A recent panellist at the Australian Hydrogen Conference 2024 in Adelaide, Viva Energy provided an update on the capabilities of its upcoming hydrogen fuelling station in Geelong.
The hub will include Australia’s first publicly accessible, commercial-scale facility offering renewable hydrogen refuelling for heavy transport vehicles.
Hydrogen mobility was the core focus of a presentation offered by Sandra Lau, Viva Energy Australia’s Head of Hydrogen & EVs.
Lau shared key learnings in what she hoped would help foster growth and further investment in Australia’s hydrogen mobility market.
“Like any early-market hydrogen project, hydrogen fuelling at the Viva Energy Hub has faced its share of technical and compliance challenges, but pleasingly, construction is underway,” she said.
Lau’s first point was to emphasise the value of investing in the customer experience.
“By investing in suitable compression and storage, our station will be capable of refuelling up to ten heavy vehicles in under two hours,” she said.
“The ability to dispense large volumes of hydrogen quickly and repeatedly will allow our truck and bus customers to refuel efficiently, getting on with the task at hand.”
Standards similar to those legislated for gasoline and diesel would matter according to Lau.
“Prescriptive standards for hydrogen purity could set a minimum benchmark for infrastructure providers while unlocking commercial contract mechanisms such as product quality guarantees, warranties and liabilities,” she said.
The levelised cost of hydrogen (LCOH) was another key issue.
“Industry is beginning to differentiate between the levelised cost of hydrogen, dispensed cost and ‘retailed price’ of hydrogen [which] is important to help identify what the cost stack looks like for the infrastructure provider versus the price that the customer actually pays at the dispenser,” said Lau.
“This project is another exciting opportunity for Viva Energy to collaborate with our customers in achieving their sustainability objectives.”
