Design of a flexible, modular, scalable infrastructure to inland intake of offshore hydrogen production

Abstract

Hydrogen is one of the energy vectors that are called to play a key role in a decarbonised energy future. On the other hand, offshore energy is one of the options to increase renewable energy generation, either electricity or other vectors, as hydrogen. At this respect, the OCEANH2 project aims to design a plant for the generation, storage and distribution of modular, flexible and intelligent offshore green hydrogen hybridizing floating wind and photovoltaic technology produced in locations at Gran Canarias and Carboneras (Spain), 1250 and 700 m to the coast. The intake of hydrogen to land is one of the bottlenecks of such project, impacting in the whole economy of the levelized cost of hydrogen that is produced. From the analysis that is presented, it is concluded that the practical alternatives in the framework of the OCEANH2 project are mainly by dedicated carbon steel pipelines due to the existing uncertainties on the utilization of non-metallic pipes and the low distance to the intake facilities at the port in the project. We have evaluated as well the implementation of hydrogen refuelling stations and truck loading stations for short-distance hydrogen delivery based on compressed hydrogen, with a capital cost of 1.7 and 7 M€ for a hydrogen management of 100 kg/day. Hydrogen transport by vessel when produced hydrogen offshore has been discarded for the particular case of OCEANH2.