Levelised cost of hydrogen production in Ukraine

Abstract

The overview of decarbonization technologies of the gas industry, particularly Power-to-Gas technologies using renewable or excess electricity to produce hydrogen via water electrolysis is presented. Also, a comparative analysis of the main types of electrolyzers for hydrogen production – alkaline and with proton exchange membrane (PEM) is presented, and the conclusion that the PEM electrolyzers using renewable electricity is advisable for implementation in Ukraine. A comparative analysis of available most reasonable data sources regarding estimates of "green" hydrogen production cost is presented. The article also presents the mathematical formulations for levelised hydrogen production cost calculation and input data for calculation. The input data were obtained based on cited sources and own estimations taking into account Ukrainian specific conditions, i.e. PEM electrolyzer operating conditions. The results of the own calculation and ones performed by the cited authors are given. The results of the calculations showed that the key initial parameters that affect the cost of hydrogen production in Ukraine, as in other countries, are capital costs, the cost of electricity, and the electrolyzer load factor. The increase of load factor decreasing levelised cost of hydrogen production, which is important to account for the design of hydrogen production facility. In particular, the production cost of hydrogen using PEM electrolyzer could be reduced from 15.73 $ US/kg H2 to 7.34 $ USA/kg H2 if electricity supplied by NPP at night at "night tariff" will be used instead of electricity from the photovoltaic plant. The results of calculations showed that the obtained hydrogen production costs in Ukraine for both cases - the use of electricity from renewables and from the grid are comparable to European estimates of the hydrogen production costs. Keywords: decarbonization, gas industry, electrolyzer, hydrogen production, weighted-average levelised cost

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