The use of hydrogen as a fuel has been given a new lease of life in the latest Labour Party election gambit.
The party's Climate Change manifesto says hydrogen is a "key future tool for reducing emissions in the parts of the world economy that will be difficult to decarbonise, such as heavy transport and aviation."
The document goes on to say hydrogen could become an export industry, and also create high-wage jobs in local businesses.
Hydrogen has long been admired as a fuel because it has no CO2 emissions, only water. And if it is produced by hydro electricity or wind-generated power, then the energy process is clean from start to finish.
Despite this, hydrogen got a resounding thumbs down in a Cabinet decision on developing a supply of electricity able to back up the system when hydro dams are empty and the wind is not blowing.
That cabinet decision approved further investigation of the Lake Onslow pumped hydro scheme. It also approved investigation of the use of woody biomass in thermal power stations, along with conversion of geothermal power from baseload to variable.
The decision also gave a resounding no to an alternative pumped hydro scheme at Lake Moawhango, on Waiouru army base, because of opposition from iwi and from the dangers of unexploded ordnance.
But the cabinet decision was at its most blunt when denouncing the use of hydrogen.
"Interruptible hydrogen electrolysis.....is not considered a viable component of a Crown-owned and operated portfolio solution to the dry year problem," the cabinet document reads.
"The concept relies on emerging technologies that are unproven at the proposed scale, and questions remain around whether equipment could be delivered on time."
However, the cabinet paper said hydrogen could still play an important role in the future, and it is this long term visions that the election policy appears to be aimed at.
It stresses the use of hydrogen is still an option able to be taken up, and it would be "greener" in New Zealand than in many other countries because the energy used to produce it is largely green in the first place.
"New Zealand is uniquely placed to become an export powerhouse in hydrogen production using renewable energy, creating new export opportunities, high-wage jobs and regional industries," the document says.
John Carnegie of Energy Resources Aotearoa says the election policy is a lot more bullish on the use of hydrogen than the cabinet paper was and he praises what he calls its high aspirations.
"Our view of this is that hydrogen production, underpinned by electrolysis, will eventually find a place in our energy export markets.
"But a better way of getting there is the use of natural gas along with Carbon Capture, Utilisation and Storage utilisatioon and Storage (CCUS)......only focusing on green hydrogen is aspirational but it suffers from the old problem of perfection being the enemy of the good."
Other aspects of the Labour Party plan include a second emissions reduction plan, more money for Green investment and pushing down gross greenhouse gas emissions.
Meanwhile hydrogen has been quietly worked on by the Government despite its rejection as dry-year reserve. This has involved hydrogen programmes which were announced in the budget and are focussed on Southland.
11 Comments
ABSURD.
1. Until someone finds a really really efficient catalyst hydrogen is simply not cost effective or efficient.
2. If someone wants to build a hydrogen plant let them bid for ETS revenue (along with everyone else) such that the bidders with the highest benefit /cost for carbon reduction get the funding.
Absurd is basically what they said about hyrdrogen.
Its actually a really good paper which I couldn't fault, they reckon best bet for NZ is to have a woody biomass plant developed, nearby a forestry, that can be spun up during a dry year. Hell, just convert the Huntly generators (which I think they said was done as a trail and was quite successful). Or have one or two geothermal plants that always run at around 25% and catch the GHGs coming out of them and re-inject. Then when we have a dry year, pump them up to 100%. Both of these options look to be far cheaper and smarter than Onslow. After reading it it changed my mind away from Onslow, I reckon they should do both of these things. We have huge geothermal potential and heaps of forests, we should look at both.
I think the biomass should be new plants , built near areas of extensive exotic forest . I.e , gisborne , napier and other regional centres. it can bealso used to heat hospitals etc , in the above cities , provide process heat for food processing plants( i think Gisbornes watties might have closed ).
This reduces transport costs , and provides regional power supplies in case of cyclones / earthquakes etc . .
NZ will never be an hydrogen export powerhouse. Our energy production is tiny! We can barely make enough for ourselves at times, let alone exporting pure energy in the form of hydrogen.
Our installed capacity for all plants, renewable and fossil is 9,761 MW.
Just the three gorges dam in China alone produces 22,500 MW
The article misses the point - there are two different uses of H at issue. Indeed storing H for dry year purposes makes no sense because of the necessary scale and exporting precious energy is is just plain bonkers. But making H for small scale local storage and heavy machinery makes total sense despite the inefficiency of H production. We will need some way to recover from events like recent where electricity distribution is damaged.
We welcome your comments below. If you are not already registered, please register to comment.
Remember we welcome robust, respectful and insightful debate. We don't welcome abusive or defamatory comments and will de-register those repeatedly making such comments. Our current comment policy is here.