Source: Energy & Management Powernews , December 07 2022
The National Hydrogen Council underlines the need to provide sufficient hydrogen storage facilities. Investment incentives must be set now,
Even with rising hydrogen imports, large-volume storage solutions are indispensable, the council explained in a statement on December 6. Germany has with its existing cavern storage facilities, which can be converted to hydrogen, the best starting conditions for the storage of hydrogen. However, it is already necessary to get government support underway to stimulate investment in conversion to hydrogen storage, it said. By 2030, the National Hydrogen Council expects hydrogen storage demand to reach at least 5 billion kWh, and to increase significantly thereafter.
The window of opportunity for key investment decisions is already closing in the middle of this decade, the panel stresses, noting the length of time it will take to obtain permits and retrofit existing natural gas storage facilities is at least five years.
In its published opinion, the Council assumes that existing natural gas storage capacities will be needed for the most part to ensure security of supply in the natural gas market, at least until 2025. From 2025, the panel expects a reduction in the need for natural gas storage that is synchronous with gas consumption. It cites the European Commission's targets for reducing gas consumption (by 15 percent by 2023) as justification.
If the politically prescribed level for natural gas supply security were to increase, the National Hydrogen Council fears a conflict of goals: on the one hand, there would be the existing cavern storage facilities for securing natural gas supplies, and on the other hand, there would be the need to convert these cavern storage facilities to hydrogen. The new construction of caverns for the storage of hydrogen would then be imperative in this context.
To create a suitable investment climate for hydrogen storage, the National Hydrogen Council advises a step-by-step plan with the following concrete measures before 2024:
- Increase financial support in the form of subsidy programs for the conversion of existing caverns or the construction of new hydrogen storage facilities. The subsidies should act both as start-up financing, as well as support the operation of the plants.
- Shorten the approval procedures analogous to the LNG Acceleration Act.
- Pilot plants should receive temporary and reliable exemptions.
- Introduce a regulatory framework for hydrogen storage projects to provide a regulatory and access regime for storage that incentivizes investment
For the period before 2030, the Council recommends the following measures:
- Exempting interconnected hydrogen networks from charging any entry and exit fees and surcharges when using hydrogen storage.
- Exemption from electricity grid charges for green electricity consumed for storage.
The eight-page Statement "Hydrogen Storage Roadmap 2030 for Germany" is available for download by the National Hydrogen Council on its website.
Author: Davina Spohn
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The Hydrogen.Bavaria Center (H2.B) advocates for a stronger consideration of Bavarian positions when updating the NWS and developed an impulse paper based on a multi-stage consultation process with 35 stakeholders from the Hydrogen Alliance Bavaria. The Impulse Paper for the Revision of the National Hydrogen Strategy is available for download on the website of the Center Hydrogen.Bavaria.