**4. Conclusion**

Metal hydrides offer a safe and compact alternative for hydrogen storage. The thermodynamic properties of them determine both their reaction heat as well as hydrogen equilibrium pressure at given temperature and, therefore, are important parameters to be taken into account. Optimised system integration for a given application is not possible without selecting a hydride with suitable thermodynamic properties. To achieve highest possible energy efficiencies the heat of reaction and temperature of operation of the metal hydride should be adapted to the waste heat and temperature of operation of the fuel cell / fuel combustion system. It has been found that the thermodynamic properties of metal hydrides can be tailored in a wide range. Unfortunately, so far all the known conventional metal hydrides with more or less ideal reaction enthalpies and hydrogen equilibrium pressures above 5 bar at room temperature suffer from a rather limited reversible hydrogen storage capacity of less than 2.5 wt.%. With such a material it is not possible to realise a solid storage hydrogen tank with a total hydrogen storage density of more than 1.8 wt.% H2. Such tank systems still have advantages for the storage of small quantities of hydrogen for larger quantities, however, modern high pressure composite tank shells have a clear advantage in respect of gravimetric storage density. To realise a solid storage tank for hydrogen with a comparable gravimetric storage density it is required that novel hydrogen storage materials based on light weight elements are developed. There are several promising systems with high gravimetric storage densities in the range of 8 – 12 wt.% H2. For the applications of these novel material systems it is important to further adapt thermodynamic properties as well as the temperatures of operation towards the practical requirements of the system.

The discovery of the approach of combining different hydrides which react with each other during hydrogen release by forming a stable compound, the so-called Reactive Hydride Composites, show a great promise for the development of novel suitable hydrogen storage material systems with elevated gravimetric storage densities. However, so far, the ideal storage material with low reaction temperatures, a reaction heat in the range of |H| = 20- 30 kJ/(mol H2) and a on-board reversible hydrogen storage density of more than 6 wt.% H2 has not been found.
