Skills & Innovation

PowerHouse

Connecting business, academia and skills providers to support the future green energy workforce for the Inverness & Cromarty Firth Green Freeport

What is The PowerHouse?

The PowerHouse is a catalyst connecting business, academia, and skills providers to support the future workforce requirements in the Freeport. It is creating opportunities for stakeholders to engage and continuously develop future workforce plans. The PowerHouse is working with key industries to ensure skills and training requirements are understood and managed as the Freeport develops.

The PowerHouse will also act as a virtual hub with links to STEM training modules for school pupils, to continuous professional development (CPD) for individuals interested in joining the renewable energy industry, which will ensure the workforce across the region have the required skills to take advantage of these transformative opportunities. We are connecting academia, industry, and different stakeholders to inspire innovation and set priorities & guidance towards accelerating the development of floating offshore wind and green hydrogen technologies and developing the workforce needed for supporting the UK net zero transition.

PowerHouse Working Group Members

Resources

The links below provide information about organisations, resources and support for careers in the green energy sector.

STEM Engagement

STEM is a form of an educational structure that merges science, technology, engineering, and mathematics in one cohesive unit to solve different problems.

STEM is usually presented through hands-on learning experiences where the students are given an in-depth understanding of the real world around them and are taught to use innovation, information analysis, research, and critical thinking to solve different challenges; thus, preparing future professionals who can transform the society.

The PowerHouse participated at the Inverness Science Festival 2022 Family Day where a number of STEM activities were conducted including building snap circuits and circuit symbols hunt. Educational Wind Turbine Kits were distributed for the winners of the circuit symbol hunt. In addition, the PowerHouse Project Manager delivered a lecture to the families at UHI’s Inverness Lecture Theatre on Inverness Campus where he introduced the different types of renewable energy sources and explained the expected opportunities and benefits to the local society from the upcoming renewable energy projects in the region.

In October 2022, the PowerHouse in collaboration with UHI North Highland College’s Creative Arts Department organised a film making event for secondary school pupils to learn about renewable energy and the sustainable energy projects in the Cromarty Firth alongside industry professionals.

School pupils from Invergordon Academy and Dingwall Academy were able to learn in a creative way about the offshore wind industry, hydrogen and ammonia fuel cells production and testing conducted at the labs of the University of St. Andrews, and the transition from the oil and gas to renewables taking place at the Ports of Cromarty Firth and Nigg.

The day consisted of several workshops that commenced with an educational presentation about green hydrogen and floating offshore wind delivered by Mina Hanna, Project Manager at the PowerHouse. Followed by storyboarding, filming, music composition, sound production and post-production led by UHI lecturers, Peter Noble and Anna McPherson, with support from 4th year film making student, John Baikie and lecturer, Stephen Bull. Pupils led and conducted live interviews with Steve Chisholm, Director of Operations and Innovation at the Global Energy Group and Mina Hanna, The PowerHouse Project Manager. The pupils had access to a recorded interview with Dr. Paul Connor, Senior Research and Teaching Fellow at St. Andrews University’s School of Chemistry.

In addition to their interview footage, the pupils also had access to photos and videos captured by students on UHI’s Contemporary Film Making degree. The students had filmed at different key locations around the Cromarty Firth and the University of St Andrews to create educational content for the pupils to gain knowledge, edit and incorporate into their films.

We’d like to thank UHI North Highland College and our partners from the Global Energy Group and the University of St Andrews/Hydrogen Accelerator for their support to the event.

Ammonia Fuel Cell

Ammonia(NH3) is a highly attractive energy vector; compared to liquid and compressed hydrogen, liquid ammonia has higher energy density, is cheaper to produce, and easier to store and handle.

Ammonia is a carbon free fuel, therefore, will not release CO₂ when combusted.

Ammonia fuel cells can be considered either direct or indirect depending on the location of the ammonia decomposition process. One of the advantages of direct ammonia fuel cells is the elimination of the requirement for hydrogen storage leading to savings in operation and production costs. In addition, internal cracking of ammonia in direct fuel cells avoids efficiency losses typically occurring due to external ammonia cracking in separate units.

In a protonic Solid Oxide Fuel Cells (SOFCs) ammonia fuel cell, ammonia gas is fed at the anodic side of the electrochemical cell that is maintained at high temperatures (450°C –1000°C) where the ammonia molecules are expected to decompose thermo-catalytically internally into hydrogen and nitrogen molecules. H⁺(protons) diffuse through the porous electrolyte to the cathode where water is formed when protons encounter oxygen. The schematic of a direct ammonia fuel cell can be seen in the figure below:

Figure 1: Process Description for a Direct Ammonia Fuel Cell. Source: Advanced Power Generation Systems. (2014). Retrieved from: https://www.sciencedirect.com/book/9780123838605/advanced-power-generation-systems

The PowerHouse’s first joint research project was participating in the UK Department for Transport’s Clean Maritime Demonstration Competition strand 1- feasibility study to develop a novel protonic Solid Oxide Fuel Cells (SOFCs) system that efficiently converts ammonia directly into water and nitrogen, yielding electric power for maritime propulsion. Low Emissions Resources Global, The Port of Cromarty Firth, The PowerHouse, The University of St. Andrews, and ZEM Fuel Systems joined forces to examine ways of decarbonising the maritime transport sector using ammonia as a clean alternative fuel to minimise the maritime industry’s environmental footprint.

The feasibility study, which was conducted from September 2021 to March 2022, entailed lab testing to develop, monitor, and optimise the ammonia SOFC system’s performance, market research, and site visits to study vessels for potential strand 2- system demonstration and testing.

The results of strand 1 proved that the newly developed protonic solid oxide ammonia fuel cells are a game-changing concept to utilise ammonia in the context of a more efficient and non-polluting alternative means of power generation. Single cell and bundle testing in the lab demonstrated minimal system degradation over hundreds of hours of testing with zero ammonia leaks detected. The results of strand 1 were presented by the project partners at the Clean Maritime Demonstration Competition final showcase at Portsmouth International port in May 2022.

Online courses

We have partnered with leading educational institutions and training providers to provide courses in hydrogen and offshore wind technologies.

Offshore Wind Awareness Course

The UK has over one-third of the global installed offshore wind capacity. Offshore wind is expected to have an important role in the UK’s 2050 net-zero transition. This Offshore Wind Awareness course has been designed by ESP in partnership with North East Scotland College and Dundee & Angus College. This course aims to give an overview of the installation, operation and associated work in relation to offshore wind farms.

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Hydrogen Awareness Course

Hydrogen will play a crucial role in the UK’s fuel mix to reach its net-zero target for 2050. This hydrogen skills tool has been designed by ESP in partnership with SGN, Orkney College UHI, and Dundee & Angus College. This tool aims to raise awareness of hydrogen through an understanding of the characteristics and behaviours of hydrogen, hydrogen production and storage, available career opportunities, and current hydrogen applications including hydrogen refuelling and hydrogen safety.

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ESP – A collaboration of Scotland’s colleges and industry partners established to increase Scotland’s capability and capacity to deliver the right skills for the energy, engineering and construction sectors to meet industry demand.

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GWO Standards Equivalent Training

Global wind organisation developed a process called ‘Merit Assessment’ to help assess existing qualifications, training, and curricula against GWO standards (Gap Analysis).

Existing training can then be audited by a GWO-appointed certification body. At the end of the process, training can be converted to a GWO certificate with a record then uploaded into WINDA.

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Inspiring future generations

It is crucial to educate younger generations about the climate change crisis and pathways to a sustainable future. Although the climate crisis will have massive impacts on the coming generations, given the right education and awareness they could change the future.