of mom’s PhD studies. Nasrin Arjomand Kermani, May 2017 ii Abstract The thesis presents design, modeling, and fabrication of a new compressor technology that involves an ionic liquid piston as a replacement for the solid piston in the conventional reciprocating compressors to compress hydrogen in hydrogen refueling stations. The motivation comes from the need to achieve more flexible and efficient compressors with longer life spans in hydrogen stations. This can eventually lead to a lower hydrogen delivery cost and faster penetration of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles into the market. A thermodynamic model simulating a single-compression stroke is developed to investigate the heat transfer phenomena inside the compression chamber; the system performance is evaluated, followed by the design process. The model is developed based on the mass and energy balance of the hydrogen, and liquid bounded by the wall of the compression chamber. Therefore, at each time step and positional node, the model estimates the pressure and temperature of the hydrogen and liquid, the temperature of the compression chamber wall, and the amount of heat extracted from the hydrogen directly at the interface between the hydrogen and liquid, and through the wall. The results indicate that depending on the heat transfer correlation, the hydrogen temperature reduces slightly between 0.2 and 0.4% compared to the adiabatic case, at 500 bar. The main reasons for the small temperature reduction are the large wall resistance and the small contact area at the interface. Moreover, the results of the sensitivity analysis illustrate that increasing the total heat transfer coefficients at the interface and the wall, as well as compression time, play key roles in reducing the hydrogen temperature. Further optimization and increasing the total heat transfer coefficient at the interface (10000 times) or at the wall (200 times), leads to 22 % or 33% reduction of the hydrogen temperature, compared to the adiabatic case, at 500 bar, during 3.5 seconds compression, respectively. A suitable ionic liquid is selected as the most reliable replacement for the solid piston in the conventional reciprocating compressors. Ionic liquids are room temperature salts which have very low vapor pressures. The ability to tune the physiochemical properties of ionic liquids by varying the cation-anion combinations is the feature of these liquids that make them as promising candidates to replace the solid piston. However, due to a large number of available combinations for ionic liquids, it is essential to systematically investigate their performance for a particular application and narrow down the final choice. In this regard, certain criteria are determined for our specific application. The roles of the most commonly used cations and anions, as well as the effect of temperature are comprehensively reviewed to identify the most suitable ionic liquids that can fulfill our requirements. Hence, the options are narrowed down to five ionic liquids with triflate and bis(trifluoromethylsulfonyl)imide as the anion choices and three different cation types of imidazolium-, phosphonium-, and ammonium-based as the cation choices. Finally the ionic liquid: 1- ethyl-3-methylimidazolium bis(trifluoromethylsulfonyl)imide is recommended as the best candidate that can be safely used as a replacement for the solid piston in the conventional reciprocating compressors for compressing hydrogen in the hydrogen refueling stations. In addition, the corrosion behavior of various commercially available stainless steels and nickel- based alloys as possible construction materials for the components which are in direct contact with the selected ionic liquids is evaluated. The results show a very high corrosion resistance and high iii stability for all of the alloys tested in any of the five selected ionic liquids. The stainless steel alloy, AISI 316L, with a high corrosion resistance and the lowest cost is selected as a material for all the components in direct contact with the ionic liquid, in the designed ionic liquid hydrogen compressor. The new compressor consists of three main parts, namely pneumatic, hydraulic, and custom-designed hydraulic to pneumatic transformer, which work together to compress hydrogen. The proposed design addresses the limitations of the current technology and previously designed compressors using the liquid piston concept and ionic liquid, by introducing a custom-designed hydraulic to pneumatic transformer. As proof of concept, a prototype for compression of hydrogen from 100 to 300 bar is built, and a detailed procedure of the design, fabrication, and control of the prototype is described in the presented work. The new compressor design has high potential to be used as an alternative to the conventional reciprocating compressors in hydrogen refueling stations, as it provides a simpler design with lower manufacturing costs, higher efficiency, much less sliding friction, possibility of internal cooling, higher functional reliability and less maintenance. iv Dansk resumé Denne afhandling præsenterer konstruktion, modellering og fremstilling af en ny kompressor, som til kompression af brint i brintladestationer benytter ionvæskestempel i stedet for en traditionel frem- og tilbagegående kompressor med fast stempel. Motivationen for denne udvikling er behovet for en mere fleksibel og effektiv kompressor med længere levetid. Dette kan til slut føre til billigere brintproduktion og dermed til hurtigere udbredelse af brændselscellekøretøjer på markedet. En termodynamisk model der simulerer et enkelt kompressionsslag,