BAKU, Azerbaijan, June 29
By Leman Zeynalova – Trend:
EU will remain dependent on overseas hydrogen production, Christof van Agt, Director of Energy Dialogue, International Energy Forum told Trend.
“The European Union aims to install at least 6 giga watt (GW) of renewable electrolysers to produce 1 million tonnes of renewable hydrogen by 2024 and have 40 GW available to produce 10 million tonnes of renewable hydrogen by 2030. North African and Eastern European countries could have an additional 40 GW capacity installed by that time as well. The EU will however remain dependent on overseas hydrogen production and more cost-effective hydrogen. Hydrogen produced from hydrocarbons in combination with CCUS will lead the way before renewable hydrogen production becomes cost competitive. The oil and gas industry is particularly well placed to scale fossil-fuel based hydrogen production in combination with CCUS in a cost efficient manner,” he said.
By 2030, the European Hydrogen Backbone largely consists of several separated networks and these regional backbones consist of mostly repurposed natural gas pipelines, with the exception of Greece and Sweden which both have a limited natural gas network today, Trend reports with reference to the hydrogen legislation paper prepared by the Gas for Climate consortium.
The total length of the hydrogen networks in the nine countries in Table already amounts to over 9,100 kilometres, of which over 64 percent consist of repurposed natural gas pipelines.
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