POWER January 2020 - 6

SPEAKING OF POWER
Is Hydrogen the Power
Industry's Holy Grail?
Aaron Larson
S
ome power industry insiders believe
hydrogen offers a solution to largescale
energy storage problems. The
concept generally revolves around utilizing
electricity generated by renewables
when supply is high and demand is low.
This could be around mid-day when solar
power production is peaking but the need
for power is relatively light. Rather than
curtailing output, the excess power could
be used to produce hydrogen through
electrolysis, for example, with the hydrogen
stored for later use. Then, when
demand picks up and renewable supplies
tail off around sunset, the hydrogen could
be used to fuel a combustion turbine,
thus supplying renewable energy.
Hydrogen Power Projects
There are several original equipment manufacturers
(OEMs) working on hydrogenrelated
technology including Mitsubishi
Hitachi Power Systems (MHPS). The company
announced in May 2019 that it was
partnering with Magnum Development,
the owner of a large and geographically
rare underground salt dome in Utah, on a
project that could store up to 1 GW of renewable
energy year-round and provide it
to power markets in the western U.S. The
$1 billion Advanced Clean Energy Storage
project in Millard, Utah, is viewed as a potential
game-changer for the industry.
" We've made a lot of progress on the
project, " Paul Browning, CEO of MHPS
Americas, told me during an exclusive
interview in November. " As you get to
higher and higher renewables penetration
on a grid, like California, for example,
you need storage, because as you start
to drop natural gas out, you need something
that's going to be there when the
wind's not blowing and the sun's not shining,
which is what natural gas's job is in
California right now, " he explained.
" What you need is storage. Right now,
what's getting done is a lot of lithium-ion
storage, and that's because what the California
grid needs right now is short-duration
storage of a few hours, " Browning
said. " But as you continue to decarbonize,
and you continue to drop more natu6
ral
gas off of your grid, you start to need
longer-duration storage. You know, you
need the storage that's going to be able
to store electricity for days, or weeks,
or months, or years. And when you get
into those kinds of longer-duration storage,
lithium-ion just gets prohibitively expensive.
And so, that's where hydrogen
comes in. "
But storing large amounts of hydrogen
isn't the only challenge, you also need to
be able to burn it in a gas turbine while
meeting strict emissions requirements.
That's why MHPS is also working on a
Carbon-Free Gas Power project in the
Netherlands. That endeavor aims to convert
one of three units at the 1.32-GW
Magnum combined cycle power plant to
run on 100% hydrogen by 2025.
Browning offered a brief explanation
of the modifications necessary to accommodate
hydrogen as a fuel. " A gas turbine
has three main sections: the compressor
section, the combustor, and the turbine
section, " he said. " The compressor
section and the turbine section are unchanged.
What changes is the combustion
section-where we combust the
fuel. " Browning said hydrogen is a much
different molecule than methane, so the
combustion physics are very different.
" We need a different combustion technology
to burn hydrogen in a dry low-NOx
kind of way. So, that's what we're in the
process of developing right now. Our existing
technology can burn 30% hydrogen.
The new stuff is going to be able to
burn 100% hydrogen, " he said.
Fundamental Changes and
Unique Hydrogen Uses
Nakul Prasad, gas turbine portfolio manager
with Siemens Energy, said when
he first joined the company and started
looking into hydrogen, the technology
had been researched on and off for
years. Naysayers suggested to him that
exploring hydrogen options would be just
another fad, essentially a " flavor of the
month. " However, Prasad has not been
so quick to dismiss the possibilities.
" This time it's fundamentally different
because you have renewables driven by
www.powermag.com
carbon reduction, " Prasad told me when
we visited during an event in New Orleans.
" Hydrogen is becoming a centerpiece
now, because it's a feedstock to
many different industries, and as a storage
medium-getting surplus renewable
energies-helping the
industry decarbonize.
And so, hydrogen takes up a new
role now. I think that's why momentum
is building up. It's not like in the past,
something segregated, it's really something
integrated now. "
Not only is Siemens working to increase
the percentage of hydrogen its
gas turbines can burn, but also the company
is developing large-scale technology
for the production of hydrogen. In
November, Siemens announced that it
would supply a 2.2-MW proton exchange
membrane (PEM) electrolysis plant to a
German steel manufacturer. Hydrogen
has long played a role in steelmaking by
enhancing the quality of annealing processes.
The necessary electrical power
for that system will come from a 30-MW
seven-turbine wind installation.
Genoa, Italy-based Ansaldo Energia
is another OEM focused on hydrogen.
In October, the company said it had
partnered with the Stavanger, Norwayheadquartered
international energy
company Equinor to validate a 100% hydrogen
gas turbine combustor. Ansaldo
said that equipping its GT26 and GT36
gas turbines with a unique sequential
combustion technology has " allowed the
utilization of the full range of hydrogen in
a low-NOx
premix system. "
Furthermore, Ansaldo said it offers extensively
tested and commercially proven
combustion system retrofit solutions
for the installed base of F-class gas turbines,
including those manufactured by
GE, Siemens-Westinghouse, and MHPS.
While the upgrades don't allow unlimited
hydrogen combustion, they are said to
provide an " impressive load range " and
" unmatched hydrogen volume percentages. "
Ansaldo suggested owners can
" Future-Proof " assets by having hydrogen
fuel flexibility. ■
-Aaron Larson is POWER's
executive editor.
POWER | January 2020
http://www.powermag.com
POWER January 2020

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