Sustainable Development of Alternative Fuels Infrastructure: Fuel Cells, Hydrogen Production, Conversion and Storage

Dear Colleagues,

Currently, climate neutrality is one of the challenges facing humanity. Reducing the emissivity of economies can be achieved through the sustainable development of alternative fuels infrastructure, which covers the areas of land, road, water transport, and aviation as well as the broadly understood energy and agriculture sectors.

Alternative fuel infrastructure includes fuel processing methods, energy conversion, devices, automation and control systems for the proper implementation of fuel and energy supply processes, and fuel and energy storage systems, including logistics.

It is hard to imagine a modern society that does not use efficient, useful, and low- or zero-carbon alternative fuels infrastructure, moving away from the use of fossil fuels.

The use of alternative fuels and fuel cells is steadily increasing, especially in renewable energy conversion systems, fuel cell electric vehicles, aviation, unmanned propulsion systems, and special and military vehicles.

Particularly noteworthy are the methods, devices and systems that enable the processing of hydrogen, which is considered to be the main fuel of hydrogen economies.

Efficient production, processing, and storage of hydrogen is extremely important, especially in the propulsion systems of hydrogen vehicles, where the efficiency of energy management, processing, and conversion is essential.

Intensive development is also observed, especially in stationary installations such as power-to-X (PtX), which use renewable energy from renewable sources to produce hydrogen and synthetic e-fuels.

The development of PtX technology contributes to the search for new materials for electrolyser components (e.g., PEM, SOEC, etc.) and fuel cells (e.g., PEMFC, MCFC, SOFC, etc.), which will enable the obtaining of higher power and energy densities and longer service lives.

An indispensable stage in the production of alternative fuels, and hydrogen in particular, is effective and cheap storage using modern and durable tanks. There is a tendency to reduce the production costs of hydrogen tanks and increase the effective storage parameters, e.g., operating pressure.

The use and implementation of modern PtX solutions require the use of appropriate methods for modelling and testing control algorithms, monitoring, and diagnostic systems, as well as predicting the values of selected parameters.

An inseparable element in the pursuit of a circular economy with the sustainable development of alternative fuels infrastructure is the use of appropriate indicators for life cycle assessment (LCA) for a given component and the entire technology, such as estimation of  levelized cost of storage (LCOS) or levelized cost of electricity (LCOE).

This Special Issue aims to present and disseminate the most recent advances related to the theory, design, modelling and control, energy conversion and management, condition monitoring, and environmental impact of all alternative fuel infrastructure components.

Topics of interest for publication include, but are not limited to:

• All aspects of sustainable development of alternative fuels infrastructure and its elements: fuel cells, electrolysers, PtX technology, logistics and transport of alternative fuels, and a review of technical and economic issues regarding alternative fuels;
• Energy conversion, modelling and control of fuel cell systems in automotive (i.e., Toyota Mirai drivetrain) and stationary applications (distributed generation);
• Experimental research and advanced methods of modelling the drive system of alternative fuel vehicles (i.e., synthetic e-fuels, hydrogen, alcohols and their mixtures, etc.);
• Novel materials and their applications in alternative fuels infrastructure components (i.e., hydrogen tanks, fuel cell components);
• Hydrogen production methods (i.e., PtG) and hydrogen capture from water vapor;
• Alternative fuels from RES applications in sector coupling (power to heat PtH, power to mobility PtM, power to gas PtG, power to ammonia PtA, etc.);
• Implementations of and research on distributed generation devices powered by alternative fuels (fuel cells, Stirling engines, microturbines, etc.);
• Online and offline condition monitoring techniques in alternative fuel infrastructure systems;
• Cybersecurity of critical alternative fuels infrastructure (preventing cyber-attacks directed from outside);
• Applications of electrochemical batteries (i.e., redox flow batteries, lithium-ion, lithium–sulfur batteries, etc.) in alternative fuels infrastructure,
• Evaluation of the impact of alternative fuels infrastructure development on the environment (i.e., LCA analysis, recycling, etc.);
• Spatial development with sustainable implementation of alternative fuels infrastructure (i.e., Trans-European Transport Networks, road routes, etc.).

Dr. Adrian Chmielewski
Dr. Lukasz Szablowski
Dr. Piotr Piórkowski
Dr. Jakub Możaryn
Prof. Dr. Ramon Costa-Castelló
Guest Editors

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• alternative fuels infrastructure
• energy conversion, modelling and control
• fuel cells
• hydrogen production methods
• hydrogen conversion and storage
• synthetic e-fuels
• alcohols (methanol, ethanol, butanol, etc.) and their mixtures
• power-to-X (PtX)
• power-to-gas (PtG)
• power-to-mobility (PtM)
• power-to-heat (PtH)
• power-to-ammonia (PtA)
• sector coupling
• transportation
• life cycle assessment (LCA)
• levelized cost of storage (LCOS)
• levelized cost of electricity (LCOE)
• distributed generation
• Trans-European Transport Networks
• condition monitoring
• spatial development and zoning