Sustainable mobility: 10 questions and answers
Oct 9, 2024
Sustainable
Daniel Hissel, Deputy Director of the Hydrogen Research Federation at CNRS (National Center for Scientific Research in France), is one of France’s leading experts in this sector. In this interview, Hissel shares his vision of hydrogen’s future as a key energy vector for decarbonizing sectors like heavy mobility and industry. He also discusses the technological and regulatory challenges Europe must overcome to establish a true hydrogen economy, from developing efficient electrolyzers to creating a distribution network for decarbonized hydrogen.
With more than two decades of experience in hydrogen technology research and development, Daniel highlights how this resource will become an essential vector in the future energy landscape, although it won’t be the only solution. His analysis prompts reflection on the technological maturity and challenges Europe faces in leading the deployment of hydrogen as a sustainable global alternative.
Daniel Hissel, Deputy Director of the Hydrogen Research Federation at CNRS (National Center for Scientific Research in France)
In the energy transition, hydrogen will play an important role as an energy vector. It will not replace other energy solutions everywhere and all the time. This energy vector must be used where it provides real added value compared to other energy solutions.
We can cite in particular heavy electric mobility (for which the batteries are too bulky and/or require too long charging times), intensive electric mobility (taxis, company fleets, etc.), the decarbonization of certain industrial sectors (refining, cement plants, steelworks, etc.), electricity production in isolated sites (hydrogen powered generators).
In projection, the International Energy Agency estimates that hydrogen will represent 18% of energy exchanges on a global scale in 2050. This is therefore enormous, especially compared to the current level (around 1%), but this also underlines that hydrogen energy is not the only solution to the energy transition. It is an essential link, but not the only one.
The International Energy Agency estimates that hydrogen will represent 18% of energy exchanges on a global scale in 2050
For my part, I believe that the primary markets for hydrogen energy are those linked to heavy mobility, on-road (trucks, buses) or off-road (trains, tractors). There are also markets linked to the production of electrical energy (or even thermal energy in cogeneration) on sites isolated from the electricity network. The use of hydrogen generators is particularly relevant here. We can of course cite non-interconnected zones such as islands, but also isolated sites in the mountains.
Primary markets for hydrogen energy are those linked to heavy mobility, on-road or off-road
But this also concerns the emergency electrical supply for applications that are electrically meshed on a daily basis (emergency generators for emergency centers, administrative command and decision centers, hospitals, etc.). Finally, industrial applications of hydrogen, even if they most often rely on larger volumes of hydrogen to be mobilized, can nevertheless also be deployed quite quickly, provided that production and use are co-located.
The challenges for Europe in developing a hydrogen economy are multiple. There are of course technological challenges: developing electrolysers, hydrogen storage elements, hydrogen applications (in particular via hydrogen fuel cells) which are both efficient, sustainable and at low costs (CAPEX and OPEX) as low as possible.
In connection with this technological challenge, it seems fundamental to me to carefully measure the environmental and societal impact of the solutions proposed, on the scale of the complete life cycle of the products developed.
Then, an essential element is linked to the massive availability of carbon-free hydrogen to supply the entire European hydrogen ecosystem. Different solutions are currently being considered, but the massive production of carbon-free hydrogen by electrolysis of water, from renewable resources or from carbon-free electricity, seems to be a very interesting avenue on a European scale. This will of course require the establishment of a real territorial network for the distribution of this decarbonized hydrogen. Obviously, an important point is also the development of a real hydrogen industry on a European scale, supported by dynamic and resident R&D.
Hydrogen can be an essential link in European reindustrialization, but we must provide ourselves with the means, both political, regulatory and societal.
Hydrogen energy already has a long history. We have moved on from an initial period, essentially devoted to pilot demonstrators, especially in the field of usages.
We are now entering a phase of massive deployment of technologies
We are now entering a phase of massive deployment of technologies, because the technological maturity is there, the performance of objects has been very significantly increased in recent years, and acquisition and operating costs are falling, even if they will (of course) still benefit from being lowered. Finally, it is clear that hydrogen will constitute an essential link in our energy future.