3 ms·

Uh, doesn't hydrogen have a history of leaking through most materials due to its small atomic size?

• lostapathy 8y ago
  At which point it disperses very easily as it floats up. The key is just to keep it separate from pure oxygen, not keep it contained
• simonh 8y ago
  Yes, but if you’re only storing it <24h to smooth out your daily power generation curve that shouldn’t be too much of a problem. It’s only really an issue if you’re storing it for weeks or more.
  • taneq 8y ago
    You're always storing some hydrogen even if the actual atoms are swapped out.
    • simonh 8y ago
      Of course, but for short term storage the percentage loss should be small relative to other losses in the system. Lets say on each storage and recovery cycle over 24h I'm losing 10% of the stored energy from various losses each cycle, including 1% of the stored energy from Hydrogen loss. No big deal. Even though I'm losing 1% to hydrogen loss every 24h cycle, it's small relative to other losses per cycle. After many cycles it would still be a small fraction of overall losses. Conversely if my cycle time is 10 days for one storage and recovery cycle, at 1% hydrogen loss per 24h all of a sudden I'm now losing more from Hydrogen loss than all other losses combined. That's really bad.
• TeMPOraL 8y ago
  Moreover, reading this made me wonder about hydrogen embrittlement. Does this risk apply in this case?