Two French teams are selected at European level for the final of the Inventor’s Prize. Among them, the researchers and entrepreneurs who created a hydrogen storage solution in the solid form of magnesium hydride, now supported by the Jomi-Leman company.
The European Patent Office awards the Inventor Award every year. For the 2023 edition, twelve finalists have been shortlisted, including two French teams: one on insect farms (see box), the other on hydrogen storage.
The French team on this second subject is formed around Daniel Fruchart, former director of research at the CNRS for work he began more than 20 years ago and which led to a transfer of technology to launch massive storage hydrogen in magnesium hydride. His colleague Patricia de Rango, research director at the Institut Néel in Grenoble and one of his doctoral students at the time, Albin Chaise, improved this solution, also with the contribution of Nataliya Skryabina who came as part of European projects. At the same time, Michel Jehan, a magnesium industrialist, validated the solution on a large scale. Their technology allows the new star molecule of the energy transition to be used when it is needed, and not only when it is produced by electrolysis of water. The major advantage of storing hydrogen in solid form is its greater density (102 kg/m³) than in liquid (72 kg/m³) and gaseous (42 kg/m³) forms, which results in a high density energy: 1 kg of magnesium hydride stores 33 kWh while an electrochemical Li-ion battery of the same weight is around 0.3 kWh. This opens the door to massive hydrogen storage.
