Alberta believes in a hydrogen economy, throws millions into projects to prove it
April 30, 2024The Canadian province is supporting 28 projects to advance its budding H2 economy.
The Government of Alberta is investing millions to advance the province’s hydrogen economy, lower its emissions and create jobs. The CA$57 million ($41.68m) – worth $280 million ($204.8m) – in funding has been made possible via Alberta Innovates and Emissions Reduction Alberta (ERA).
The funding is for 28 projects.
Specifically, the innovation funding announced by the province’s government will be given to 28 projects designed to advance Alberta’s hydrogen economy. Twenty (20) early-stage projects through the Hydrogen Centre of Excellence – Competition 2, will receive CA$22.5 million ($16.4m) from Alberta Innovates, in partnership with Natural Resources Canada. An additional CA$34.5 million ($25.2m) will be committed by ERA, with funding from Technology Innovation and Emissions Reduction, for 8 late-stage projects via its Accelerating Hydrogen Challenge.
The hydrogen economy projects funding garnered plenty of interest, drawing over 90 applicants. All applicants underwent a competitive review process. Experts in various fields, including engineering, science, business development, financing, commercialization, and greenhouse gas quantification among others, conducted rigorous and transparent reviews to determine the viability of the projects. From there 28 applicants were selected and these successful applications received funding.
Applicants who received funding via the Alberta Innovates projects have 24 months to complete their work, while those a part of the ERA-funding projects have 36 months to finish their work.
Projects to make a hydrogen economy a reality.
The projects selected will cover the various aspects required to support and sustain a hydrogen economy. These include projects involving the production of hydrogen, storing hydrogen, hydrogen transportation as well as the distribution and use of hydrogen.
More to the point, among the projects that will receive funding in Alberta will include projects that:
- Build robust pipelines that can safely distribute hydrogen
- Create hydrogen-powered furnaces and water heaters
- Advance retrofit kits of diesel engines
- Provide heat and power to a municipal recreation center
A hydrogen refueling station network was also announced for the province.
In addition to the $57 million in funding for hydrogen economy projects, it was also announced that US-based industrial gas manufacturer, Air Products, will be building a network of hydrogen refueling stations in Alberta. These stations will be equipped for heavy-duty vehicle refueling as well as light-duty fuel cell vans and cars.
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Good news for Canada, but the use of hydrogen for “furnaces” (which are domestic boilers) and water heaters mentioned above, is complete nonsense, as burning hydrogen for heating is very inefficient when you consider the around 60% efficiency of producing the hydrogen from electricity in the first place. A far more efficient use of the electricity used to produce the hydrogen, is to use it directly to power a heat pump which will deliver around 350% more heat than the electrical energy to run it. It took more than four years for the UK authorities to understand that hydrogen should not be used for heating.