Ecological assessment of fuel cell electric vehicles with special focuson type IV carbon fiber hydrogen tank

Fuel cell electric vehicles promise to be a viable technical option for using surplus energy produced byrenewables, and in turn, help the transport sector to reduce environmental impacts. However, thetechnology is still under development and, for some components, the environmental performance isuncertain, e.g. the hydrogen storage tank. Manufacturers produce hydrogen tanks consisting of carboncomposite materials because of their mechanical properties. Yet, the production of carbon fibers involvescomplex and energy-intensive processes. Therefore, this study addresses a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) ofa fuel cell electric vehicle (FCEV) and focuses on the manufacturing process of the hydrogen storage tankand carbon fibers needed for its production. This study suggests that the tank is important for climatechange, ionizing radiation and fossil depletion, but less relevant for toxic-related environmental indicators.The evaluation of the future scenario suggested an improvement in the environmental performanceof the tank, especially regarding climate change by 46%, namely 5.6 t CO2-Eq versus 3.0 t CO2-Eq, and human toxicity by 75%, namely 2.7 t 1, 4-DCB-Eq versus 0.7 t 1, 4-DCB-Eq per tank for current andfuture conditions, respectively. Finally, for a lifetime mileage of 150,000 km, the fuel cell electric vehicleis responsible for 15 kg CO2-Eq/100 km in the current scenario and 9 kg CO2-Eq/100 km in the futurescenario, respectively