A hop kiln pushes heated air up through a bed of freshly picked cones for hours. The heat usually comes from a gas, oil or wood-fired burner, but the fans that move the air, the burner controls, temperature probes and the conveyors that load and unload the kiln all need electricity. The picking machine and baler in the same shed add to the load. If the fans stop with the burner running, the burner's safety controls should shut it down, which stops the dry and can leave the bed uneven.
The system's UPS-mode inverter and LiFePO4 battery switch over without a gap, so fan drives and burner controllers stay on. The fuel cell then carries the load from stored hydrogen, made earlier on off-peak power and kept at 30 bar or less. Since kilns run through the night in harvest, a quiet supply with no engine beside the shed is welcome.
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It is not replacing the burner. Heating a kiln electrically from hydrogen would take far more than 15 kW, and with round-trip efficiency of 30% or less it would be a poor use of energy. The fit is the electrical side: fans, controls, conveyors and lights. A large picking machine and baler running alongside big kiln fans may exceed 15 kW, in which case the pilot would size a larger or multi-unit setup.
Most hop gardens would see the value in the few weeks of harvest when a stopped kiln matters most. Outside harvest, the same store can quietly back up the house and workshop on the property. There is no fuel going stale in a tank over the off-season.
No, and we would not suggest it. Kiln heat is a very large load and making it from hydrogen at 30% or less round-trip would waste energy. The burner stays as it is; the system keeps fans and controls running.
It depends on its motors. A small picker may fit alongside the kiln fans within 15 kW, a large one may not. The pilot would log the shed during a harvest day and size from that.
It would be sited away from the kiln, like any plant room. It is designed to AS/NZS 60079 and ISO 19880, with redundant leak sensors, automatic shutdown and venting, and storage at 30 bar or less.
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