German industrial park boss Kreysing: "We will have to import large quantities of hydrogen"

"Hydrogen will be available faster than many believe, says Joachim Kreysing, managing director of the industrial park operator Infraserv Höchst. He also believes that hydrogen will be affordable in the future.

Mr. Kreysing, the Federal Chancellor and the Federal Minister for Economic Affairs recently signed letters of intent for hydrogen deliveries with Canada and Saudi Arabia. Is this a substitute for lost natural gas, will this energy source help us out of the crisis?

 

Hydrogen cannot solve the energy supply problems in the next two to five years. There is simply a lack of production capacity and infrastructure for transporting hydrogen. Their construction takes time.

The strategies for the energy transition state that relevant quantities of hydrogen can be available from 2030 onwards. Is this realistic?

I think that in about five years there will be significantly more opportunities for hydrogen production in Europe and imports to Europe.

In which countries do you see corresponding preparations?

In Germany there are many, but rather smaller project initiatives. In Europe, countries like Spain and the Netherlands are very active.

 

 In principle, all countries that have a high proportion of hours of sunshine or wind are predestined for hydrogen production. 

 

When we think about international cooperation, factors such as political stability and transport routes also play an important role. Australia could become a major hydrogen producer, as could Saudi Arabia, South American countries such as Chile or African countries such as Namibia.

Everywhere there the production facilities would have to be built, and many ships would have to travel halfway around the world to cover our energy needs. That doesn't sound like a cheap form of energy generation.

There will be two ways we can source hydrogen. The easiest way are pipeline connections, which can be used for transport within Europe or from North Africa. Transport by ship is more complex and therefore more expensive, and it is no longer so important whether a longer or shorter distance has to be covered. In principle, ship transport is associated with significantly higher costs.

Ship transport is not yet technologically mature. To do this, the hydrogen would have to be liquefied, which requires enormous amounts of energy and would make the gas very expensive.

There are probably better ideas than the variant of liquefying the hydrogen. 

 

Personally, I find the plan very charming to convert the hydrogen obtained from the sun or wind into green methane [1], i.e. into a kind of green natural gas, while still at the production site. Then transport would be possible with the existing natural gas infrastructure: with LNG ships and gas pipelines. 

 

There is a company called TES that will build an LNG terminal in Wilhelmshaven, through which fossil LNG will first come into the country and then green LNG as early as 2026.

Projects like this require a lot of money and the appropriate legal framework. Investors are ready, but regulation is still being debated.

It is also about the question of which hydrogen can be considered green, i.e. was produced without emitting carbon dioxide. The EU Commission has very rigid ideas as to where the renewable energy for hydrogen production may come from. However, such strong restrictions would limit the market ramp-up and thus slow down the energy transition.

Brussels is trying to prevent the electricity from renewable sources, which will be scarce in the foreseeable future, from flowing into the more inefficient but potentially profitable hydrogen production instead of being used directly.

There is this nice quote that hydrogen is the champagne of the energy sources for the energy transition and can therefore be used very sparingly. This is understandable for hydrogen production with renewable electricity, which is generated here in Hesse.

 

 But that is not enough to achieve the climate goals, because in future we will not only obtain renewable energies from Germany and Europe, but will have to import large quantities. And we will have to import this energy as hydrogen and not as electricity.

 

Not only the hydrogen strategy of the state of Hesse assumes that we will transport and use energy primarily as electricity in the future. Only where battery operation does not seem possible, such as in aviation, do molecular energy apply energy storage in gases such as hydrogen, as useful.

That's the idea of ​​an all-electric society, which I don't think is expedient and unrealistic. We currently only use 20 percent of energy in the form of electricity, the remaining 80 percent comes from gas, oil, wood, etc. We will not be able to produce the quantities of renewable electricity required for full electrification, nor will we be able to expand the power grids to do so I don't think it's feasible. 

 

It would also be downright negligent to abandon the existing infrastructure for the distribution of gaseous energy carriers.

 

So why is politics rejecting this supposedly easier path?

The policy approach of initially focusing use on certain sectors is understandable as long as there are no opportunities to import hydrogen. But the solution will look different in the end, and I can now see a rethink.

So electric cars and heat pumps could ultimately go down in history as transitional technologies and the fuel cell still win the race?

It's not an either/or. Most passenger cars can run well with batteries, but the question arises as to whether it makes sense to modify the entire building stock in the heating sector in such a way that heat pumps can be used exclusively. This is sometimes more inefficient than using green hydrogen. However, this inefficiency tends to be overlooked by some politicians, while the high costs and efficiency losses in hydrogen production are almost overemphasized.

But green hydrogen is much more expensive than electricity from wind or sun.

This applies to green hydrogen, which is produced in this country on the basis of high electricity prices. In countries with many hours of sunshine, it can be produced much more cheaply. 

 

There are studies according to which the production costs there can be reduced to two euros per kilogram or less by 2030.

 

How expensive is that compared to today's price and fossil fuels?

 

At the moment, a kilogram of hydrogen costs 12 euros at the filling station. With production costs of 2 euros, converted into megawatts, we would be around 50 euros per megawatt hour. Natural gas currently costs 200 euros per megawatt hour, but for a long time it was just over 20 euros. But with a production price of 2 euros per kilogram, hydrogen would certainly be competitive.

 

Nobody has managed it yet, but you and other companies from Hessen have warned that the federal state must be more committed to arming itself for the hydrogen future.

Hessen in particular, as an energy importing country, must create the infrastructure so that in a few years hydrogen can reach us in larger quantities.

What to do?

The concrete planning of a distribution grid for the Rhine-Main region could already begin now. There are already initial impulses for a pipeline system here in Rhein-Main. We must also ensure that the region is connected to the large transnational networks. We have good prerequisites for this, the industrial park already functions as a hydrogen hub.

Does today's demand justify an expansion of production capacities?

Based on the inquiries, we are noticing that the demand for hydrogen is increasing significantly. We are therefore currently expanding our trailer station so that we can supply even more customers.

Infraserv Höchst is currently the largest hydrogen supplier in the region?

Yes, we have two hydrogen sources here. On the one hand it is available as a by-product from the chlor-alkali electrolysis, on the other hand we have built a water electrolyser so that in future we can seamlessly supply the fuel trains that will run on the Taunusbahn and refuel in the industrial park.

Where else is the gas used?

On the one hand, hydrogen has long been used as a raw material in some production processes. There has been a hydrogen filling station at the industrial park since 2006, where cars, buses and trucks can fill up. Fuel cell buses have been driving in the industrial park for several years. And by filling so-called trailer trucks, customers in the region can be supplied.

When the Taunusbahn with its up to 27 trains is added in December, will the resources then be exhausted?

No, not yet, we could supply a much larger fleet. We have also reserved amounts of hydrogen for the start-up Ineratec, which wants to build a pioneering plant for the production of e-fuels for aviation here in Höchst. Only when this production has ramped up will we reach the limit with our current capacities.

And everyone else then has to wait until import volumes increase?

I see the ramp-up in three phases: In the short term, it makes sense to produce more hydrogen here in the industrial park or in the region and to cover the needs for other projects. In the medium term we can possibly increase the available quantities in the second phase via the green methane mentioned and bridge the gap until the large quantities arrive here via pipelines."

1. “The Sabatier reaction or Sabatier process produces methane and water from a reaction of hydrogen with carbon dioxide at elevated temperatures (optimally 300–400 °C) and pressures (perhaps 3 MPa) in the presence of a nickel catalyst.”