Hydrogen production

We always have to make our own hydrogen and there are different ways to do this. The least environmentally friendly ones are unfortunately the cheapest. Hydrogen production is one way of storing surplus electricity when renewable power stations are running at full capacity but there is no demand. Hydrogen can be produced globally. Purely theoretically, this would make countries independent of mineral wealth or the politics of the oil powers. There is also a large amount of hydrogen in the country, which is produced as a by-product and is not effectively utilised.

Non-environmental production from fossil fuels

Hydrogen can be produced in many ways from a wide range of feedstocks. At present, production from fossil fuels (96%) dominates global production, so-called steam reforming of natural gas. This technology is the cheapest. It is a high temperature chemical process that reacts a mixture of methane and water vapour to produce hydrogen and CO2. The efficiency of this method of production is around 80%, but it has the significant disadvantage of producing large amounts of carbon dioxide - for every 1 kg of hydrogen produced, 5.5 kg of CO2 is produced.

Hydrogen production from renewable sources. Storing energy in hydrogen

However, hydrogen production is also possible from renewable sources (currently 4%), such as biomass, water electrolysis or steam electrolysis. In the electrolysis of water, an electric current is passed through the solution to break the bonds between hydrogen and oxygen, thus decomposing the water into these two gases. The overall efficiency of this process is around 55-60 %. The production of 1 kg of hydrogen by electrolysis requires 9 l of water and 60 kWh of electricity. Hydrogen production is one way to store surplus electricity when renewable energy plants are running at full capacity but grid users do not have adequate consumption.

For massive sustainable hydrogen production, the production of hydrogen in newly developed fourth generation nuclear reactors seems promising. The high temperature of the reactor coolant together with the electrical energy from the core are suitable for high-temperature electrolysis. Hydrogen can be produced globally. Purely theoretically, this would make countries independent of mineral wealth or the politics of the oil powers.

Hydrogen as a by-product

There are several industrial enterprises in the Czech Republic that produce hydrogen - as a main or by-product (e.g. Spolchemie, Unipetrol). Often these are petrochemical processes and the hydrogen produced in them is not effectively used - often it is literally burned in the chimney. This free hydrogen in the Czech Republic would allow FCEVs (hydrogen powered cars) to run at hundreds of thousands of km/day.

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Watch a funny video about storing energy in hydrogen: