Potential for Hydrogen Production from Biomass Residues in the Valencian Community

The production of hydrogen from renewable sources is essential to develop the future hydrogen economy. Biomass is an abundant, clean and renewable energy source and it can be important in the production of hydrogen. The Valencian Community due to its great agricultural and forestry activities, generates an important quantity of biomass residues that can be used for energy generation, approximately 778 kt of wet biomass residues per year. This great quantity of biomass can be transformed into a hydrogen-rich gas by different thermochemical conversion processes. In this article the potential of production of hydrogen-rich gas is analyzed, considering several factors affecting the conversion yield of these processes. As a result of this analysis it could be possible to produce 1271 MNm3 of H₂ per year considering the total biomass residues of the community and selecting the gasification processes.