Linde Opens Hydrogen Fueling Station for Fuel Cell Passenger Ships

29 August 2008

The Linde Group has opened a hydrogen filling station for fuel cell passenger ships in Hamburg to support the Zemship project. (Earlier post.)

The Zemship filling station is located in the Hamburg city park. The first passenger ship to be operated via a hydrogen fuel cell will convey up to 100 passengers on both the Alster as well as the Elbe rivers. For fuelling, liquid hydrogen stored at a temperature of -253° C is converted into hydrogen gas in an evaporator and then compressed up to 450 bar via a two-stage compressor system. The complete fuelling station was designed and built by Linde.

Linde is the leading international equipment supplier for hydrogen fuelling stations. By the end of last year, Linde had performed 120,000 hydrogen fill-ups by the end of last year, including passenger cars with an average 300 fill-ups per week as well as trucks, buses and forklifts.

To demonstrate that hydrogen is suited as a fuel for ships, the Hamburg Office of Urban Planning and Environmental Affairs brought together Germanische Lloyd AG, Proton Motor, Hamburger Hochbahn AG, The Linde Group, Alster-Touristik GmbH, Hochschule für Angewandte Wissenschaften Hamburg, hySolutions GmbH and The UJV Nuclear Research Institute rez plc for the Zemship project. Zemship is a EU-sponsored project.