Compression specialist, the Girodin-Sauer company reminds us of the role, but also the economic aspects and technical performances of this essential element in the hydrogen production process. A look back at its range of dry or lubricated piston compressors!
French subsidiary of Sauer Group, specialist in gas compression, the Girodin-Sauer company is present on markets of military origin and shippingbut also in industry with two wide ranges of compressors including models adapted to storage throughout the hydrogen sector. Sauer’s original range consists of lubricated piston compressors ranging from 10 to 1000 m3 for a pressure of 10 to 350 bars.
Added to this is the Haug range of dry compressors, which goes from 1 to 60 m3 for a pressure of 30 to 450 bars.
Oil-free compressors can be useful in particular for the use of hydrogen in fuel cells, sensitive to particles, although filters can be installed with lubricated compressors. “We can meet the requirements of hydrogen fuel standards,” says Fabien Farsy, sales engineer at Girodin. Our piston compressors from 300 to 800 m3/h for example remain overall 30% cheaper than diaphragm compressors in Capex, with a slightly lower Opex cost at 10 years.
The need to compress hydrogen to optimize storage is present in almost all hydrogen utilities. With pressures ranging from 1 to 30 bars at the outlet of a PEM or alkaline electrolyser, it is necessary to go up to 200 bars, and up to 700 bars in industry and mobility.
Remember that 1 kg of hydrogen occupies a volume of approximately 11 m3 at atmospheric pressure. At 10 bars, 10 kg therefore occupy 1 m³. However, a car must be able to store 4 to 5 kg, a bus 25 kg and a truck 35 kg. Storage also allows you to refill quickly. We ultimately place ourselves between production and uses, knowing that if an electrolyser consumes 1 MW of electricity to produce 200 m³ of hydrogen per hour, our compressors, which have average efficiency, only consume 90 to 130 kW to compress these 200 m3. »
A la carte service
A particular feature of Girodin-Sauer is the development of an “Engineering service which allows us to offer our customers an à la carte service,” explains Fabien Farsy. Our team offers, in addition to compressors, skids or containers, storage, specific instrumentation, with plug and play solutions, all tested by us. A turnkey solution enabled by our wide range, but also our assembly and assembly workshop as well as our testing room. We are studying the optimum way to integrate the compression brick into our customers’ processes. We can also support them as a “compression” partner in the assembly of a station for example.”
“In addition, all our compressors are Atex certified. This is also the case for our specific solutions such as container assemblies where all elements and design are selected for maximum safety. Our objective, with our solutions manufactured and tested in France, is that our customers can really take ownership of their project and be active from the start of the project until commissioning. »
“With our experience in shipping and Navy, with resistant marine products, we guarantee the availability of spare parts for 35 years. We also guarantee management of spare parts over this period. This service is an undeniable asset in industry as well. »
Another configuration, in the Lhyfe green hydrogen production project, in Nantes. On the French Atlantic coast, hydrogen is produced in an electrolysis process using electricity from wind power. The hydrogen is then compressed using a piston compressor, stored and made available as fuel at hydrogen filling stations. The compressor compresses the hydrogen in five stages, from a slight gas overpressure of 0.05 bar(g) to 350 bar(g). To do this, a lubricated piston compressor with downstream gas filtration is used, which guarantees a residual oil content of less than 0.01 mg/m3 of hydrogen. The hydrogen production capacity of the first phase, which will be put into operation this year, is 300 kg of hydrogen per day.
