A hydrogen-powered future: Insights from Hydrologiq’s Senior Software Engineer
Follow me on my journey as Hydrologiq’s first tech hire, in which we will discuss the challenges, architectural decisions, and unique experiences of start-up life in the hydrogen industry 💧
Me
I joined Hydrologiq last June as the first software engineer on the team, it has been a great experience so far but not without its challenges. The first couple of weeks felt like information overload 🤯, as I arrived at a Hydrogen business with just my software credentials to back me up and had a lot to learn. And quickly! But hey, sometimes in life you need a challenge.
Throughout my career spanning 5 years, I have had a wide range of experience working in different industries and using different technologies. Before joining Hydrologiq I was a senior software engineer at Thoughtworks. In this role I was developing larger-scale web applications for the public sector, one example being the modernisation of a dataset (NaPTAN) for the Department of Transport. As for my early career, I started my first job during a placement year and went on to work at the same company, ADLINK, for a couple of years. During my role at ADLINK, I developed IoT, Edge Computing, and Computer Vision applications and solutions that enabled real-world process improvements.
Hydrologiq has not disappointed as a great place for me to combine all my past experience: to design and build complex solutions which deliver major value to the end user and implement the key processes that enable this 🛠️.
Why Hydrologiq?
I want to make a positive impact on the world and helping drive the transition to net zero is a great way to do that. By joining Hydrologiq, I can do just that. I have realised that decarbonising high-impact areas, such as off-grid power is a difficult task, and many businesses are struggling to do so 🏭. Hydrologiq’s vision and expertise accelerates the phasing out of diesel and the adoption of cleaner solutions.
I also have a passion for being at the forefront of innovation and building data-driven solutions, which is reflected by my past experiences building distributed data services; IoT and AI solutions; and scalable web applications. At Hydrologiq I can combine all of these to help build out Hydrologiq’s scalable platform and be at the forefront of supply chain innovation.
Being the first developer on the team is a new experience for me and felt like a natural next stage of my career as I always want to push myself to learn and develop new and existing skills. I also realised during my consulting work, that I missed the ability to influence and own products and shape the direction of the business, which I can do at Hydrologiq.
I also see a massive room for growth 📈. As Hydrologiq expands, I will have many opportunities to grow, gain responsibilities, and own various processes. Examples include hiring new developers and enabling career progression; developing and maintaining technology roadmaps; and fostering a positive work environment.
Why Hydrogen?
You may be wondering why hydrogen as a fuel? For off-grid scenarios, specifically powering non-road mobile machinery (NRMM) 🏗️, there are some core requirements to determine a renewable power source's suitability. These include no emissions (clean air and site), transportability (enabling continuous supply), and high energy density ⚡ (enabling high power demand use case). Hydrogen ticks all these boxes beating its competition (biodiesel and batteries + solar) whilst providing multiple other benefits such as the fact a deployment is practically silent and has little ground-level vibrations; there are zero emission and fuel spills; it is reliable and low maintenance as there are no moving parts.
At Hydrologiq we are accelerating the transition to off-grid electricity powered by Hydrogen, to enable businesses to drastically cut CO2e 🌍♻️. We are creating economically viable solutions to reduce our society’s carbon footprint, building towards the common goal of Net Zero. Using our proprietary tools and hardware, we make deploying hydrogen-powered generators and other hydrogen-powered NRMM easier, faster, and less risky.
Common problems deploying Hydrogen generators
When deploying a hydrogen generator, there are three main stages: the planning, the deployment, and the teardown. There are some common problems we see that customers face during the three stages, that Hydrologiq has solved and are solving. Some of these problem statements are as follows:
Lack of data
This can be split into two categories:
- Lack of existing usage data of live sites 🤔 (construction sites, festivals, events, filmsets, etc.), limits the ability to provide an accurate estimation of the generator(s) and fuel needed for a deployment which increases costs for the customer.
- The lack of independent data reduces customers' ability to gain insight into their existing solutions. During the deployment of a generator, this can lead to many problems such as the inability to deliver the correct amount of fuel at the right time leading to a lack of financial certainty.
New technology
Using Hydrogen for power generators is relatively new, and adopting new products means customers need to understand how it will affect their business-as-usual processes e.g., refuelling logistics, health, and safety, alongside having confidence in the product.
Emerging supply chain
Hydrogen is an emerging supply chain. With this comes two main challenges: lack of confidence and high costs. An example that encapsulates both is being able to guarantee fuel being delivered on time and with the correct quantity.
I would group these problem statements into three main categories: lack of data, data visibility, and a fragmented supply chain. Solving each of these categories is key to the adoption of hydrogen as a fuel, especially in off-grid scenarios.
How we are addressing these problems
At Hydrologiq we have two products which are addressing these problems: the Hydrologiq Platform, which includes both operational and customer use cases, and the Hydrogen Testbed.
Hydrologiq Platform
Our Platform 💧 provides all the information needed for a customer’s hydrogen deployment (timeline, key events, documents, etc…); real-time monitoring of generators deployed at the site, data points can include pressure, power, and weight of hydrogen; fuel forecasting to predict when a re-fuelling event needs to occur; and reporting so being able to provide the raw data which enables them to fulfill their environmental reporting. These are just some of the features the dashboard will provide, and it will continually evolve.
Hydrogen Testbed
The Hydrogen Testbed is an interactive digital version of the emerging hydrogen supply chain, initially focused on hydrogen-powered generator applications with support from project partners Motive Fuels and Reynolds Logistics, alongside funding from Digital Catapult. We will be focusing on developing a digital-first connected 🕸️ supply chain that will enable the standardisation of data in a non-standardised market. Alongside providing an understandable and live view of the hydrogen market. The digital-first supply chain will aim to provide a foundation for the future of the hydrogen market.
What’s next?
I’m aiming to produce regular blogs, covering a wide range of topics with specific tracks (hopefully including but not limited to) some software engineering challenges and how we overcame them; architectural designs and decisions; more general blogs about life at a start-up; and the challenges that exist within the hydrogen industry.
Get in touch with me directly if you have any questions! 📧💨
