API PROMOTES INFRASTRUCTURE REPURPOSING

The American Petroleum Institute, or API, has some concerns about the U.S. Department of Energy’s focus on green hydrogen.

Rachel Fox is API’s policy advisor on Low-Carbon Energy, API Natural Gas Markets. She said to Breakbulk: “The expansion of a hydrogen economy, including all forms of low-carbon hydrogen production, is considered to be critical to meeting any meaningful emissions reduction goals. As our industry advances emissions reduction efforts, it is vital that the necessary energy infrastructure is developed.”

In oil and gas, hydrogen production infrastructure already exists. The industry is an established supplier of feedstock for hydrogen production, consumer of hydrogen, and leader in CO2 management. It expects to expand that role, producing, transporting, and consuming low-carbon hydrogen, according to the API.

“The natural gas and oil industry is working with industries across the value chain to urge policymakers to advance a transparent, timely and consistent permitting process and support American energy infrastructure,” Fox added.

The First U.S. Plan

The U.S. Department of Energy, or DOE, unveiled its Draft National Clean Hydrogen Strategy and Roadmap last fall, calling clean hydrogen an important element along the nation’s path to decarbonization.

The DOE’s plan was fathered by BIL, the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. BIL outlined major investments to be made in clean hydrogen, including: US$1 billion toward an electrolysis program; a half billion dollars to assist clean hydrogen manufacturing and recycling; US$8 billion for regional clean hydrogen hubs; and a hydrogen production tax credit, among other funding and incentives.

This funding is only a start. By some estimates, generating enough green hydrogen to meet only 25 percent of global energy needs would require more electricity than the world currently makes. BloombergNEF, for example, estimates that 25 percent would necessitate an investment of US$11 trillion in production, storage and transportation infrastructure around the world.

Prioritization will be critical to ensure clean hydrogen is rolled out as an effective decarbonization tool in the U.S. The DOE set out three priorities: to target strategic, highimpact uses for clean hydrogen (specifically, the industrial sector, heavy-duty transportation, longduration energy storage to enable a clean grid, and exports); to reduce the cost of clean hydrogen (leveraging the Hydrogen Energy Earthshot launched in 2021 to catalyze innovation and scale, stimulate private sector investments, and spur development along the hydrogen supply chain); and to focus on regional networks – clean hydrogen hubs.

The DOE strategy acknowledged that heavy investment and action in the near, mid, and long-term are needed to lay the foundation for broader clean hydrogen adoption, to drive down cost, and to increase scale sustainably.

Ports Gearing Up

U.S. ports are looking at opportunities to move hydrogen infrastructure cargo, transport finished hydrogen and provide carbon capture alternatives to hydrogen producers.

Jeffrey Pollack is chief strategy and sustainability officer for the Port of Corpus Christi. He described several port MOUs supporting energy transition. One is with Howard Midstream Energy Partners, LLC to convert Howard’s Javelina refinery services facility into the region’s first carbon-neutral (blue) hydrogen production plant. The transition would be supported by the facility’s existing pipeline connectivity to all six local refineries. Javelina controls sixty-million-cubic-feet of steam reformer hydrogen production per day.

Another project aims to develop renewable energy infrastructure on Port of Corpus Christi property to support the production of green hydrogen – and potentially provide renewable power directly to the port and its customers. The port envisions a renewable energy and clean-fuel hub that includes solar facilities, battery storage facilities and the electrolyzer facilities that create green hydrogen.

One of America’s largest green hydrogen projects is the conversion of Intermountain Power Project’s coal-fired plant in Utah. Construction began in 2022. The new plant, which will be operational using natural gas and 30 percent green hydrogen in 2025, will eventually transition to 100 percent hydrogen fuel, according to Intermountain Power Agency General Manager Cameron Cowan.

To ensure hydrogen is continuously available for grid-scale electricity generation, underground salt caverns will be used for storage of the hydrogen produced by electrolysis.

While green hydrogen is getting a lot of attention because it is produced in a climate-neutral manner from the electrolysis of water, hydrogen can be produced in other ways. Some are “cleaner” than others.

Planned and Operational PEM Electrolyzer Capacity

The World Economic Forum outlined the differences. Grey hydrogen is a common form generated from natural gas through the “steam reforming” process. Blue hydrogen is low-carbon – carbon generated from steam reforming is captured and stored, typically underground. Black or brown hydrogen is produced from bituminous or lignite coal, respectively, and typically generates CO2 or carbon monoxide that is not recaptured. Other forms include pink hydrogen (created through electrolysis of water, like green hydrogen, but via a process powered by nuclear energy rather than renewables); turquoise hydrogen (produced through the process of methane pyrolysis, which generates solid carbon); and yellow hydrogen (made through electrolysis using solar power, although the term is evolving and may include hydrogen produced through mixed processes).

Project Cargo Pipeline

Heavy investment in low or no-carbon hydrogen production plants will create a pipeline of project cargo. Input cargo and components will be needed by new hydrogen production plants, as well as by the new and expanding renewable energy facilities that will provide the energy to produce green hydrogen, or indeed any clean hydrogen. Components include industrial gas storage, compressors, liquid storage tanker, and vacuum pumps. However, most new projects will be years in the making; there is very little green hydrogen infrastructure now.

Yet, as the globe stumbles through its clean energy transition, clean hydrogen may be the answer, especially for hard-to-electrify sectors such as transportation and heavy industry, according to Francesco La Camera, IRENA’s directorgeneral, in a report last June.

IRENA’s World Energy Report for 2022 is a geopolitical survey that indicated three quarters of global green hydrogen can be expected to be produced and used locally. That indicates a demand for new infrastructure the world over, not just in traditional energy-producing nations. In fact, green hydrogen is expected to be most economical in locations that have abundant renewable resources, space for solar or wind farms, and access to water, along with, of course, the capability to export. American hydrogen fuel cell company Plug Power and global engineering, procurement and construction company McDermott have proposed a scalable solution to accelerate infrastructure development. They have collaborated to deploy green hydrogen with a concept design for a 1GW plant. Built around PLUG’s PEM electrolyzers, the design integrates modular technologies and optimizes the balance of plant through standardization and centralization, a best practice in many scale projects across industries today.

Based in the U.S., Lori Musser is a veteran shipping industry writer.