Facilitating the transition to a hydrogen economy will also require social, legal, and economic changes. The HySUCCESS consortium will work on these changes thanks to a grant from NWO in collaboration with the NGF programme GroenvermogenNL. A total of over EUR 13 million has been made available.
Hydrogen is seen as an important energy carrier in a future sustainable economy. It can also be used in various industrial processes such as fertiliser production, refining and making clean steel. When hydrogen is produced with green energy and water, it is called 'green'. The National Growth Fund programme GroenvermogenNL was created to accelerate the transition to a green hydrogen economy. Besides the technical challenges, there are also social challenges, which may hinder the transition. For example, is there sufficient societal support for green hydrogen? The transport pipes and storage tanks will take up space, and the spatial incorporation of electrolysers and the wind turbines and solar panels from which the green electricity is to be generated may also cause social resistance.
HySUCCESS (Social, User aCCeptable, Economically Sustainable Systems for hydrogen) emerged from one of the seven R&D packages of GroenvermogenNL. HySUCCESS aims to comprehensively investigate the socio-economic factors influencing the role of hydrogen in a sustainable energy system. The consortium will evaluate how economic, legal, policy and socio-cultural aspects may hinder or promote the implementation of green hydrogen. In addition, HySUCCESS aims to identify strategies to overcome barriers to scale up green hydrogen production and use. It will also evaluate the environmental impacts of using green hydrogen and devise measures to mitigate negative impacts. These insights will clarify the potential of green hydrogen in future energy and materials systems.
The consortium consists of ten universities, five universities of applied sciences (UAS), four commercial parties and a trade association that have jointly arrived at a proposal thanks to an intensive process. These parties provide the expertise needed to make the project a success.
The faculty congratulates associate professor Dr. Vincent de Gooyert who is going to investigate the societal aspects of green hydrogen through stakeholder dialogues across the whole green hydrogen value chain.
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