Products
Heat exchanger for hydrogen station
Heat exchanger for hydrogen station
Fuel cell vehicles (FCVs) run on hydrogen and emit only water, making them an environmentally friendly mode of transportation. To achieve a driving range comparable to conventional gasoline vehicles, approximately 5 kg of hydrogen is required. Because hydrogen is gaseous at room temperature, it must be compressed under high pressure and stored in on-board tanks.
At hydrogen stations, hydrogen is compressed using a compressor. Since compression raises the temperature of hydrogen, an “aftercooler”—a type of heat exchanger—is used to cool the hot, compressed hydrogen. To fully fill the limited space of the vehicle’s tank, hydrogen is typically compressed and stored at pressures up to 82 MPa.
When hydrogen is rapidly filled, its temperature rises due to adiabatic heating. In order to ensure the safety of the hydrogen storage tank, the hydrogen must be cooled to approximately -40°C before filling. The heat exchanger that performs this cooling is called a “precooler.”
WELCON manufactures and sells heat exchangers for hydrogen stations under the brand names “WEL-Cool® H2A/H2C” (precoolers) and “aftercoolers.”