Assessment of the sustainability of various ways of hydrogen production and supply by applying LCA and exergy

The Netherlands is known for its high penetration of natural gas use in households and industry, but the threat of climate change and earthquakes in the province of Groningen, caused by natural gas production, stimulate the search for alternatives, such as hydrogen gas. Various ways of producing and supplying hydrogen have the attention of scientists, companies and policy makers. This study compares the following three ways of green hydrogen production: 1) a photovoltaic system in Africa is used to produce hydrogen from sea water, followed by pipeline transport to Rotterdam, Netherlands, 2) electricity generated by the offshore Borssele 1&2 wind farm in the Netherlands is used for the offshore production of hydrogen from sea water followed by pipeline transport to Rotterdam, or 3) the electricity generated by this offshore wind farm is transmitted to Rotterdam where it is used for onshore production of hydrogen from sea water. The sustainability of the three systems is assessed from a life cycle point of view. The environmental LCA resulted in ReCiPe 2016 endpoint indicators and the midpoint indicators GWP, land use and water consumption. The exergetic sustainability assessment applied the Total Cumulative Exergy Loss (TCExL) method. The preferred system according to the results of the environmental LCA and the exergetic sustainability assessment is the wind energy system including offshore hydrogen production. The results are not unanimous as to which system is the second-best. The three systems need to be investigated in more detail before firm conclusions can be drawn. It is recommended that attention also be paid to the economic and social pillars of sustainability, and to the exergetic sustainability of technological systems in general, as exergetic assessment results are independent of changing and subjective models, weighting factors and other variables.