David Jaramillo | VERNE: Hydrogen refueling and storage solutions for the heavy-duty sector
In this episode, David Jaramillo, Co-founder and CTO at Verne, explains how Verne's technology innovation enables cost-effective clean hydrogen storage and refueling to decarbonize heavy-duty transport. Verne's unique storage technology cry-compression enables a higher energy density than liquefied or pressurized (up to 700 bar) hydrogen at at least half the cost.
Listen on Spotify and Apple.
This article is part of the series: Hydrogen Innovators Podcast
Transcript
[00:00:00.00] [Music Playing]
[00:00:02.47] David Jaramillo: 80% of that cost is actually due to the refueling and storage. So about 20% is the production. So if we're going to drive down that green premium, get the diesel parity and decarbonize long-haul trucking in the US and globally, we have to bring down this 80% of the cost, which is refueling in storage.
[00:00:21.13] Karen Baert: Verne is a startup developing hydrogen refueling and storage solutions for the heavy-duty sector. Their technology platform doubles the operating range of vehicles while keeping fuel costs low. This podcast was recorded in the beginning of 2023.
[00:00:36.72] And since then, Verne has made a lot of progress. They successfully carried out a demo in a fuel cell vehicle, obtained letters of intent for over 160 trucks, and Verne is now working with some of the leading truck OEMs. Last but not least, Verne accelerated its development for the aviation sector and has started a collaboration to develop refueling equipment.
[00:01:01.95] [Theme Music]
[00:01:06.77] Dear listeners, welcome to this week's episode of the Hydrogen Innovators Podcast series, produced by the Stanford Hydrogen Initiative, spotlighting bold innovators in hydrogen all the way from academia to industry. If you like our podcast, please follow the Stanford Hydrogen Initiative on LinkedIn and subscribe to Hydrogen Innovators on Spotify or Apple Podcasts. I'm Karen Baert, recent Stanford MBA graduate, entrepreneur, and innovation strategist at the Initiative. And I'm thrilled to be your host for this week's podcast.
[00:01:38.30] Today, we have the privilege to welcome David Jaramillo. David is co-founder and CTO at one of the Bay's most famous hydrogen storage startups, Vern. After David's bachelor in chemistry, he successfully completed his PhD in inorganic and materials chemistry at Berkeley. David, thank you so much for being here with us today.
[00:01:59.41] David Jaramillo: Yeah. Thanks a lot, Karen. I'm really excited about the hydrogen initiative.
[00:02:03.22] Karen Baert: Let's kick it off. I was listening to a David Crane earlier today, the director of clean energy at the DOE. And he mentioned, hey, if you think about the 19th century, it was a century of coal. The 20th century was a century of gas and oil.
[00:02:19.77] The 21st century is a century of hydrogen, which I thought was a pretty cool sign to show how the hydrogen industry is really, really taking off. Now, Verne is working on one of the big challenges that remains in the hydrogen industry, and that is how do we transport and store it. Would you tell us a bit more about Verne and how Verne is tackling the hydrogen storage problem?
[00:02:43.71] David Jaramillo: Yeah, absolutely. So Verne is focused on heavy-duty transport and accelerating the transition to a hydrogen power industry. So one of the key limiting factors there is how you store the hydrogen, as you pointed out. And there's many different current solutions that exist, but all of them have major drawbacks. You can summarize all that by saying that the density is still not sufficient relative to diesel performance, to make the transition from the end customer as smooth and as fast as possible.
[00:03:16.17] So what Verne is doing succinctly is, we're bringing to market a new technology known as cryo-compressed hydrogen, which represents the, let's say, thermodynamic sweet spot of high density, low cost. And we can get maybe more into the details after this overview. So we're bringing this new technology on the storage side and refueling, and really first targeting trucking to long-haul trucking which is responsible for about 4% of global CO2 gas emissions.
[00:03:47.25] So we're rolling out this new technology. We're prototype stage right now. And ultimately, the vision is starting in 2026 time frame, starting to have commercial trucks running on cryo-compressed as hydrogen in the US and globally.
[00:04:00.27] Karen Baert: Great, cool. We'd love to hear more about that. So if we start with the storage issue-- so you can store hydrogen in the form of a gas. But that's expensive. And then the other option is liquid. Where does cryogenic storage sit in-between all of that.
[00:04:16.56] David Jaramillo: Yeah, I think the cool thing about it, too-- and as you pointed out in the beginning of the podcast, is that there's so many different use cases for hydrogen. There's going to be different needs for different kinds of hydrogen storage. And I think we will cover some later on-- many different kinds.
[00:04:30.36] Well, let's focus the conversation mainly, then, on transport-- so heavy-duty transport. And then we really focus on the customer needs fleet operators. You can then highlight some of the main pain points. And so we can summarize the following.
[00:04:44.79] So we have compressed gas. So that's what you see today on the Toyota Mirai, the Hyundai Nexo, Honda Clarity. So all of those are going to have 700 bar storage vessels. In order to get enough hydrogen density-- energy density from the hydrogen can densify it so much, you're going to 700 times the pressure of the atmosphere, so incredibly high pressures. And even then, the density is still not sufficient to meet a lot of the needs of fleet operators.
[00:05:14.24] And so a lot of fleet operators, truck OEMs, they see this 700 bar compressed technology as a stepping stone. It's what's commercially available. Let's try it.
[00:05:23.37] There's a lot of de-risking that has to happen. But they know that that's not going to mean the end solution. It's not dense enough.
[00:05:29.67] So the other kind of standard consideration is the liquid hydrogen. So we know how to compress hydrogen. We've done this for many decades. We also know how to liquefy hydrogen. We've done this for many decades, so let's consider that as another option.
[00:05:44.21] And so the issue with liquid-- there's a few. One of those is the much higher cost. So sure, you'll have liquid hydrogen.
[00:05:52.88] But to begin with, put into context, the amount of liquid hydrogen that exists today is minimal. It's a very small percentage of all. It's dominated in the US.
[00:06:02.91] It was mostly dominated for aerospace applications, and also specialty manufacturing. It's so very small. It's getting a lot of headlines, and it will continue to grow.
[00:06:11.60] But it's not a very deployable technology. For a new liquefaction plant of about 30 tons per day, we need $250 million, and takes four to five years plus, so not very deployable. So what is the cost and how the refueling structure gets rolled out is a big issue for liquid.
[00:06:27.54] The second main issue is around the storage vessels themselves. You're storing this at 20 Kelvin, so thermal transfer is a huge issue. It's also a liquid. So if you get too much heat, and you're going to do a phase transition, that expansion needs to be immediately resolved. Venting is normally what's done, so you have a lot of complex thermal management, a lot of complex components required for the storage.
[00:06:53.36] So really setting the stage there, compressed hydrogen is readily available, but not enough density. Liquid can meet the density requirements but brings a lot of challenges. So that's the state-of-the-art problems and where we find ourselves trying to address all those issues.
[00:07:11.16] Karen Baert: Why has nobody else worked on cryogenic hydrogen before? And if so, where or how has it been worked on?
[00:07:20.25] David Jaramillo: Yeah so for liquid that's low pressure, cryogenic, so let's think about 6 bar, 20 Kelvin, put some context. And so what we're doing is cryo-compressed. And you can think of that as, we're going to make the hydrogen cold, really increasing the densities. But without an elevated 20 Kelvin, you can look at the phase diagram, and you get this massive uptick if you cool just to about 70 or 60 Kelvin.
[00:07:46.34] And then we're also going to pressurize. So we pressurize. But we don't go to crazy high pressures like 700 bar. We can stay at 300 bar or 400 bar, which makes actually a very big difference from cost perspective.
[00:07:57.66] So it's really the sweet spot, and it's known as cryo-compressed. It's been done for two decades. So it was really pioneered by DOE-funded work, so led by Lawrence Livermore National Lab. And Salvador Aceves, he led some of this early work back then.
[00:08:15.41] And in the early-- yeah, around the 2008, 2010, time frame, when there was an early push for hydrogen that has been explored for light duty vehicles. BMW worked with Livermore. They had a create agreement. They were looking into this. I would say that it stopped. You can think of why it stopped as a false fail.
[00:08:39.48] It wasn't necessarily inherent to the technology. It was more, I think, a market-driven decision. And the amount of complexity and de-risking required didn't reap the benefits, as there was not really a big market for light-duty hydrogen vehicles in 2010.
[00:08:55.13] Karen Baert: Fascinating. So the technology has been around for a while. But only now it has become super-relevant, specifically for hydrogen in road transportation.
[00:09:03.46] David Jaramillo: Yeah, and so I think that, with heavy duty trucks, and when you think about the use case and the problem that they're facing, then cryo-compression, when you revisit sort of everything that's been done cryo-compression, it really has a strong value proposition for that.
[00:09:20.65] Karen Baert: So this is on the storage technology side. You mentioned you're also working on the fueling technology. Can you elaborate more on that?
[00:09:28.56] David Jaramillo: Yeah, and what we also want to do, one, is the storage. So we can effectively-- with these cryo-compression vessels we can double the amount of energy stored relative to what's currently available, effectively doubling the range. So it's a game changer for fleet operators. But that's useless if they can't refuel where they normally want to refuel.
[00:09:47.61] So the other really great attribute of cryo-compressed hydrogen is that you can fill with other liquid hydrogen supplied or a gaseous supply using the same kind of tank. So this supply chain optionality is a huge deal, especially in the current stage of-- there's a lot of optionality required. There's unknown infrastructure rollout.
[00:10:10.14] And so there's liquid, and Verne is working with some commercially established technologies, as well as a few things that have to be demonstrated to fill with what's known as a liquid hydrogen cryopump. So if you have liquid, great. We just run a cryopump, and you can very efficiently fill a cryo-compression vessel.
[00:10:27.44] If it's gaseous, maybe it's on-site, being produced, or it's gaseous delivery. Rather than having to liquefy it, and then use the liquid hydrogen cryopump, Verne is developing a cryo-compressor, which is just another process of what I said earlier. You're going to compress and cool, get it to this thermodynamic sweet spot, and then fill. So that way, whether it's gas or liquid, you will be able to fill the cryo-compression vessel.
[00:10:55.31] Karen Baert: Interesting. So you're focused on trucks today. I think I recently read Hyundai is going to have 30 [INAUDIBLE] big trucks on the roads in California at the second half of this year. So it's definitely a market that is developing and growing as we speak.
[00:11:10.07] At the same time, obviously, hydrogen has a lot of other use cases as well. Or does Verne envision to look at other use cases beyond road transport? And if so, where are you looking at?
[00:11:21.48] David Jaramillo: So for the trucking we're definitely focused on that through most of this decade is our main focus. And we'll see hundreds to thousands of trucks starting in 2026 for hydrogen trucks in the US, and ramping up to 20,000 to 30,000 by 2030. And so we believe that, once we execute and de-risk the technology, a major component of that will be cryo-compressed.
[00:11:46.29] Taking a step back, another kind of where we're hearing there could be a lot of interest, and where we're also exploring, are industries in which fast refueling is needed, industries in which downtime needs to be minimized, and in which the power demands on board are great. So with those three things all required, you absolutely need the highest density, really fast refueling. So you're not going to do batteries. And one of those is, of course, long-haul trucks.
[00:12:11.71] But the other big one is mining. And so within mining there's all different kinds of trucks and use cases. But mining haulage trucks, trucks that weigh 200 to 400 tons, are going to be operating, they're very expensive. So for the business model to work for the users in that case, there's very little downtime. So you have to maximize uptime, quick refueling.
[00:12:34.84] So mining is one where mining entities are exploring different hydrogen solutions for those properties. And that's one that, if we focus on trucking, get trucking right, based on the systems, then the amount of hydrogen required in a mining is 2x or 3x what we're doing for trucks. So then there'd be a natural stepping stone for us to go into mining.
[00:12:53.84] Karen Baert: Interesting And then maybe with that, there's also other specialized vehicles, for example, in the building or construction industry that could be use cases?
[00:13:02.53] David Jaramillo: Yeah, exactly. So construction also has some parallels with mining. And I think all those would be really important industries. And if we get trucking right, then we can go into these adjacent industries.
[00:13:15.38] Karen Baert: Great. Fascinating. Now I'm curious to hear your thoughts on what you think are areas in the hydrogen industry that are hampering the industry, and that not enough people are working on yet? Verne is tackling a huge, huge challenge in there, because obviously, there's a lot of challenges. What would be the number one thing you would find out there?
[00:13:37.60] David Jaramillo: Yeah, I think one thing I would really point out is the more just collaborating perspective. So I think it's great to have all this emphasis on hydrogen [INAUDIBLE], all this emphasis on hydrogen production. We need all that.
[00:13:51.09] But for hydrogen transport, consider that the cost of hydrogen at the pump today is about $15 per kilogram. 80% of that cost is actually due to the refueling and storage. So about 20% is the production. So if we're going to drive down that green premium and get the diesel parity and decarbonize long-haul trucking in the US and globally, we have to bring down this 80% of the cost, which is refueling and storage.
[00:14:23.14] So I would say that we do need production. Let's do more of it. But we also need more focus from different entities, from the government, from national labs, from startups, focused on storage and refueling. That's 80% of the cost.
[00:14:39.06] The second is, in order for this to be rolled out, we also need to think about the specialty component vendors-- so the different nozzles, the different sensors. It requires a very complex ecosystem, so it's not a single big company that could do it all. And so those are maybe the two main things I think should be more emphasized and more discussed and be more front of mind.
[00:15:04.57] Karen Baert: [INAUDIBLE] Thank you for sharing that. And it's such a good point, that we shouldn't only focus on the levelized cost of hydrogen production, but also think about, OK, what's the cost in terms of dollars a kilogram when we're actually using it, and work on that to get that cost down.
[00:15:20.46] Great, cool, I'm going to ask you a couple of rapid firing questions. And I'd love to get your quick thoughts on some of these. First one is, hydrogen passenger vehicles-- hype or hope?
[00:15:31.34] David Jaramillo: Yeah, I think-- and so I'll just say a few things on that one where you have some in California, so maybe 4,000 of those. And that's really a tiny market. But generally, I don't think that it makes too much sense. However, depending on some of these conditions, I think.
[00:15:50.28] So in total globally, there's maybe 60,000 fuel cell vehicles. South Korea alone has about 25,000 light-duty vehicles. And I think it's 6x from last year, or from 2022 relative to 2021. So they clearly see based on how they're going to do their end infrastructure and hydrogen roadmap, that light-duty vehicles can play a big part.
[00:16:15.10] You also have big OEMs there that are really moving it forward. So I think it might not be a big industry in the United States, for example, for light-duty vehicles. But it could be a massive industry in other countries such as South Korea.
[00:16:28.69] Karen Baert: Great. OK. Second one-- so we talked about storing hydrogen in its pure form in different ways. Other options are derivatives of hydrogen, or adding hydrogen to other molecules, to newer ones A lot of people are talking about organic hydrogen carriers, and metal organic frameworks. I'd love to hear your thoughts on these.
[00:16:50.71] David Jaramillo: Yeah, so I did my PhD on metal-organic frameworks focusing on hydrogen storage.
[00:16:55.51] Karen Baert: All right.
[00:16:56.20] David Jaramillo: So I think that they have a lot of promise. So the idea there is, the main upside is you can do really high-density storage without going to very high pressures. I think the downside is the thermal management is very complicated, and you'll likely have cost issues and durability issues.
[00:17:14.80] There's some parallels there with liquid organic hydrogen carriers. So those in terms of their applications, I think you could have some niche applications. There's probably scenarios where, for safety reasons, you want to stay low pressure, really high density. One of those could be underground mining where you don't want high pressure physical methods, like 700 bar. But instead, maybe you have a material absorbent at 50 bar or in data centers in the city, for example, for different reasons.
[00:17:44.17] Same thing for liquid organic hydrogen carriers-- those are much easier to handle. It's a liquid. So I think there's a lot of upside for these use cases where pressure is a big issue. The downside is just going to be more expensive and limited durability.
[00:17:56.95] Karen Baert: Well, David, thank you so much for this great quick overview on hydrogen storage and what Verne is doing. I really hope this sparks our listeners' interest to go check out Verne and learn more about them and the space in general. Now, I'd love to move over to a couple of more personal leadership questions.
[00:18:14.07] The first one is-- so many of our listeners are inspired by your career path, and then the progress you and the team at Verne have been making over the last years. At the same time, I can imagine the entrepreneurial roller coaster isn't always that [INAUDIBLE]. One, what has been the moment you've been closest to giving up with Verne? And what has kept you going?
[00:18:34.40] David Jaramillo: Yeah, [INAUDIBLE] the answer you're looking for-- I think I'm maybe default optimistic. Sure there's times where it's incredibly stressful. You have many different fires to put out.
[00:18:47.16] But I think what keeps me going is that I can truly say there's nothing else I'd rather be doing. And I think I've been blessed with opportunities I've been given, from undergrad to grad school fellowships, even at Stanford with the TomKat got started all through grants and fellowships. So there's nothing I'd rather be doing.
[00:19:08.80] And mostly, I wake up thinking there's nothing I'd rather do. So I think that puts into context really the stressful things, and the fact that I got to choose to do this. So there's times that are stressful. But I've never had any doubt in doing this.
[00:19:23.74] Karen Baert: Yeah, that's so cool. I can imagine having that as the North Star helps to get you through the highs and lows.
[00:19:28.90] David Jaramillo: Yeah.
[00:19:29.28] Karen Baert: What was the biggest high with the Verne team over the last years?
[00:19:33.71] David Jaramillo: Yeah, I think probably it's going to be-- when the founders, myself, Ted McKlveen, and Bav Roy started this during COVID, so the three of us for a while. I think the biggest high is when the three of us are doing our own thing and we check on the team. And we realize we've been lucky and have been able to assemble the right sort of engineers, the right culture, where they don't even need us or guidance in many cases.
[00:20:07.24] So there's definitely specific instances of that come up, a few of when we finally started to test our first prototype at a National Lab. Probably this week, when we're building one of our first big systems, and we're really formalizing into all these things. Yeah, so I think it's that. It's more the team, and there's moments that is really heightened by the progress that's been made by the team, and then when we realize that Verne's success is really on the team.
[00:20:37.33] Karen Baert: That's so cool. That's beautiful, the fact that the team is thriving far beyond the co-founder team. Really cool. Getting to the last question of on the podcast already-- and this is a question we like to ask all of our guests.
[00:20:51.60] I have this strong belief that we all stand on the shoulders of the giants who came before us. And using Isaac Newton's words, it's standing on their shoulders that makes us look further. In that context, we'd love to hear who inspires you most and why.
[00:21:06.13] David Jaramillo: Yeah, that's a great question. So I think it's my dad. And I think the reason for that is-- it wasn't always-- I guess the reason for it wasn't always evident to me.
[00:21:23.08] But over time, it's become more and more evident. And I think it's because he embodies this long-term thinking and staying optimistic and going after big challenges. So in particular, my dad was a judge in Colombia. And then he came to the US, just so we have a better chance at an education, so I could have a better chance at a proper education.
[00:21:47.36] And so he went from being a judge to just being a caretaker, mowing the lawn. And he did that since I was eight years old. And I think just having that commitment, that perseverance is really inspiring. And so to me, there's very little to complain about, and always focus on the long-term and solving big problems.
[00:22:09.35] Karen Baert: That is really inspiring and a beautiful way to end the podcast. David, it's been such a privilege to learn from you and get to know you better. Thank you for your time today, and more importantly, the hard work you and the team are doing to tackle the biggest challenge of our generation-- a sustainability challenge. We're rooting for you and the full team. And we cannot wait to continue to follow along.
[00:22:31.40] David Jaramillo: Yeah, thanks a lot, Karen. Thanks a lot for all the great questions. And I just want to say that we're all really thankful for a lot of the early ecosystem kind of individuals and entities that helped-- [INAUDIBLE] Stanford, TomKat a lot of particulars of course Breakthrough Energy Fellows.
[00:22:51.97] And so I'd like to just end by saying that I recommend any entrepreneur in this space, if they're lucky to be in this ecosystem, take full advantage of what Stanford and Berkeley have to offer in Breakthrough Energy Fellows. And yeah, if you'd like to learn more about Verne, you can find us at verneh2.com. You can find us on LinkedIn. You can find me that way, and feel free to reach out. Happy to connect with others thinking about hydrogen, startups, or related topics.
[00:23:17.91] Karen Baert: Fantastic. Thank you so much, David. Keep up the good work.
[00:23:20.82] [Theme Music]
