Despite having been around for some time now, hydrogen is still relatively unknown by many as a fuel choice in the UK.
However, sales of new electrolysers from ITM Power have doubled over the past year and a new partnership with Shell will bring hydrogen next to petrol pumps on forecourts by the end of 2017.
The partnership between ITM Power and Shell was announced in September 2015, and the first site to include a hydrogen refuelling station was at Cobham, which opened in February this year.
Two more stations are set to open by the end of 2017, one in Beaconsfield and the other at Gatwick Airport. The Cobham station was the first time that hydrogen was available on a forecourt in the UK and the Beaconsfield site, due to open shortly, will be the first time that a hydrogen dispenser will be under the canopy next to other refuelling pumps.
Simon Bourne, Chief Technology Officer at ITM Power plc (LON:ITM), told BusinessCar, “One of the transformational things has been the partnership with Shell, and there’s been a lot of work done to deal with the compliance issues of putting hydrogen on the forecourt to make it look and feel as similar to normal fuels as possible.
“Today, the hydrogen we are making through electrolysis at Cobham is the lowest-cost hydrogen you can buy for fuel. These assets are pretty underused at the moment; you can easily get cost-comparative with diesel today and we would expect that to get better as uptake continues.”