Belgium

This report aims to summarise the status of the European hydrogen policies and standards landscape. It is based on the information available at the European Hydrogen Observatory (EHO) platform the leading source of data and information on hydrogen in Europe (EU27 EFTA and the UK) providing an overview of the European and national policies legislations strategies and codes and standards which impact the deployment of hydrogen technologies and infrastructures. The EHO database covers a total of 29 EU policies and legislations that directly or indirectly affect the development and deployment of hydrogen technologies. To achieve its net zero ambitions the EU started with cross-cutting strategies such as the EU Green Deal and the EU Hydrogen Strategy setting forward roadmaps and targets that are to be achieved in the near future. As a next step the EU has developed legislations such as those bundled in the Fit for 55 package to meet the targets they have put forward. The implemented legislations including funding vehicles and initiatives have an impact on the whole value chain of hydrogen including production transport storage and distribution and end-uses. At national level as of July 2023 63% of the European countries have successfully published their national strategies in the hydrogen sector while 6% of the countries are currently in the draft stage. Several European countries have strategically incorporated quantitative indicators within their national strategies outlining their targets and estimates across the hydrogen value chain. This deliberate approach reflects a commitment to providing clear and measurable goals within their hydrogen strategies. A target often used in the national strategies is on electrolyser capacity as an effort to enhance the domestic renewable hydrogen production. Germany took the lead with an ambitious goal of achieving 10 GW by 2030 followed by France (6.5 GW) and Denmark (4 - 6 GW). Other targets that some of the countries use in their strategies are on the number of hydrogen refuelling stations fuel cell electric vehicles and total (renewable) hydrogen demand. A few countries also have targets on renewable hydrogen uptake in industry and hydrogen injection limit in the transmission grid. To monitor the policies and legislation that are adopted on a national level across the hydrogen value chain a survey was launched with national experts which was validated by Hydrogen Europe. In total 28 European countries have participated to the survey. On production the survey revealed that 61% of country specialists report that their country provides support for capital expenditure (CAPEX) in the development of renewable or low-carbon hydrogen production plants. Moreover 7 countries also provide support for operational expenditure (OPEX). Furthermore 8 countries have instituted official 6 permitting guidelines for hydrogen production projects while 5 countries have enacted a legal act or established an agency serving as a single point of contact for hydrogen project developers. For transmission only two countries reported to provide support schemes for hydrogen injection. Several countries have policies in place that clearly define the hydrogen limit in their transmission grid for now and in the future ranging from 0.02% up to 15% while a few countries define within their policies the operation of hydrogen storage facilities. On end-use the majority of countries totalling 71% reported to have implemented support schemes aimed at promoting the adoption of hydrogen in the mobility sector. Purchase subsidies stand out as the predominant form of support for fuel cell electric vehicles (FCEVs) with implementation observed in 17 countries. In the context of support schemes for stationary fuel applications for heating or power generation only two countries have adopted such measures. A slightly larger group of four countries do provide support for the deployment of residential and commercial heating systems utilizing hydrogen. For hydrogen end-use in industry a total of 9 countries reported to provide support schemes with a major focus on ammonia production (8) and the chemicals industry (7). On the topic of technology manufacturing 7 countries have reported to have support schemes of which grants emerge as the mainly used method (4). Exploring the latest advancements into European codes and standards relevant to the deployment of hydrogen technologies and infrastructures a total of 11 standards have been revised and developed between January 2022 and September 2023. This includes standards covering the following areas: 6 for fuel cell technologies 2 for gas cylinders 2 for road vehicles and 1 for hydrogen refuelling. Moreover 5 standards were published since September 2023 which will be added to the EHO database in its next update. This includes ISO/TS 19870:2023 which sets a methodology for determining the greenhouse gas emissions associated with the production conditioning and transport of hydrogen to consumption gate. This landmark standard which was unveiled at COP28 aims to act as a foundation for harmonization safety interoperability and sustainability across the hydrogen value chain.

Purpose: The purpose of the hydrogen supply and demand data stream is to track changes in the structure of hydrogen supply capacity and demand in Europe. This report is mainly focused on presenting the current landscape that will allow for future year-on-year comparisons to assess the progress Europe is making with regards to deployment of clean hydrogen production capacity as well as development of demand for clean hydrogen from emerging new hydrogen applications in industry or mobility sectors. Scope: The following report contains data about hydrogen production capacity and consumption in EU countries together with Switzerland Norway Iceland and the United Kingdom. Hydrogen production capacity is presented by country and by production technology whereas the hydrogen consumption data is presented by country and by end-use sector. The analysis undertaken for this report was completed using data reflecting end of 2019. Key Findings: The current hydrogen market (on both the demand and supply side) is dominated by ammonia and refining industries with three countries (DE NL PL) responsible for almost half of hydrogen consumption. Hydrogen is overwhelmingly produced by reforming of fossil fuels (mostly natural gas). Clean hydrogen production capacities are currently insignificant with hydrogen produced from natural gas coupled with carbon capture at 0.5% and hydrogen produced from water electrolysis at 0.14% of total production capacity.

During her State of the Union Address the President of the European Commission Ursula Von der Leyen defined 2023 as the "European Year of Skills" highlighting the urgency to overcome the shortage of skilled workforce in Europe a challenge that affects the hydrogen sector as well. The rapid development of the European Hydrogen Value Chain over the coming years is expected to generate approximately 1 million highly skilled jobs by 2030 and up to 5.4 million by 2050.  In the fourth episode titled "Reskill to Repower: Preparing the Hydrogen workforce" our Chief Technology & Market Officer Stephen Jackson discusses with Massimo Valsania VP of Engineering at EthosEnergy and Co-chair of Hydrogen Europe Skills Working Group. Starting off with Massimo's professional background and his current role in our association the two speakers discussed the skills needed in the hydrogen economy and the policies that should be put in place to attract new generations.

This study deals with the use of hydrogen for the de-carbonization of the Resources and Energy Intensive Industries (REIIs) and gives a specific insight of the situation of the steel-making industry. The growing use of hydrogen in our economy is synonym for an equal increase in electricity consumption. This results from the fact that the current most promising technologies of H2 production is water electrolysis. For this purpose the EU hydrogen strategy foresees a progressive ramp up of H2 production capacities. But bottlenecks (especially regarding energy needed for electrolysers) may occur. Capacities should reach 40 GW (around 10 Mt/y) by the end of 2030. The steel-making industry relies heavily on H2 to decarbonise its process (through direct iron ore reduction). Our study analyses the conditions under which this new process will be able to compete with both European and offshore existing carbonised assets (i.e. blast furnaces). It emphasises the need for integrated and consistent policies from carbon prices to the carbon border adjustment mechanism through carbon contracts for differences but also highlightsthat a better regulation of electricity prices should not be neglected.

Europe’s aviation sector continues its resilient and pioneering spirit as it leads the world’s transport system into its new era of great transformation. Surviving the pandemic it is adapting rapidly to satisfy the rising demand for competitive air mobility services while managing a scarcity of resources and embracing the new challenges of climate change and energy transition. Facilitated by ACARE the European Commission its Member States aviation research organisations design and manufacturing industries airlines airports and aviation energy and service providers have all joined together to envision a synchronized transformation path that will ensure that Europe can lead the world towards a climate neutral citizen centric and competitive air mobility system. “Fly the Green Deal” is Europe’s Vision for Sustainable Aviation. It describes the actions and actors necessary towards aviation’s three main strategic goals. It details three time horizons and defines as well the requirement for a proactive and synchronised implementation framework facilitated by the European Commission and EU Member States that includes both the initiating instruments (policies regulations and incentives) and a system of measuring and impact monitoring to ensure the goals are achieved.

HarmonHy is a European Union-funded Specific Support Action aiming to make an assessment of the activities on hydrogen and fuel cell regulations codes and standards (RCS) on a worldwide level. On this basis gaps have been identified and potential conflicts between regulations codes and standards have been investigated. Types of document to be referred to include international regional and national standards EU directives UNECE regulations… Particular attention will be paid to the identification of the needs for standards as perceived by the industry as well as to actions aiming to ensure concordance between standards codes and regulations. Standards and regulations require harmonization. HarmonHy pursues the elaboration of an action plan and a roadmap for future work on harmonizing regulations codes and standards on hydrogen and fuel cells on an international level.

In this present work simulations of 20 kW furnace were carried out with hydrogenenriched methane mixtures to identify optimal geometrical configurations and operating conditions to operate in flameless combustion regime. The objective of this work is to show the advantages of flameless combustion for hydrogen-enriched fuels and the limits of current typical industrial designs for these mixtures. The performances of a semi-industrial combustion chamber equipped with a self-recuperative flameless burner are evaluated with increasing H2 concentrations. For highly H2-enriched mixtures typical burners employed for methane appear to be inadequate to reach flameless conditions. In particular for a typical coaxial injector configuration an equimolar mixture of hydrogen and methane represents the limit for hydrogen enrichment. To achieve flameless conditions different injector geometries and configuration were tested. Fuel dilution with CO2 and H2O was also investigated. Dilution slows the mixing process consequently helping the transition to flameless conditions. CO2 and H2O are typical products of hydrogen generation processes therefore their use in fuel dilution is convenient for industrial applications. Dilution thus allows the use of greater hydrogen percentages in the mixture.

A “combined world” of fuel cell electric vehicles (FCEVs) and battery electric vehicles (BEVs) will create a greener transportation sector faster and cheaper than one of the solutions alone. Hydrogen Council with analytical support from McKinsey and Company published a report that highlights the complementary roles of FCEVs and BEVs in a decarbonised transportation sector.

The analysis found that each solution has comparable systemic efficiencies and similar CO2 life cycle intensity. From the vehicle user perspective FCEVs and BEVs will provide the flexibility and convenience to meet their specific context of use and geographic location. Additionally the costs of two supporting infrastructure for FCEVs and BEVs is cheaper than one infrastructure network primarily due to the reduced peak loads and avoidance of costly upgrades on the electricity grid. The report’s messages were developed in dialogue with the Observatory Group which consisted of representatives of government agencies and academia as well as associations and companies active in sectors like regenerative electricity generation electricity grid equipment manufacturing electric vehicle charging fleet management.

The paper can be found on their website.

Current technological improvements are yet to put the world on track to net-zero which will require the uptake of transformative low-carbon innovations to supplement mitigation efforts. However the role of such innovations is not yet fully understood; some of these ‘miracles’ are considered indispensable to Paris Agreement-compliant mitigation but their limitations availability and potential remain a source of debate. We evaluate such potentially game-changing innovations from the experts’ perspective aiming to support the design of realistic decarbonisation scenarios and better-informed net-zero policy strategies. In a worldwide survey 260 climate and energy experts assessed transformative innovations against their mitigation potential at-scale availability and/or widescale adoption and risk of delayed diffusion. Hierarchical clustering and multi-criteria decision-making revealed differences in perceptions of core technological innovations with next generation energy storage alternative building materials iron-ore electrolysis and hydrogen in steelmaking emerging as top priorities. Instead technologies highly represented in well-below-2◦C scenarios seemingly feature considerable and impactful delays hinting at the need to re-evaluate their role in future pathways. Experts’ assessments appear to converge more on the potential role of other disruptive innovations including lifestyle shifts and alternative economic models indicating the importance of scenarios including non-technological and demand-side innovations. To provide insights for expert elicitation processes we finally note caveats related to the level of representativeness among the 260 engaged experts the level of their expertise that may have varied across the examined innovations and the potential for subjective interpretation to which the employed linguistic scales may be prone to.

With the adoption of the EU Climate Law in 2021 the EU has set itself a binding target to achieve climate neutrality by 2050 and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 55 percent compared to 1990 levels by 2030. To support the increased ambition the EU Commission adopted proposals for revising the key directives and regulations addressing energy efficiency renewable energies and greenhouse gas emissions in the Fit for 55 package. The heating and cooling (H&C) sector plays a key role for reaching the EU energy and climate targets. H&C accounts for about 50 percent of the final energy consumption in the EU and the sector is largely based on fossil fuels. In 2021 the share of renewable energies in H&C reached 23%.