Policy & Socio-Economics

Hydrogen holds an important strategic position in the energy systems of many countries. Many studies have analyzed the acceptance of hydrogen energy technology from the public’s perspective but few have examined it from the corporate perspective. This paper establishes a technology acceptance model and employs structural equation modeling to investigate the factors affecting the acceptance of hydrogen energy technology within enterprises. After conducting questionnaire surveys among employees of energy enterprises electric power companies and new energy vehicle manufacturers the results indicate that while most of the interviewed enterprises have positive attitudes towards hydrogen technology their willingness to develop hydrogen business does not appear to be correspondingly positive. In addition government trust perceived benefit and social influence positively impact corporate acceptability indirectly whereas perceived risk exhibits a negative indirect effect on corporate acceptance. Finally this paper discusses the results of the above studies and makes corresponding policy recommendations.

Côte d’Ivoire has substantially neglected crop residues from farms in rural areas so this study aimed to provide strategies for the sustainable conversion of these products to hydrogen. The use of existing data showed that in the Côte d’Ivoire there were up to 16801306 tons of crop residues from 11 crop types in 2019 from which 1296424.84 tons of hydrogen could potentially be derived via theoretical gasification and dark fermentation approaches. As 907497.39 tons of hydrogen is expected annually the following estimations were derived. The three hydrogen-project implementation scenarios developed indicate that Ivorian industries could be supplied with 9026635 gigajoules of heat alongside 17910 cars and 4732 buses in the transport sector. It was estimated that 817293.95 tons of green ammonia could be supplied to farmers. According to the study 5727992 households could be expected to have access to 1718.40 gigawatts of electricity. Due to these changes in the transport energy industry and agricultural sectors a reduction of 1644722.08 tons of carbon dioxide per year could theoretically be achieved. With these scenarios around 263276.87 tons of hydrogen could be exported to other countries. The conversion of crop residues to hydrogen is a promising opportunity with environmental and socio-economic impacts. Therefore this study requires further extensive research.

The global resurgence of hydrogen as a clean energy source particularly green hydrogen derived from renewable energy is pivotal for achieving a carbon-neutral future. However scalability poses a significant challenge. This research proposes innovative business models leveraging the low-emission property of green hydrogen to reduce its financial costs thereby fostering its widespread adoption. Key components of the business workflow are elaborated mathematical formulations of market parameters are derived and case studies are presented to demonstrate the feasibility and efficiency of these models. Results demonstrate that the substantial costs associated with the current hydrogen industry can be effectively subsidized via the implementation of proposed business models. When the carbon emission price falls within the range of approximately 86–105 USD/ton free access to hydrogen becomes a viable option for end-users. This highlights the significance and promising potential of the proposed business models within the green hydrogen credit framework.

Hydrogen is set to become an important energy carrier in Germany in the next decades in the country’s quest to reach the target of climate neutrality by 2045. To meet Germany’s potential green hydrogen demand of up to 587 to 1143 TWh by 2045 electrolyser capacities between 7 and 71 GW by 2030 and between 137 to 275 GW by 2050 are required. Presently the capacities for electrolysis are small (around 153 MW) and even with an increase in electrolysis capacity of >1 GW per year Germany will still need to import large quantities of hydrogen to meet its future demand. This work examines the expected green hydrogen demand in different sectors describes the available technologies and highlights the current situation and challenges that need to be addressed in the next years to reach Germany’s climate goals with regard to scaling up production infrastructure development and transport as well as developing the demand for green hydrogen.

The disruption associated with heat decarbonisation has been identified as a key opportunity for hydrogen technologies in temperate countries and regions where established distribution infrastructure and familiarity with natural gas boilers predominate. A key element of such claims is the empirically untested belief that citizens will prefer to minimise disruption and perceive hydrogen to be less disruptive than the network upgrades and retrofit measures needed to support electric and other low carbon heating technologies. This article reports on exploratory deliberative research with residents of Cardiff Wales which examined public perceptions of heating disruptions. Our findings suggest that concerns over public responses to disruption may be overstated particularly as they relate to construction and road excavation for network upgrade. Disruptions arising from permanent changes to building fabric may be more problematic for heat pump retrofit however these may be greatly overshadowed by anxieties over the cost implications of moving to hydrogen fuel. Furthermore the biographical patterning of citizen preferences raises significant questions for hydrogen roll-out strategies relying on regionalised network conversion. We conclude by arguing that far from a non-disruptive alternative to electrification hydrogen risks being seen as posing substantial disruptions to precarious household finances and lifestyles.

This paper investigates the untapped potential of the Permian Basin a multifaceted energy axis in Texas and adjoining states in the emerging era of decarbonization. Aligned with current policy directives on regional hydrogen hubs this study explores the viability of developing a hydrogen energy hub in the Permian Basin thereby producing low-carbon intensity hydrogen from natural gas in the Basin and transporting it to the Greater Houston area. Diverging from existing literature this study provides an integrated techno-economic evaluation of the entire hydrogen value chain in the Permian Basin encompassing production storage and transportation. Furthermore it comparatively analyzes the scenario of interest against an optimized base scenario thereby underlining comparative advantages and disadvantages. The paper concludes that the delivered cost of Permian based low-carbon intensity hydrogen to the Greater Houston area is $1.85/kg benchmarked to the scenario with hydrogen produced close to the Greater Houston area and delivered at $1.42/kg. Our findings reveal that Permian-based low-carbon intensity hydrogen production can achieve cost savings in feedstock ($0.25/kg) and potentially accrue a higher production tax credit due to a shorter gas supply chain to production ($0.33/kg). Nevertheless a significant cost barrier is the expense of long-haul pipeline transport ($0.90/kg) from the Permian Basin to Houston as opposed to local production. Despite the obstacles the study identifies a potential breakeven solution where increasing the production scale to at least 412000 metric ton per year (about 3 steam reforming plants) in the Permian Basin can effectively lower costs in the transport sector. Hence a scaled-up production can mitigate the cost difference and establish the Permian Basin as a competitive player in the hydrogen market. In conclusion a SWOT analysis presents Strengths Weaknesses Opportunities and Threats associated with Permian-based hydrogen production.

The primary motivation of the present study is to mitigate the severe impact of ongoing energy resource shortages while offering clean and sustainable energy carriers such as hydrogen and ammonia. The present system mainly encompasses water splitting and the Haber-Bosch (HB) processes for green hydrogen and ammonia synthesis using solar and wind power respectively. Pointwise quantification analyses are conducted to quantify the power hydrogen and ammonia as well as the economic parameters specifically the levelized cost of energy (LCOE) levelized cost of hydrogen (LCOH) and levelized cost of ammonia (LCOA). This analysis is based on meteorological data from three sites in Egypt considering the specific water and nitrogen requirements for hydrogen and ammonia synthesis respectively. Furthermore carbon dioxide mitigation from solar and wind systems is estimated. These respective sites are Jarjoub on the coastlines of the Mediterranean Sea and Ain Sokhna and Jabal Al-Zait on the coastlines of the Red Sea. The results indicate that the lowest values of LCOE LCOH and LCOA are 12.58 $/MWh 1.91 $/kg H2 and 396.1 $/Ton NH3 respectively which were attained using solar resources at Ain Sokhna geographical site at the Red Sea. Besides Jarjoub which is located in the Mediterranean Sea could attain LCOH of 2.15 $/kg which is still a promising option due to its export potential to Europe. However the use of wind resources is incompetent for solar counterparts in the respective sites; their potential application in Egypt is still promising. The results demonstrate that Jabal Al-Zait stands as a favorable location for green power hydrogen and ammonia synthesis using wind resources which has LCOE LCOH and LCOA of 23.67 $/MWh 2.75 $/kg H2 and 547.8 $/Ton NH3 respectively.

Hydrogen and its derivatives are important components to achieve climate policy goals especially in terms of greenhouse gas neutrality. There is an ongoing controversial debate about the applications in which hydrogen and its derivatives should be used and to what extent. Typically the estimation of hydrogen demand relies on scenario-based analyses with varying underlying assumptions and targets. This study establishes a new framework consisting of existing energy system simulation and optimisation models in order to assess the long-term price-elastic demand of hydrogen. The aim of this work is to shift towards an analysis of the hydrogen demand that is primarily driven by its price. This is done for the case of Germany because of the expected high hydrogen demand for the years 2025–2045. 15 wholesale price pathways were established with final prices in 2045 between 56 €/MWh and 182 €/MWh. The results suggest that – if climate targets are to be achieved - even with high hydrogen prices (252 €/MWh in 2030 and 182 €/MWh in 2045) a significant hydrogen demand in the industry sector and the energy conversion sector is expected to emerge (318 TWh). Furthermore the energy conversion sector has a large share of price sensitive hydrogen demand and therefore its demand strongly increases with lower prices. The road transportation sector will only play a small role in terms of hydrogen demand if prices are low. In the decentralised heating for buildings no relevant demand will be seen over the considered price ranges whereas the centralised supply of heat via heat grids increases as prices fall.

This report outlines the methods and assumptions used in the hydrogen technology market analysis. The results of the analysis are presented in The UK Hydrogen Innovation Opportunity and the supporting report Hydrogen technology roadmaps. They include forecasts for the following market data:

○ Global hydrogen economy The overall size of the global hydrogen economy in 2023 2030 and 2050.

○ Global and UK hydrogen technology market by technology family

This is the proportion of the total future hydrogen economy attributable to hydrogen-related technologies in 2023 2030 and 2050. The hydrogen economy is defined as the ‘end-to-end’ value created from hydrogen production storage & distribution and use. This includes the direct economic value associated with production and distribution of hydrogen as a fuel or chemical feedstock hydrogen infrastructure technologies products services and the indirect economic value created through products and services that indirectly support the use of hydrogen in industry transport power generation and heating. This endto-end definition of the hydrogen economy is represented in Figure 1 overleaf.

This report can also be downloaded for free on the Hydrogen Innovation Initiative website.

Acting in accordance with the requirements of the 2015 Paris Agreement Poland as well as other European Union countries have committed to achieving climate neutrality by 2050. One of the solutions to reduce emissions of harmful substances into the environment is the implementation of large-scale hydrogen technologies. This article presents the cost of producing green hydrogen produced using an alkaline electrolyzer with electricity supplied from a photovoltaic farm. The analysis was performed using the Monte Carlo method and for baseline assumptions including an electricity price of 0.053 EUR/kWh the cost of producing green hydrogen was 5.321 EUR/kgH2 . In addition this article presents a sensitivity analysis showing the impact of the electricity price before and after the energy crisis and other variables on the cost of green hydrogen production. The large change occurring in electricity prices (from 0.035 EUR/kWh to 0.24 EUR/kWh) significantly affected the levelized cost of green hydrogen (LCOH) which could change by up to 14 EUR/kgH2 in recent years. The results of the analysis showed that the parameters that successively have the greatest impact on the cost of green hydrogen production are the operating time of the plant and the unit capital expenditure. The development of green hydrogen production facilities along with the scaling of technology in the future can reduce the cost of its production.