Green hydrogen — one of the buzziest buzzwords in the green family — has become something of a media magnet hese days. A few years ago the buzz was all about wind and solar but in the past couple of years green hydrogen has staked its very own claim as indispensable element of the energy transition to zero emissions.
Again, great reporting! Honestly, I had not thought of the volume of water, and we all know the inability of energy policy makers to plan past the next election cycle. Great writing.
Thanks, Stu. I've found that being a non-expert sometimes help. As a non-expert I asked myself "If this is made breaking down water just how much water might be necessary?" and it went from there.
Yes, hydrogen is hazardous. I think it's more combustible than oil and gas and there have been explosions at hydrogen filling stations, so there's that, too.
I think a wide variety of carbon steels are subject to hydrogen enbrittlement and tanks would require a coating or different alloys. In the case they would want to use existing pipeline infrastructure for transport, this would likely require upgrades to existing pipe.
As one who has spent a lot of my career around large industrial plants, I feel certain that hydrogen production plants are not designed to run only in the daytime! Large plants like that MUST run 24/7 to obtain efficiencies to get enough ROI to justify building the plant. Stopping and starting a giant production plant takes an enormous amount of energy, labor and resources. No way you could do it every night. It would be a good research project to verify my experience. Therefore, I agree with Greg: the only way this works is nuclear.
Thanks, Irina. What an interesting topic hydrogen is! You'd think people would be afraid of the stuff given the historical record, but somehow most people seem cool with it.
The authors of the cited text (Does green hydrogen have a water problem?) seem to draw a different conclusion than you do. At the end of their introduction they say:
"[W]e find that [...] there is a negligible impact of the amount of water consumed for hydrogen production compared to the amount of water available."
And in the conclusion:
"[W]ater supply will not be the limitation for electrolyzers, and we should instead continue to focus on technological improvements for the energy efficiency of electrolyzers, which is currently the limiting factor and has the potential for significant advancements."
They make some pretty big assumptions, however. Like this one:
"[H]ydrogen will be produced by water electrolysis powered by renewable energy."
That, according to the piece you cited about the new Chinese plant, "the Baofeng facility might also be run using grid electricity when the sun is not shining" shows that this assumption is questionable at best. Here's another big one:
"[E]lectrolysis will render fossil fuel energy sources obsolete as the energy sector is able to move more toward renewable technologies, saving 10 billion m3 of freshwater that would have been consumed by energy-related uses of fossil fuels."
This basically describes the desired end-state post transition. It says nothing about the transition period itself, when there would presumably be significant stress on water resources from both electrolysis and fossil fuel energy sources. By the way, they say fossil fuel energy sources use water "for cooling, mining, hydraulic fracturing, and refining." So I suppose there's an implicit assumption that the renewable energy supply they stipulate can be achieved without turning up the intensity of mining too much. I have a feeling that might be the biggest assumption of all.
I also noticed that both of the new electrolysis plants mentioned in that article (the 150 MW one and the 260 MW one) are of the alkaline electrolysis type, and not PEM. This is unsurprising since the alkaline electrolysis tech is more mature, and the business case is stronger. The reason this is interesting is that whenever someone makes the case for electrolysis powered by variable renewables, they are usually talking about PEM. In fact, according to the Wikipedia article about PEM, this is one of the chief advantages of this tech:
"One of the largest advantages to PEM electrolysis is its ability to operate at high current densities. This can result in reduced operational costs, especially for systems coupled with very dynamic energy sources such as wind and solar, where sudden spikes in energy input would otherwise result in uncaptured energy."
But as the news story about the Chinese plants shows, when people actually want to build big, they choose alkaline. At least for now.
Pretending that an electrolysis plant has the economics of alkaline and the flexibility of PEM is as misleading as pretending that a power plant has the economics of solar and the flexibility of natural gas. They are both fantasy plants. People, especially experts, should not be allowed to get away with this kind of confusion, which I feel is often deliberate, unfortunately.
Yes. But they do admit it needs a lot of water, which is something that does not get any attention at all. The assumptions are more or less obligatory in the transition narrative, I've found, like the assumption of constantly falling costs for wind and solar. Of course, when they don't pan out, we're all shocked.
There isn't enough natural gas storage, as the recent energy crisis made abundantly clear. There is a large overabundance of room to store hydrogen in Europe - literally decades of energy requirements equivalent of hydrogen can be stored in readily accessible sites - and with the usual caveat about pumped hydro, it's absurdly inexpensive compared to other energy storage technologies .
The infrastructure isn't built and requires investment, but the geological potential is there is overabundance wherever surveys have been conducted - what I've seen are Europe, Australia, North America, and Korea. - e.g. Detlef Stolten (PI of the modeling group, FZJ + key IEA contributor) has been extremely strong on Europe and the whole European Backbone plan rests on this, e.g. https://www.preprints.org/manuscript/201910.0187/v1 + https://gasforclimate2050.eu/ehb/
Bute Energy, which has never before built a wind "farm" but has 21 registered energy parks they plan to construct in Wales, including Nant Mithil atop the ancient hills of the Radnor Forest where I live, is also getting into the hydrogen game having incorporated Bute Hydrogen Limited 22 February 2023: https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/SC759869
As you may well be aware, CIP has invested in hydrogen projects worldwide including in the North Sea where it intends to construct a "hydrogen island." See: https://archive.ph/vypcL
I was wondering if you have looked into hydrogen again recently? When I have looked, there really isn't a lot of critical analysis of the worldwide push for "green" hydrogen. When I first became aware of this a few years ago I balked since the plans were intertwined with the "need" to carpet land and sea with not clean nor green unreliable "renewables."
Green hydrogen is shaping up as an even smellier bubble than wind and solar together, definitely. But all it's getting is hype and billions in investments, most of it just pledged for the time being, I gather.
It most definitely appears that way which is why so many investors are jumping on board. We lowly peasants will of course help to subsidise it through tariffs tacked onto our ever increasing electricity bills as people are pushed further into energy poverty.
From the Telegraph article: "The Government is backing the development of 10GW of low-carbon hydrogen production capacity by 2030, which it plans to pay for through a similar funding scheme as the onshore wind industry." https://archive.ph/dArBl#selection-2841.4-2841.54
Again, great reporting! Honestly, I had not thought of the volume of water, and we all know the inability of energy policy makers to plan past the next election cycle. Great writing.
Thanks, Stu. I've found that being a non-expert sometimes help. As a non-expert I asked myself "If this is made breaking down water just how much water might be necessary?" and it went from there.
Irina, isn't handling the produced gas - h2 - fraught with issues? Is it storable in standard steel tanks?
Yes, hydrogen is hazardous. I think it's more combustible than oil and gas and there have been explosions at hydrogen filling stations, so there's that, too.
I think a wide variety of carbon steels are subject to hydrogen enbrittlement and tanks would require a coating or different alloys. In the case they would want to use existing pipeline infrastructure for transport, this would likely require upgrades to existing pipe.
This is a very good point, thank you for making it.
Hey. I have a novel idea. Let’s use Nuclear power…..
As one who has spent a lot of my career around large industrial plants, I feel certain that hydrogen production plants are not designed to run only in the daytime! Large plants like that MUST run 24/7 to obtain efficiencies to get enough ROI to justify building the plant. Stopping and starting a giant production plant takes an enormous amount of energy, labor and resources. No way you could do it every night. It would be a good research project to verify my experience. Therefore, I agree with Greg: the only way this works is nuclear.
Thanks, Irina. What an interesting topic hydrogen is! You'd think people would be afraid of the stuff given the historical record, but somehow most people seem cool with it.
The authors of the cited text (Does green hydrogen have a water problem?) seem to draw a different conclusion than you do. At the end of their introduction they say:
"[W]e find that [...] there is a negligible impact of the amount of water consumed for hydrogen production compared to the amount of water available."
And in the conclusion:
"[W]ater supply will not be the limitation for electrolyzers, and we should instead continue to focus on technological improvements for the energy efficiency of electrolyzers, which is currently the limiting factor and has the potential for significant advancements."
They make some pretty big assumptions, however. Like this one:
"[H]ydrogen will be produced by water electrolysis powered by renewable energy."
That, according to the piece you cited about the new Chinese plant, "the Baofeng facility might also be run using grid electricity when the sun is not shining" shows that this assumption is questionable at best. Here's another big one:
"[E]lectrolysis will render fossil fuel energy sources obsolete as the energy sector is able to move more toward renewable technologies, saving 10 billion m3 of freshwater that would have been consumed by energy-related uses of fossil fuels."
This basically describes the desired end-state post transition. It says nothing about the transition period itself, when there would presumably be significant stress on water resources from both electrolysis and fossil fuel energy sources. By the way, they say fossil fuel energy sources use water "for cooling, mining, hydraulic fracturing, and refining." So I suppose there's an implicit assumption that the renewable energy supply they stipulate can be achieved without turning up the intensity of mining too much. I have a feeling that might be the biggest assumption of all.
I also noticed that both of the new electrolysis plants mentioned in that article (the 150 MW one and the 260 MW one) are of the alkaline electrolysis type, and not PEM. This is unsurprising since the alkaline electrolysis tech is more mature, and the business case is stronger. The reason this is interesting is that whenever someone makes the case for electrolysis powered by variable renewables, they are usually talking about PEM. In fact, according to the Wikipedia article about PEM, this is one of the chief advantages of this tech:
"One of the largest advantages to PEM electrolysis is its ability to operate at high current densities. This can result in reduced operational costs, especially for systems coupled with very dynamic energy sources such as wind and solar, where sudden spikes in energy input would otherwise result in uncaptured energy."
But as the news story about the Chinese plants shows, when people actually want to build big, they choose alkaline. At least for now.
Pretending that an electrolysis plant has the economics of alkaline and the flexibility of PEM is as misleading as pretending that a power plant has the economics of solar and the flexibility of natural gas. They are both fantasy plants. People, especially experts, should not be allowed to get away with this kind of confusion, which I feel is often deliberate, unfortunately.
Yes. But they do admit it needs a lot of water, which is something that does not get any attention at all. The assumptions are more or less obligatory in the transition narrative, I've found, like the assumption of constantly falling costs for wind and solar. Of course, when they don't pan out, we're all shocked.
Please help me here please?.....................
So the idea is to use electricity in order to produce hydrogen via a very circuitous route with lots of wastage and inefficiencies?
What are we supposed to use the hydrogen for? Heating and transport?
Surely easier and less wasteful to cut out the middleman and use electricity directly?
I can only assume that the idea is to use the production of hydrogen as a sort of very inefficient battery?
Am I missing something ?
Heating, transport (eventually, when the costs fall) and energy storage. Also ammonia production, I believe.
There isn't enough natural gas storage, as the recent energy crisis made abundantly clear. There is a large overabundance of room to store hydrogen in Europe - literally decades of energy requirements equivalent of hydrogen can be stored in readily accessible sites - and with the usual caveat about pumped hydro, it's absurdly inexpensive compared to other energy storage technologies .
I'm a bit confused -- there aren't enough caverns for gas but there are more than enough for hydrogen?
The infrastructure isn't built and requires investment, but the geological potential is there is overabundance wherever surveys have been conducted - what I've seen are Europe, Australia, North America, and Korea. - e.g. Detlef Stolten (PI of the modeling group, FZJ + key IEA contributor) has been extremely strong on Europe and the whole European Backbone plan rests on this, e.g. https://www.preprints.org/manuscript/201910.0187/v1 + https://gasforclimate2050.eu/ehb/
Thank you for writing this Irina.
They announced yesterday in the UK that "Household costs could soar from 2025 to fund the development of hydrogen gas." Source: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/05/18/net-zero-hydrogen-gas-rising-energy-bills/
Bute Energy, which has never before built a wind "farm" but has 21 registered energy parks they plan to construct in Wales, including Nant Mithil atop the ancient hills of the Radnor Forest where I live, is also getting into the hydrogen game having incorporated Bute Hydrogen Limited 22 February 2023: https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/SC759869
Bute has been working in partnership with Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP) officially since February 2023: https://renews.biz/75828/cip-bute-team-up-to-develop-2gw-welsh-renewables/
As you may well be aware, CIP has invested in hydrogen projects worldwide including in the North Sea where it intends to construct a "hydrogen island." See: https://archive.ph/vypcL
I was wondering if you have looked into hydrogen again recently? When I have looked, there really isn't a lot of critical analysis of the worldwide push for "green" hydrogen. When I first became aware of this a few years ago I balked since the plans were intertwined with the "need" to carpet land and sea with not clean nor green unreliable "renewables."
This was published in February 2023: "Green hydrogen is no longer a pipe dream — it will be a significant element in deep decarbonisation worldwide: Stefan J. Reichelstein" https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/et-evoke/green-hydrogen-is-no-longer-a-pipe-dream-it-will-be-a-significant-element-in-deep-decarbonisation-worldwide-stefan-j-reichelstein/articleshow/97782083.cms
Green hydrogen is shaping up as an even smellier bubble than wind and solar together, definitely. But all it's getting is hype and billions in investments, most of it just pledged for the time being, I gather.
It most definitely appears that way which is why so many investors are jumping on board. We lowly peasants will of course help to subsidise it through tariffs tacked onto our ever increasing electricity bills as people are pushed further into energy poverty.
From the Telegraph article: "The Government is backing the development of 10GW of low-carbon hydrogen production capacity by 2030, which it plans to pay for through a similar funding scheme as the onshore wind industry." https://archive.ph/dArBl#selection-2841.4-2841.54
Yep. Unless investors wake up to the non-returnability of their investments. We clearly can't count on rationality from governments.