Our feedback on the National Hydrogen Strategy

Southern Green Gas was delighted to make a submission to Australia's Chief Scientist, Dr Alan Finkel and the Working Group developing the National Hydrogen Strategy.

The submission proposes a cost-effective renewable methane solution for creating the hydrogen which can be transported through existing gas pipeline infrastructure.

SGG’a submission to Dr Alan Finkel and the Working Group, developing Australia’s National Hydrogen Strategy, is provided below.

SGG would like to draw your attention to an opportunity of national significance for Australia. As is widely acknowledged, Australia has a global competitive advantage in the generation of solar electricity in regional areas, in terms of quality (high sunlight intensity, few rainfall days) and quantity (abundant low cost flat land in high sunlight intensity areas). This in turn can allow the production of hydrogen at comparatively low cost.

To capitalise on this advantage and build a new export industry, a means to transport the hydrogen from Australia’s inland regional areas to major markets is required. One solution that is potentially being overlooked is renewable methane.

Renewable methane, produced from the reaction of hydrogen with CO2 extracted from the air, is carbon neutral and being fungible with natural gas can utilise all the existing natural gas infrastructure. That means renewable methane can be piped to the coast using existing pipelines, and shipped overseas through the existing LNG system – potentially to the 40 countries that currently import LNG.

The key technology that unlocks this huge potential is the extraction of CO2 from the air. This technology is moving quickly out of the R&D realm into the commercialisation phase. New adsorbents with superior storage capacity and low energy requirements offer scope to extract CO2 at an all-in-cost less than $50 per tonne.

Renewable methane can solve the intermittency issues with solar generation. It can be produced 24/7 by incorporating hydrogen storage.

Not only can renewable methane be readily reformed back into renewable hydrogen for use in fuel cell vehicles, it can also be used as fuel for existing gas fired power stations. This allows the generation of dispatchable renewable electricity.

Southern Green Gas is proposing the renewable methane solution. It is backed by a team with a deep knowledge of energy markets and technology commercialisation. We have a credible plan to make renewable methane cost competitive. We would welcome the opportunity to discuss this is more detail.