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Why SA is not ready to produce green hydrogen
- Green hydrogen has been identified by many countries as a way to tackle climate change.
- However, South Africa faces several infrastructural complications hindering it from producing green hydrogen.
- The success of green hydrogen projects depends on developing infrastructure to transport it to target industries and converting existing equipment to use green hydrogen.
- An estimated 30 litres of fresh water is required to produce 1 kg of green hydrogen, which would require desalination or water recycling plants where there is a water scarcity problem.
- Producing one kilogram of green hydrogen needs up to 30 litres of fresh water. This means that desalination or water recycling plants will be needed if green hydrogen hubs are set up in water scarce areas.
- Research has shown that the projects that are quick to adopt new and massive technology may double or triple their costs from initial estimates, and over half of the projects fail to meet production targets in their first six months.
- Hydrogen, including green hydrogen, can only be moved around through specialised pipelines or costly conversion means such as conversion to liquid form at -253°C.
- In most cases, solar or wind power is cheaper and more efficient than green hydrogen, which could pose a problem for financing green hydrogen projects.
- To make the most of a prospective green hydrogen industry in South Africa, it is important to coordinate production, transportation and usage infrastructure build at the same time across the entire value chain.
- A better approach to South Africa's green hydrogen industry is to focus initially on industries that will find it easy to switch from fossil fuels to green hydrogen.
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