On June 23, 2022, LATTICE Technology and Sankyo Techno announced an MOU to design a small-scale LH2 bunkering ship commissioned by a prefecture in Japan. In this project, LATTICE Technology designs the LH2 containment system utilizing its LPV (Lattice Pressure Vessel) technology and the associated LH2 handling systems. Sankyo Techno, specializing in small and medium-sized special ships for 40 years in Japan, conducts design of the hull and marine systems. This project was mediated by Daun Trading, which has facilitated cooperation between the two companies.
Like many other countries, Japan attempts to convert aging patrol boats into hydrogen fuel versions as its awareness of the environment increases. A short-term plan is to operate zero-emission coastal ships, such as hydrogen fuel cell ships, during the Osaka Expo in 2025.
The LH2 bunkering ship will supply hydrogen fuel to such zero-emission ships. One challenge is to minimize the size of the storage tank for LH2 whose density is just one sixth of LNG.
Keunoh Park, CEO of LATTICE Technology, says:
The prefectural government has decided to adopt the bunkering ship for hydrogen fuel supply at sea. The LPV was chosen over traditional cylindrical tanks as it perfectly fits the space given in the ship.
Throughout this project, which is a first of its kind in the Japanese marine LH2 bunkering market, the two companies hope to bring their experience and know-how accumulated in the LNG and LH2 fields to the Japanese marine LH2 bunkering market, which just starts to grow.
This project is aiming at securing an Approval in Principle (AiP) for the ship design by March 2023. Once this has been successfully achieved, the actual ship can be built within three years. To achieve this goal, LATTICE Technology and Sankyo Techno will collaborate with renowned organizations and companies in Japan from hydrogen production via ship building to ship operation.
The next step of the two companies is to design and build an LH2 bunkering ship with a 300 - 500 m3 LPV on board. An expert manufacturer in the prefecture will fabricate the tank and install it on the ship, which will be built by a ship building company also in the area. LATTICE Technology’s plan is to expand its collaboration to Japanese leading shipping companies for large-scale LH2 import into Japan.
Meanwhile, LATTICE Technology is developing containment solutions over the entire LH2 supply chain from mini-containers less than 1 m3 for land vehicles to large-scale cargo tanks over 10,000 m3. In addition, the company is designing core systems for LH2 infrastructure, including 75,000 m3 transportable LH2 export and import terminals in a Korea-Australian international joint development project as well as a 50,000 m3 LH2 carrier in a research grant project from the Korean government. In particular, the company’s innovative vacuum insulation system, called the V-CCS for large-scale LH2 tanks, was granted an AiP from Lloyds Register in 2020. The plan is to complete the design, manufacture, and demonstration of a 200 m3 V-CCS pilot tank by 2023.
