Generation, of the energy carrier HYDROGEN In context ... - needs

NyOrka Page 33 12/18/20084.4 Future scenarios – cost comparisonReferring to the policy chapter and European alternative fuels policy then hydrogenshould constitute 2% of the fuel market by 2015 (and 3% by 2020). 170 hydrogen plantseach with 10 times greater capacity of most current stations or 600Nm3 are needed tofeed about 12500 hydrogen buses into this scenario, according to given parameters in thecharacter of buses 40 . Still the NEEDS project does not account for transport energy, thestationary fuel cells would mostly run on less pure feed stock. As shown in section 4.3the cost of hydrogen production depends to a high extent on the rate of the neededfeedstock, natural gas for reformation or price of electricity and water availability forelectrolysis. (Water can be collected from vehicles and reused). The production qualityfluctuates somewhat between these two production methods but PEM fuel cells are amore likely candidate to be used with hydrogen that is made from dump-load power fromfluctuating RE (grid) systems whereas they are more flexible in operation.When setting the price of electricity at 0,10€ as the mean cost of electricity from RE assuggested in a recent report made for the European renewable energy council 41 , a costcalculation can be presented as which production technology is preferable in fluctuatingpower settings. No increase in life time has been incorporated in the hydrogen productionstations but an expected learning curve decrease of cost (similar to the foreseen costreduction as are presented in the Hy-Ways European Hydrogen Road map p15) has beenincorporated as these 170 sites are inaugurated as well as 375.000€ for site preparation ineach case and similar costs for storage for the two types of hydrogen production.When comparing the hydrogen production costs calculated in this study with costnumbers provided by other studies it is essential to carefully consider the boundaryconditions that have been applied. These figures relate to actual measured data withrunning first generation equipment and the parameters for future forecasting are alsorestricted to specific boundaries. Note that while using eventually electricity that isdumped from renewable generation the price of electricity may be set less than 10€c.Table 13 shows the boundary conditions on which the calculations for on-site hydrogenproduction stations are based and refer to CUTE project conditions as presented by MarcBinder and Michael Faltenbacher 42 . The relevant economic parameters are shown inTable 14.40 These assuptions are listed in deliverable 6 page 2641 EREC (European renewable energy council) 2006: Renewable (r)evoltution; a sustainable oecd europe energy p. 2942 Binder Marc and Michael Faltenbacher ; Economic Analysis of the hydrogen infrastructure , Clean Transport forEurope, deliverable 6. EC funded project no NNE5-2000-113