Green Hydrogen Vs Battery - Which could be a more promising story for India ?
It is interesting !
Battery is a energy storage solution …Hydrogen is a Fuel…how can we compare them ?
Well, Green Hydrogen or also named as renewable Hydrogen in this article since electricity produced by Wind /Solar power is used to split water to get Hydrogen and oxygen by a process called by electrolysis with the help of an Electrolyzer.
This Hydrogen gas so produced by Solar/Wind is versatile in nature as can be stored in a Storage Tank at power plant site and later used in 4-different ways :
(1) for example at night there is no sun light or cloudy days there is no sun light and wind is not available 24X7… .so during this time when sunlight wind not available , Hydrogen stored in a tank can be used for producing electricity with the help of an Electrochemical Cell and oxygen from air. Electricity so produced can be fed in to the grid
(2) The Hydrogen from the storage tanks can be transported by truck tankers , by containers , by Pipe lines to Fertiliser plants for producing urea- hydrogen is the required feedstock and to oil refineries where Hydrogen is required as one of the main feed stock for crude refining…and a no of down stream products. Today the mandate for Fertiliser plants and refineries is to use green hydrogen only. No more Grey Hydrogen !
(3) Hydrogen stored at solar / wind sites can also be transported through tankers just like petrol diesel to petrol pumps for using in Hydrogen IC engine vehicles or Hydrogen fuel cells vehicles. No batteries required in these vehicles for energy storage…
(4) Hydrogen can be mixed with CNG 5-10% and existing CNG pipelines can be used to trasport for using in CNG vehicles and Even domestic use…
All the 4 steps above - we can be self reliant - made in India …Technology is proven and available …currently already followed in several countries.
Coming to Battery technology , which is very popular for EV, but not very popular for Solar power/ wind power plant sites as Li ion batteries are 100% imported from China…very costly … consists of 30% of EV cost …lithium cobalt scarce…not available in our country . . So not sustainable for the long term… .
but if the Sodium ION battery project comes through , we can be self reliant which Reliance is trying to do… may be it can also be used as sustainable storage solution for India for both EV and Solar wind storage . .