The energy transition is advancing rapidly, and the Dutch electricity grid is changing with it. Increasing shares of variable renewable energy sources create mismatches between electricity supply and demand. These mismatches create a need for large-scale energy storage. Existing large-scale energy storage technologies are pumped hydro energy storage and compressed air energy storage, but their storage potential in the Netherlands is limited. The alternative is to store energy in chemical bonds, for example by producing hydrogen, and regenerate the electricity later. This type of storage is called a Power-to-X-to-Power (PtXtP) system. Power-to-X technologies have existed for a long time. This
report evaluates their potential in an energy storage application. First, PtXtP systems are compared to compressed air energy storage (CAES) and pumped hydro energy storage (PHES). The geographic potential of CAES and PHES in the Netherlands is limited for both technologies, proving large scale energy storage is a challenge to which PtXtP. Next, all PtXtP technologies are investigated and compared based on available literature. The three technologies with the most potential (hydrogen, ammonia and methane) are further investigated. This report gives a current and comprehensive overview of data on PtXtP system components, including amongst others their OPEX, CAPEX, efficiency and energy use. This data was used as input for several models of hydrogen, methane and ammonia storage systems, to determine system cost and performance in a dynamic system. Simulations are run with these PtXtP systems as energy storage technologies for a 1GW wind park. The simulations are used to identify main system bottlenecks, investigate the impact of intermittent use on system performance, and evaluate the potential of a PtXtP storage system. The first important bottleneck is the size of the hydrogen buffer required for operation of the Haber-Bosch reactor and Sabatier reactor. It is as large as or larger than the storage capacity in a hydrogen storage system. The second bottleneck is the size of ammonia and hydrogen fuel cells. The required fuel cell power is 425 MW, which is larger than any current or expected fuel cells. Next the simulations were used to investigate the performance of a PtXtP system as energy storage medium in a VRES system. The first important finding is the tradeoff between system flexibility and system sizing. An ammonia system with 33%-100% flexibility can be 60% smaller than a 0%-100% system, while still processing the same annual amount of hydrogen. Intermittent system use increases the levelized cost of storage significantly, in these models by factor 2.2-4, due to the unchanged CAPEX which must be paid for a reduced system output. The first important finding related to the PtXtP system is that the cost and energy consumption of hydrogen transport and storage are relatively small compared to energy conversion steps. The electrolyser proved to be the system component with the highest cost and energy loss. Finally, the added value of the storage system is significant wind park size reduction. The 1GW wind park size could be reduced by 35% when connected to a hydrogen storage system, while still meeting the same demand. In addition, zero grid exchange can only be achieved when implementing a storage system. With lower shares of grid exchange, storage becomes increasingly more valuable. The overall conclusion drawn is that hydrogen or methane systems seem to have the most potential for energy storage purposes. The report also shows energy storage is necessary, and no alternatives to PtXtP are available in the Netherlands. PtXtP will therefore have to play a large role in the future Dutch electricity grid. However, use of PtXtP storage will increase the price of electricity and several technological developments, mostly scale-ups, are necessary before a PtXtP
system is feasible.

Over the past years, the scientific community has payed increasing attention to the integration of Eco-design in product development processes. In spite of this, Eco-design practices within mainstream manufacturing companies has proven to be scarce. A great share of the literature has focused on the development and improvement of Eco-design tools from a theoretical perspective. A more practical perspective, including companies’ point of view, allow us to identify bottlenecks or improvement potential only visible for practitioners, such as the compatibility of tools with companies’ current procedures, time and data constraints, or guidance provided by output mechanisms. This thesis reviews a set of Eco-design tools adopted or developed by three automotive companies (BMW AG, VW AG and AB Volvo) with decades of experience in Eco-design. The extensive literature review aims at combining and integrating the observed best practices into a model that offers guidance on how to incorporate Eco-design into product development processes of less experienced companies. The model presents an iterative process comprised of three phases: impact assessment, definition of action, and management and control. The impact assessment phase consists of the analysis of hotspots and the comparison of design alternatives. The results from the impact assessment then lead to the definition of improvement actions. Actions that are agreed through team dialogues among different departments of the company which are selected according to a prioritization process to find the right balance between aspects, such as costs, product functionality, customer preference, current and future policy compliance or corporative image. Once impact results are translated into technical targets, the management and control phase ensures that employees are designated to supervise the implementation of actions, report possible rebound effects and inform about the findings that become the knowledge foundation of future projects. The automotive experience also reveals that LCA represents the cornerstone of the three companies in the integration of Eco-design practices, but it is noteworthy that LCA approaches are recognized to be dependent on other indispensable tools. From the observed experience, the LCA studies are conducted in a form that are too dependent on the product system of preceding versions of the product, which often limits radical innovation and rather results in small incremental improvement. In combination with LCA, systematic team dialogues between different knowledge fields shall contribute to the creation of collective knowledge. An appropriate arena that allows experts to reflect on impact results and explore innovative improvement opportunities, out of the scope of LCA practitioners.

As the transition to a low-carbon economy is imminent in the view of global warming and climate change, there comes a need to identify energy carriers that can completely or partially replace fossil fuels that are used today. Green hydrogen in this respect has been proposed and researched into as a possible replacement for currently used fossil fuels. Despite hydrogen being a relatively cleaner source of energy and a good energy storage medium, the transportation and storage of hydrogen acts as a barrier for the large-scale implementation of a hydrogen economy. The low density of hydrogen requires it to be compressed to high pressures or liquefied to transport and store it while the explosive nature makes it difficult to handle hydrogen. These drawbacks open up opportunities for other hydrogen energy carriers to be considered instead of hydrogen. The aim of this thesis is to identify bottlenecks in the supply chain of hydrogen and hydrogen energy carriers which include production, storage, transportation, imports and reforming of the energy carriers. The hydrogen energy carriers that have been shortlisted other than hydrogen include ammonia, methanol, dimethyl ether and synthetic methane while the transport modes considered include road transport, maritime shipping and pipeline transport. The Netherlands is chosen as a case study taking into account the demand for hydrogen across the six industrial clusters for the year 2050. The demand for hydrogen includes hydrogen for energy and for feedstock which resulted in a total demand of 444 PJ for the year 2050. Hydrogen production which also serves as a starting point for the production of the other energy carriers, is based on the predicted 15 GW surplus offshore wind energy available in the Netherlands from the North Sea wind farms by the year 2050. Considering the supply and demand, the supply chain of each energy carrier within the three transport modes are modelled resulting in the estimation of the energy efficiency and the system costs. Further, region specific costs are estimated to identify what factors affect the costs of delivering the energy carriers to the different regions in the Netherlands. The results indicate that pipeline transport was the most economical transport mode followed closely by liquid road transport. Compressed road transport was not as attractive, as the high transport pressures resulted in high loading and unloading costs and lower system efficiencies. Hydrogen pipelines was the most economical energy carrier and transport mode followed by liquid hydrogen road transport and ammonia pipeline. Transporting synthetic methane was the most expensive energy carrier across all transport modes while methanol and DME had very similar system costs. The production and import costs were the two main factors determining the system costs while transport costs had an vital impact only in the case of compressed road transport. Storage and reforming costs of the energy carrier were almost negligible in most cases. The Capex and the efficiency of the hydrogen electrolyser played a major role in determining the production costs of all the energy carriers. Ammonia reforming was identified as a bottleneck pushing the system costs of transporting ammonia higher than the system costs of transporting hydrogen. Liquefaction of hydrogen and synthetic methane resulted in higher import costs for these energy carriers and higher transport costs when transported as a liquid by road, in comparison to the other three energy carriers. Estimating region specific costs for hydrogen pipeline transport resulted in a variation in the costs of hydrogen delivered to the different regions in the Netherlands. The allocation of cheaper imports and relatively expensive domestic production across the six industrial clusters in the Netherlands was a major factor in determining the costs of the energy carrier delivered to the industrial clusters.