Skip to main content

EU split over hydrogen transport.

 

hydrogen transport

Ambitious plans to build a €2.5bn undersea hydrogen pipeline between Spain and France are exposing divisions over the best way to transport energy from southern Europe to the continent’s northern industrial heartland. Green hydrogen’s potential is unproven as it is not yet produced commercially. However, it struck a deal with the port of Rotterdam in September to create a «green hydrogen corridor» to bring the fuel from Spain to northern Europe. Initially, from 2027, the corridor will be a shipping route as Cepsa plans to convert green hydrogen into ammonia and then transport it by boat from the Spanish port of Algeciras.
The green hydrogen will come from planned Cepsa plants in Campo de Gibraltar and Palos de la Frontera that will produce up to 300,000 tonnes of fuel a year. The EU aims to produce 10mn tonnes of renewable hydrogen by 2030 and match it with the same volume of imports, according to plans for REPowerEU, an energy transition fund. Iberdrola, Spain’s biggest energy company, is also investing in hydrogen production but has taken an opposing position on the undersea pipeline. «The most efficient way to produce hydrogen is local, transporting the green electricity needed to make it from elsewhere, if necessary,» said Ignacio Galán, executive chair.

The argument against hydrogen pipelines is that they would cost more than natural gas pipelines and entail significant engineering challenges because the technology for long-distance transportation of the fuel, which is highly flammable, does not yet exist. Iberdrola’s investments assume that heavy industry will use hydrogen near where it is made. The installation in Puertollano, Castile-La Mancha, includes a 100MW solar array that powers an electrolyser to separate hydrogen from water, then sends it to an adjacent plant where another company, Fertiberia, uses it to make fertiliser. For Germany, Iberdrola’s vision dictates that the best way to secure hydrogen supplies would be to produce the fuel using electricity generated by renewables.

Another sceptic on long-distance hydrogen exports is Lluís Noguera, chief executive of X-Elio, one of Spain’s longest-standing solar power developers. He believes renewable power is vital in producing hydrogen but says insufficient space to build power generation facilities for electrolysers is available next to most steel and cement plants or refineries. Noguera said electricity should be produced where the sun shone and then sent via the grid to industrial sites so «the renewable power comes from where it makes sense to produce it, and the hydrogen comes from where it makes sense to consume it». Hydrogen export advocates say it would be cheaper to move hydrogen than electricity.

It would cost €5/MWh to transport the gas in a 1,000km pipeline against €12/MWh to send the equivalent electricity via an overhead AC power line, according to the European Hydrogen Backbone, a group of pro-pipeline energy operators. They also say more energy is lost in transmitting electricity than piping hydrogen. Wetselaar said the main flaw in the argument for exporting electricity was that Europe’s grid was «undersized» and looked set to remain so. As a result, it would not be able to transport much power to produce hydrogen, especially once the demand for electric vehicles accelerated. Moreover, securing approval for high-voltage cables was much more challenging than for underground pipelines.

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Cloud Bookkeeping

US FED rate rise.

  The US Federal Reserve officials have indicated that they plan to resume increasing interest rates to control inflation in the world's biggest economy. During the June meeting, the Federal Open Market Committee reached a consensus to keep interest rates stable for the time being to evaluate whether further tightening of policy would be necessary. However, the majority of the committee anticipates that additional rate increases will be required in the future. The minutes of the meeting have recently been made public. According to the minutes, most participants believed maintaining the federal funds rate at 5 to 5.25 per cent was appropriate or acceptable, despite some individuals wanting to raise the acceleration due to slow progress in cooling inflation. Although Fed forecasts predicted a mild recession starting later in the year, policymakers faced challenges in interpreting data that showed a tight job market and only slight improvements in inflation. Additionally, officials gr...
Post a Comment
Read more

India- UK trade deal.

  According to India's top trade official, talks with the UK regarding a trade agreement are progressing well, despite obstacles related to temporary work visas and the opening up industries like automotive and spirits. The Commerce and Industry Minister, Piyush Goyal, explained that India is seeking transition periods or greater market access in specific sectors due to its economy, which is slightly larger than the UK's and expected to outgrow it in the coming decades. If a trade deal is reached, it would be one of the most significant agreements for Britain since leaving the EU, and it would also be necessary for India, which surpassed the UK as the fifth-largest economy last year. Goyal stated that India aims to increase its economy from $3.5tn to $35tn by 2047, the country's centenary of independence. According to officials and diplomats in India, talks about a proposed trade deal may be finished by early September, just in time for the G20 summit in New Delhi. Nigel Hu...
Post a Comment
Read more

EU business slide.

  S&P Global’s flash eurozone composite purchasing managers’ index, a key gauge of business conditions for the manufacturing and services sector, fell 1 point to 47.1, figures showed yesterday. That is its lowest level since November 2020 and the fourth consecutive month below the crucial 50 mark separating growth from contraction. One of the few bright spots in the survey was that companies in all sectors reported a slight easing of cost pressures, price growth and supply chain constraints. However, prices charged for goods and services still rose at the sixth fastest rate since such data started in 2002. Jobs growth increased marginally from October but remained low compared with the past 18 months. Following a few months of falling price pressure in manufacturing and services, the October print shows an overall stabilisation said Jens Eisenschmidt, chief European economist at Morgan Stanley. However, German businesses, at the hub of Europe’s energy crisis, reported that manu...
1 comment
Read more