Improved Design Strategies for Flexible Hydrogen Networks

Although MINLP models have already been developed for generating the optimal hydrogen networks, improvements are still needed to circumvent their common drawbacks concerning (1) unreasonable unit models and (2) incomprehensive design considerations. These issues are addressed in this study by modifying the conventional formulations so as to produce realistic multi-period designs. In addition to the programming approach, a systematic timesharing algorithm is also devised to manually integrate multiple single-period designs to form a less economical but more flexible structure for operation in different periods. One example is provided to illustrate these two design strategies.