Honeycomb metallic structure for improving heat exchange in hydrogen storage system

A two-dimensional model for predicting heat and mass transfer in an alanate hydride reactor with metallic honeycomb structure (MHCS) heat exchanger has been developed. Using this model, a numerical study was performed to examine the influence of the MHCS’s cell size on the profiles of temperature, concentrations of the formed species, and hydrogen charging rate. The obtained results showed that the reduction of the MHCS’s cell size combined with an external cooling design configuration permits better use of the storage system. Based on this model, a comparison of the operating performance of various reactor designs was carried out. It was found that equipping the reactor with hexagonal cooling tubes clearly improved the performance of the charging process without further loss in the gravimetric and volumetric capacities of the hydrogen storage system.