Optimizing the Size of a Hydrogen Refueling Station for Energy-Efficient Bus Fleet Operations

A Hydrogen Refueling Station (HRS) is the infrastructure that supplies hydrogen to Fuel Cell Electric Vehicles (FCEV), which offer advantages over battery-powered electric vehicles such as shorter refueling times and longer ranges achieved using hydrogen at high pressure. Building on a previous study of Caponi et al., this article examines the energy required to compress hydrogen for vehicle refueling, simulating the thermodynamics and the operations of a two-tank HRS serving a fleet of 10 fuel cell buses. The values of parameters such as refueling schedule, compressor activation timing, and HRS storage tank dimension are varied, performing a multiobjective optimization whose results reveal that larger HRS are energetically more efficient than smaller ones with a modest but significant impact on hydrogen price. This finding highlights the importance of the trade-off between energy savings and station tank size, among other considerations in HRS design.