Hydrogen for railways: design and simulation of an industrial benchmark study

Electrified railway system is probably the most sustainable way to move people and goods especially for ground connections over short and mid distances. Hydrogen and battery-operated trains represents a feasible solution to increase sustainability of railway lines that are currently not electrified and consequently operated with fossil powered units. In this work, authors investigate on a benchmark test case, advantages and critical aspects of the proposed technology with respect to near to realistic design constraints. The proposed train layout is quite innovative because the composition is longer and storage is arranged to make faster and easier system refuelling. Authors focused their attention on three aspects that have proven quite critical for the design: encumbrances of hydrogen storage, additional consumptions introduced by auxiliaries also during train stops and other preparation phases, real orography of Italian lines which deeply affects the autonomy of the train.