The Russian-Ukrainian war is putting additional pressure on the kettle of energy transition. Our customers are also increasingly looking for alternatives to fossil fuels. The question of whether hydrogen can also play a role in their projects is becoming increasingly louder. Is hydrogen really the panacea for all applications? To get everyone moving in the same direction, Ingenium developed a strategy and vision based on various national and international sources.
Unlike fossil fuels, hydrogen contains no carbon. Therefore, there are no CO2 emissions from combustion or other reactions. Moreover, hydrogen is already used in industry, mainly in hydrocracking and sulfur reduction in oil refineries, and in the production of ammonia, methanol and steel. As a result, all the building blocks for storage, transportation and safe handling are known. Setting up large-scale hydrogen infrastructure or converting the current natural gas infrastructure is therefore possible in principle. The key to greater sustainability lies only in the production of hydrogen.
Broadly speaking, there are two methods of producing hydrogen: from (fossil) fuels - by steam reforming or pyrolysis - or from electricity with an electrolyser. Today, just about all hydrogen produced is "gray. This involves cracking natural gas, resulting in high CO2 emissions. With "blue" hydrogen, the CO2 is captured, but this has yet to be proven in practice. Green" hydrogen also uses an electrolyser, but this operates entirely on renewable energy, making its production virtually emission-free.
The study "The Future of Hydrogen" calculated the most profitable locations worldwide to produce yellow hydrogen - green hydrogen based on PV plants. It shows that Western Europe is not an interesting region for this production, that the most interesting regions are farthest from areas of high energy demand and, moreover, are themselves the driest regions in the world. The latter is important because electrolysis-based hydrogen production always requires (pure) water. Thus, with renewable energy and pure water as two scarce resources, yellow hydrogen by definition also becomes a scarce resource that must be used thoughtfully.
Based on the Hydrogen Ladder (Natuur en Milieu Nederland) and the Belgian Federal Hydrogen Strategy, we can better assess for which applications hydrogen is indeed a sustainable alternative. It is almost certain that green hydrogen will play a priority role in industrial processes requiring very high temperatures, such as fertilizer and steel production. For low-grade industrial process heat, there is already a viable alternative, namely electricity-based heat (via heat pump or resistance heating).
For transportation, too, the answer is nuanced. Light and short-distance traffic benefits more from a further breakthrough in electrification, while for heavy and long-distance traffic, green hydrogen - converted into more easily manageable forms such as ammonia - may well be a possible solution.
Mind you, this green hydrogen will mainly have to be imported from other parts of the world. The idea that Europe can become completely energy independent is unrealistic because in our energy-intensive region we will have difficulty producing enough good-quality green energy.
The question we get most often at the moment is whether hydrogen can be an alternative for building heating. For most buildings, the answer is a clear: no. The main ingredients for sustainable heating remain insulation, low-temperature (45°C) heating systems and a sustainable heat grid or heat pump. Moreover, insulation still helps best in taming the energy bill.Starting from renewable electricity, the energetic efficiency of a heat pump is six times that of the entire hydrogen chain.
Where insulation and low-temperature heating are not possible - as with some heritage buildings - we continue to investigate possible solutions.
Hydrogen has great potential to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. In the short term, however, we see applications mainly in some intensive industrial processes. For most other applications, including building heating, electrification seems a better solution. We also currently see no reason why this would change in the medium or long term.
Want to know more about our hydrogen vision and the possibilities for your project? Contact Thomas Koch at 050 40 45 30 or thomas.koch@ingenium.be.
