Hydrogen without remorse: how the Germans see it

6 March 20213 years ago babelfish

Speech by Giuseppe Tomassetti (FIRE vice president) and Michelangelo Celozzi (executive president of TEN srl)

On 11 February 2021, Agora, the German Energy Transition Agency, presented a study entitled "No regret Hydrogen" 3, which we paraphrased in our title, on the next steps for the construction of a Hydrogen infrastructure in Europe, produced from renewable sources.

The study was placed in an international public investigation and represents an opportunity for us to take stock of some crucial steps in the development of a Hydrogen supply chain, on the basis of which to establish priorities for the use of the relevant economic and financial resources made available provision by the EU to support the Energy Transition.

First of all, it must be remembered that hydrogen technology is not new, having been developed in the last decades for some specific applications.

Therefore, Hydrogen is not a "game changer" for the environment and energy sector, but one of the possible options to be evaluated without preconceptions, but also without false hopes, starting from already consolidated knowledge. Hence the excellent title of the study "No regret Hydrogen": to have no remorse …

Below we refer to a brief summary of the study, to then expose some comments for the location in Italy of infrastructures for the production and use of Hydrogen.

THE QUESTION OF H2

In the Study, the analysis of the demand refers to two time horizons: 2030 and 2050. The current thermal uses of energy are largely related to uses at temperatures below 100 ° C, to satisfy which more efficient solutions already exist. the use of hydrogen. The same is true for the storage of electricity, for which the study was concentrated on the applications for which H2 has its own value from the chemical point of view, rather than energy.

Currently (2020) the sectors of use of H2 are refineries and ammonia production. In this decade the use for the direct reduction of ferrous minerals will develop; in the decade 2030-2040 the use in refineries will progressively reduce due to the reduction of fossil fuels, replaced, in the following decade, by the chemical regeneration of plastics.

The overall demand for H2 in these three sectors of use (steel, ammonia and regeneration) is estimated to amount, for the whole of the EU, to 270 TWh / year, in terms of energy, fairly constant in the period under review; the forecast of annual demand in Italy is concentrated in refineries and in ILVA for 18-16 TWh / a.

THE OFFER OF H2

The alternative between blue H2 (derived from fossil methane with CO2 capture and storage) and green H2 (derived from water electrolysis, powered by electricity produced from renewable sources) was examined; however this window of technical-economic choice should remain valid only for a few years, so it could only affect those countries, such as Norway and the UK, which have already developed the technologies for the use, capture and storage of CO24 and above all the related regulations, for which the context makes provision for simpler authorization processes.

For the other countries it is believed that the resources for the realization of projects based on the use of Blue Hydrogen , and above all on the remote storage and distribution, would be nullified by the expected reduction in the production costs of Hydrogen, i.e. of the electrolysers, assessed in traditional market conditions around 450 € / kW in 2030 and 260 € / kW in 2050, but for which it is expected that the stimulus of the market with adequate incentives (very likely) could reduce costs up to about 96 € / kW and 67 € / kW, in the same years.

The reduction in the cost of electrolysers would favor the countries of Central and Southern Europe, which could use photovoltaics without problems, despite the greater seasonality and lower load factors of the plants, compared to the countries of the North, where interest is prevalent. for off-shore wind power (with shallow sea bottoms and load factor of the plants in the order of 4,000 h / a).

The study therefore hypothesizes the spread of wind power plants in Northern countries and photovoltaic power plants in Central and Southern Europe.

THE LOGISTICS

This issue is extremely relevant, given that hydrogen technology is not new and the problems of storage and transport are well known. Unfortunately, it is also the most delicate and difficult issue, where data and information are less certain and consolidated: here it is not a question of replacing a component in a supply chain already active and structured over decades, but it is a question of hypothesizing a completely new supply chain. which must respond to a series of parameters often dependent on the territory.

The preferential uses will be those that constant and guaranteed supplies. The gas carrier industry today guarantees supplies, mixing internal production and imports, thanks to a network of interconnected gas pipelines, extended at a regional level, and a series of regasifiers, powered by tankers for the transport of LNG. To manage seasonal variations in demand, depleted gas fields used as storage tanks are used where they exist.

An infrastructure of this type, dedicated to H2, does not exist; on the other hand, the expected volumes are only a small percentage of the current methane consumption, therefore it is possible, considering the complexity of the safety aspects for distributed uses, that this infrastructure will not be born even in the future. The infrastructures for the use of H2, in fact, do not have the constraint of the location of the sources of supply of energy raw materials, therefore their development is foreseen, at least in an initial phase, without connections between them, around the points of consumption. more relevant, with a close link between production and use.

The production of H2 from renewable sources, and photovoltaic in particular, reflects all the problems of intermittence, both daily and seasonal, of electricity production from renewable sources, therefore it requires a storage infrastructure, of electricity or hydrogen, of adequate size. to the characteristics of the single plant.

The study indicates for southern Europe the need for accumulation of the order of 40% of annual consumption; the methane accumulated in the Italian tanks, even with all the existing redundancies, is about 20% of the annual consumption.

However, there are no experiences of hydrogen accumulation in natural cavities, nor are the regulations to be followed to adapt them to this function defined; the study does not exclude that in the future depleted methane deposits used for methane storage can be used as hydrogen reservoirs, but it is believed that the only solution that can receive rapid approval is that of caves in salt deposits.

For very small volumes, accumulations in metal tanks are possible, but with high construction and operating costs (for compression at 700 atm), connected to safety risks.5

The study mentions the problems of the possible use of existing methane pipelines for the distribution of H2, but does not investigate the relevant technical problems (leaks and brittle fracture), much less the regulatory ones. The study evaluated the possible use of H2 mixed with methane6 in networks, but with negative results due to the loss of value of the product compared to the investment costs

CONCLUSIONS

The study evaluates the costs for the different logistic solutions and concludes that four European areas are conceivable as candidates for local hydrogen networks for uses concentrated in activities that are difficult to decarbonise:
• one between Dunkirk and Hamburg, through Belgium and Holland,
• a second one on the Catalan coast,
• a third between Poland and Lithuania,
• finally, a fourth in the Balkans.

Italy is excluded due to the lack of salt deposits in which to potentially carry out the accumulations.

Only a case study on the Tuscan coast is cited, with H2 carried by sea (probably in the form of NH3) with the use of metal tanks; however, this implies a cost for storage that is three times higher than that for the production of H2.

On the basis of the assessments reported in the Study, some comments can be added on the development not so much of an Italian Hydrogen supply chain, since its isolation from the European context is not likely, but on the characteristics of possible projects that can be developed in Italy and the development times.

Any project cannot be separated from a preventive technical-economic feasibility study, to identify the possible industrial use of Hydrogen, the applicable technologies, in particular for the accumulation of energy for the stabilization of the operation of the plant in the face of intermittency the primary energy source available, short-term or seasonal, and the interactions with existing electricity and gas infrastructures.

For Italy, the choice of photovoltaic technology for the decarbonisation of electricity has already been made, and hence the need to seasonally adjust this production, especially if you want to replace fossil fuels in winter heating, using electric heat pumps.

For Hydrogen, in principle, applications for uses concentrated in specific applications take priority, which appear operationally and temporally more viable, where the greater and concentrated volumes of demand allow to bear the costs of hydrogen production in the short-medium term. .

The most widespread applications are likely to require greater in-depth analysis, both for the volumes involved and for the safety problems in the phases of accumulation and distribution of Hydrogen, also from the point of view of the technical standards for the authorization of construction and operation. missing, and that starts from the specific conditions (technical, economic and regulatory) of the Italian energy system.

Some proposals in this sense have already been presented to the Ministry of Economic Development, for the construction of an "Important Project of Common European Interest" (IPCEI) to enhance the opportunities for using Hydrogen, as part of the industrial policy initiatives promoted. from Italy in conjunction with the other EU Member States and the European Commission. Among these, one concerns the feasibility study of an integrated plant for the production and use of Hydrogen produced with the electricity generated by a dedicated photovoltaic system, which would allow to increase the penetration of renewable sources in the final uses of energy so far satisfied exclusively by fossil fuels, such as high temperature thermal uses.

Since hydrogen can also be produced electrolytically using sea water, this type of application would be replicable throughout the Mediterranean. The project hypothesis is based on the innovative use of mature technologies, to accelerate development times and enhance the skills of the Italian industry, evaluating the development possibilities in terms of production capacity of the systems making up the hydrogen production plant. and scale of the plant, reducing performance risks and costs of development, construction, operation and maintenance.

The proposal involves four stages:
• Technical Economic Feasibility Study for the construction and location of an integrated plant for the production of "green" Hydrogen, comprising four sections:
Photovoltaic power generation plant for the production of Hydrogen
Electric storage system, for regulating the daily electricity production
Electrolyser for hydrogen production and water supply system
Hydrogen delivery system to the final use plant and supply management

The study will have to identify the possible locations of the plant in relation to the topology of the existing electricity and gas infrastructures, the potential industrial sites of use and the climatic characteristics, as well as the engineering choices for the optimal management of the hydrogen supply (risk analysis, stability, adjustment).
• Public inquiry. The results of the study will be placed in an international public inquiry, to acquire possible contributions deriving from different experiences.
• Cost Benefit Analysis to optimize the size and location of the plant, according to internationally recognized methodologies
• Preliminary Design of the Plant and determination of the technical specifications to entrust the market with the final investment decision for the Construction and Operation of the Plant.

Without this type of analysis, in the future it will be difficult to make significant investments for the Energy Transition, capable of triggering a process of relaunch and innovation of our economy.

This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/energia/idrogeno-senza-rimorsi-come-lo-vedono-i-tedeschi/ on Sat, 06 Mar 2021 07:00:23 +0000.