2024 Robin Paul prize lecture: The Hydrogen Catalyst: Removing a Quantum Barrier to Fuel Sustainable Aviation

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• Paula Mendoza-Moreno - Department of Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology, University of Cambridge
• Wednesday 26 November 2025, 13:30-14:30
• Lecture Theatre 1, Department of Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology, West Cambridge Site.

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The single greatest barrier to hydrogen (H₂) aviation is the immense challenge of storing and distributing liquid hydrogen (LH₂). This challenge is the primary obstacle to making flights that emit only water a practical reality. A significant part of this challenge stems from a fundamental property of H₂ itself: the interconversion of its isomers, ortho- and para-H₂, under liquid storage conditions. This exothermic isomerisation reaction is a major, direct contributor to the quick evaporation of LH₂, making fuel storage inherently inefficient. A solution is to promote the ortho-para conversion (OPC) with a catalyst in liquefaction. This enables the supply of stable LH₂ fuel that meets the standards required by H₂ aircraft designs.

This lecture will present findings from a recent study demonstrating that the industry-standard pursuit of >99% para-hydrogen purity is not only more expensive than we thought but also energetically sub-optimal for the aviation fuel cycle. The findings reveal that a strategically-tuned OPC process, accepting purities of 83-95%, reduces liquefaction energy demands by 8-13% while reducing evaporation losses during storage for the critical 1-7 day transport window. This optimisation, when coupled with green H₂ production, leads to a >92% reduction of CO₂ emissions from fuel production to flight on routes such as London-New York. Furthermore, this talk will outline the experimental continuation of this work, building on the kinetic understanding of the catalytic OPC . The new insights gained into this quantum phenomenon directly address the evaporation of H₂ in storage tanks, the economic viability of H₂ aviation, and the carbon footprint of the LH₂ supply.

This talk is part of the Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology series.

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