Saudi Arabia Wants To Supply Europe With Green Hydrogen

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Hydrogen. The phrase conjures up visions of a courageous new world with ample, zero-emissions power and plenty of inexperienced metal. In brief, hydrogen is seen because the marvel drug that may permit people to benefit from the way of life to which they’ve turn into accustomed with out inflicting the planet to overheat. It’s not stunning such a wondrous prospect has many supporters clapping and cheering. There are few clouds on the hydrogen horizon, nonetheless.

For one factor, making green hydrogen entails splitting water into its element atoms — hydrogen and oxygen — utilizing electrical energy. If that electrical energy is comprised of thermal technology that depends on coal or methane, the ensuing hydrogen can’t declare to be inexperienced. The electrolyzers wanted are additionally voracious customers of electrical energy. There’s merely not sufficient renewable power out there in most locations on the planet to provide all of the electrons wanted to function them. Lastly, the price of inexperienced hydrogen is thrice — or extra — larger than the price of hydrogen comprised of methane fuel. Technological wonders are all properly and good within the laboratory, however of little curiosity to the world of commerce except they’re value aggressive. In an ideal world, saving people from being cooked by a warmer planet would carry nice weight, however in actuality, except it may be performed cheaply, nobody cares.

Saudi Arabia has peered into the longer term and seen there could also be a time when it has no extra oil to promote, and so it needs to transition to promoting inexperienced hydrogen as a substitute. It wish to assist the world scale back its carbon emissions, which is relatively ironic contemplating that it has been the first supply of these emissions for the previous 70 years or so. Nonetheless, at COP 29 on Baku final yr, Wesam Al-Ghamdi, CEO of NOEM Inexperienced Hydrogen Firm, introduced that the world’s largest inexperienced hydrogen facility is on monitor to start manufacturing in December of 2026. He enthused that the venture is “being built at a scale no one has attempted before,” and can rely completely on photo voltaic and wind power to energy a 2.2 gigawatt electrolyzer that may produce hydrogen repeatedly.

Utilizing Saudi Arabia’s ample photo voltaic and wind power will scale back the manufacturing bills and make the inexperienced hydrogen extra commercially viable. “We have the abundance of solar and wind, so we have that renewable power competitive advantage,” he mentioned. That value benefit is predicted to make the inexperienced hydrogen produced cheaper than what is accessible from different world suppliers. Whether or not will probably be cheaper than the grey hydrogen comprised of methane immediately is a query he didn’t tackle.

The venture is situated inside NEOM, a $1.5 trillion planned city situated within the northwest nook of Saudi Arabia that’s not anticipated to be accomplished till 2040. Unfold throughout greater than 10,000 sq. miles, it’s anticipated to incorporate a floating industrial complicated, a worldwide buying and selling hub, a number of vacationer resorts, and a linear metropolis powered by renewable power sources. It’s a part of Saudi Arabia’s broader Imaginative and prescient 2030 initiative designed to scale back the nation’s financial reliance on oil by increasing into new industries equivalent to renewable power, tourism, and know-how. “Our goal isn’t just to produce hydrogen but to build a foundation of expertise here in Saudi Arabia,” Al-Ghamdi advised Arab Information, and added that the venture seeks to construct a long-lasting expertise base within the nation.

With world curiosity in hydrogen accelerating, he sees the venture as particularly properly positioned to capitalize on Saudi Arabia’s pure benefits. “We have the scale, location, and the partnerships in place that give us a significant lead,” he mentioned, describing NGHC as a possible mannequin for Saudi Arabia’s broader push into renewable power and a major a part of Imaginative and prescient 2030’s financial transformation objectives, NGHC has signed a 30-year distribution contract with Air Merchandise to convey its inexperienced hydrogen to worldwide markets within the type of ammonia, which makes it simpler to move and distribute.

SEFE Indicators Hydrogen Deal

NGHC will not be the one firm in Saudi Arabia that’s making inexperienced hydrogen a central a part of its future. Securing Vitality for Europe (SEFE) in Berlin, an instrumentality of the German authorities, has signed a letter of intent with Saudi-based ACWA Energy to provide it with 200,000 tons of inexperienced hydrogen starting in 2030. Is there a necessity for a lot inexperienced hydrogen? One metal plant in Duisburg is predicted to require 143,000 tons of it per yr.

In keeping with Handelsblattin a local weather impartial financial system, hydrogen will play a significant function alongside renewable electrical energy in a transition to a low or zero emissions financial system. Hydrogen fuel will be burned to generate electrical energy in energy crops when there’s not sufficient wind and solar energy. It can be used as a substitute of coke in blast furnaces for metal manufacturing, which can get rid of a number of the enormous quantities of carbon dioxide created by conventional metal making processes.

ACWA Energy will act as a number one developer, investor, and operator of manufacturing crops for inexperienced hydrogen and inexperienced ammonia, whereas SEFE shall be a co-investor and principal buyer. It’ll use its place as one in all Europe’s largest power merchants to market inexperienced hydrogen to German and European clients. The letter of intent was signed within the presence of German finance minister Jörg Kukies and Saudi power minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman. SEFE was beforehand often known as GazpromGermania and was a subsidiary of Russia’s nationwide methane producers, Gazprom. After Russian invaded Ukraine — which sparked an power disaster in Europe, particularly in Germany — the corporate was nationalized and the title modified.

SEFE has already concluded different agreements on hydrogen imports. In November 2024, the corporate introduced a cooperation with the Brazilian power producer Elektrobras for 200,000 tons of inexperienced hydrogen per yr starting in 2030. That contract is open-ended with no specified finish date. In December 2023, SEFE and the Norwegian firm Equinor signed a letter of intent for the German firm to turn into a long run purchaser of low carbon hydrogen from Equinor between 2029 and 2060. The preliminary purpose is to provide 5 terawatt hours per yr, which shall be elevated to as much as 40 terawatt hours per yr between 2050 and 2060. Simply precisely what constitutes low carbon hydrogen will not be clarified within the Handelsblatt article. Norway does have ample hydropower sources, however Equinor can also be a significant methane producer.

The Conversion Issue

Hydrogen is damnably tough to move. It reacts with many different parts. It leaks from each doable supply. It may be transformed to a liquid, nevertheless it needs to be chilled to -253º C (-423º F) first and stored at that temperature throughout transit. It may be compressed to between 350 and 700 bar (5,000 and 10,000 psi) for transport, however as soon as once more, that stress should be maintained throughout transit. Extremely chilly temperatures and excessive pressures are challenges that drive up the price of hydrogen for business use.

Some consider one of the best ways to move hydrogen is to transform it to ammoniawhich doesn’t require low temperatures or excessive pressures to maneuver it from one place to a different. It can be used as a gasoline, as Andrew Forrest demonstrated when he introduced an ammonia-powered ship to the COP 28 convention in Dubai. However there’s a drawback. To make hydrogen, the ammonia would must be transformed again to hydrogen as soon as it arrives at its vacation spot. Each time there’s an power conversion, there are losses concerned within the course of. If we boil water, we lose a number of the liquid to evaporation. Those that have photo voltaic installations on their roofs know a specific amount of the electrical energy produced is misplaced when DC present is transformed to AC present. The extra conversions, the larger the losses.

That’s the reason Transport and  Environment recommends an “electrification first” strategy for Europe earlier than seeking to inexperienced hydrogen for options. In the case of making inexperienced metal, hydrogen could also be important, however the concept of utilizing sunshine on the Arabian peninsular to energy electrolyzers that make hydrogen from water, then changing that hydrogen to ammonia to be positioned aboard ships sure for Germany the place the ammonia shall be transformed again into hydrogen which can then be used to make electrical energy is a vastly wasteful course of. The variety of conversions wanted ought to make that concept a non-starter.

Inexperienced hydrogen has been a dream for advocates of a zero carbon world for many years. It sounds good on paper and works properly within the lab, however in the actual world it has but to turn into remotely aggressive. Till it does, it would stay only a nice fantasy.