Green hydrogen collaboration forms between RWE and SGN

Green hydrogen collaboration forms between RWE and SGN

June 17, 2022 0 By Tami Hood

The partnership between the two companies will focus on domestic heat in Scotland.

Gas distribution company SGN and renewable electricity generator RWE have announced that they will be partnering on green hydrogen for domestic heat in Scotland.

The Memorandum of Understanding was signed to supply towns and rural communities with sustainable H2

The partnership will be focused on providing Scottish rural communities and towns with green hydrogen gas that will be used for home heating. SGN and RWE signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for the investigation and development of electrolyzers which will be powered by the RWE’s ten Scottish onshore wind farms. Those wind farms have a combined 213-megawatt capacity and will be using the Scottish gas network to supply homes and businesses with H2.

Green hydrogen - RWE and SGN

H2 is expected to play a central role in achieving decarbonization goals. It will be vital to the effort to achieve net zero in difficult to mitigate sectors such as heavy-load transport, industry, aviation and heat. The UK Government published its Energy Security Strategy in April 2022. That plan doubled the UK’s low-carbon H2 production capacity plans to 10 GW by 2030. Similarly, the Scottish Government released its own Hydrogen Action Plan, which targets 5GW of H2 production capacity by 2030, and 25GW by 2045.

The MoU involves using green hydrogen to decarbonize home and business heating in Scotland.

The collaboration will look into decarbonizing homes and businesses connected to the networks of Wick, Thurso, Oban, Stornoway, and Campbeltown. Those communities are not connected to the mains gas network. Instead, their networks are presently supplied by liquified natural gas (LNG) as well as liquefied petroleum gas (LPG). The LNG and LPG will be exchanged for H2 with the potential to save 21,000 tonnes of CO2 each year as it decarbonizes the heating of 9,500 properties.

The collaboration will determine how much H2 will be required, as well as what will be needed for the conversion of the networks to hydrogen gas. It will also help to define the required green electrolytic H2 from the renewable onshore wind farms owned by RWE.

In this way, the green hydrogen project may also open up wind farm developments in areas that are grid constrained. This will help to provide a specific use for the renewable electricity generated there.

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