Germany seeks to boost hydrogen in energy mix

Bloomberg

Germany is seeking to boost momentum behind using hydrogen as an alternative to natural gas, part of a broader effort to quicken the pace of emissions cuts.
The government is preparing an incentive program for early December that will help develop a local market for the technology, according to Stefan Rolle, an adviser in Germany’s Economy & Energy Ministry. The so-called hydrogen strategy will focus on the industrial, transport and heating sectors.
“The strategy will involve money and incentives to promote different technologies to produce hydrogen,” Rolle said. “In many sectors, hydrogen can play an important role. We will concentrate the strategy in sectors where hydrogen can be used most efficiently.”
From government officials to utilities and power grid operators, hydrogen is being touted as a cleaner way to break Germany’s dependence on coal. The technology is now seen as an important option to fill the energy gap left from the impending closure of nuclear stations and the phaseout of coal-fired power. Germany’s strategy will include both green and blue hydrogen, Rolle said.
So-called blue hydrogen is produced by breaking down the natural gas molecule, a relatively cheap option but still not a carbon-free one, since the process emits carbon dioxide. Green hydrogen is made by converting wind or solar electricity into hydrogen through electrolysis — a zero-emission but expensive process that
consumes a lot of energy.
Chancellor Angela Merkel pledged to cut in half carbon dioxide emissions by 2030 compared with 1990 levels. That ambition was endorsed in the Paris Agreement on climate change in 2015, though progress toward that goal has slipped since then.