Working group plasma electrolysis
The Future German and European Energy System – The Role of Hydrogen and its Production, Transport, and Use
A plasma workshop will take place with a special lecture on electrolysis, focusing on future energy scenarios, by Marcel Fiebrandt from Thyssengas on the 25th of February at 10:00.
The EU's Green Deal and the German Federal Climate Protection Act, adapted in 2021, set the ambitious goal of achieving greenhouse gas neutrality by 2050 and 2045, respectively. The necessary transformation of the world's fourth-largest economy toward climate neutrality requires massive adjustments in all sectors and energy carriers as well as in the energy infrastructure. In the national and European hydrogen strategy, hydrogen in combination with renewable energy sources is assigned a central role for the transformation of the European energy system. This is the case as the properties of hydrogen are able to complement the increasing electrification of the sectors. For example, hydrogen can be stored in large underground caverns, transported in pipelines and used for power generation when renewable energy generation is insufficient, and it provides decarbonization opportunities in applications that cannot or are difficult to decarbonize through direct electrification. As a result, power-to-gas-systems, and especially electrolysers, will play a key role as the interface of electricity and gas infrastructure in the future integrated energy system to couple both energy carriers. In this talk, a brief overview of the future energy system scenarios and their implications on the industrial, mobility, and heating sector will be given. Afterwards, the options of producing hydrogen will be discussed and which requirements they have to fulfil to be integrated effectively and economically in the future energy system. Due to their critical role at the interface of the power and gas grid, special attention is paid to the technical requirements based on the properties and restrictions of the energy grid.