The purpose of the Hydrogen TEA Taskforce is to help RD20 participants and society more broadly understand how participating institutes perform techno-economic assessment and how their methods vary.
Techno-economic assessment (TEA) provides information about the competitiveness of emerging energy technologies and research and development opportunities. Competitive hydrogen production prices are crucial to stimulating hydrogen’s widespread adoption as an energy source, and accurate cost assessment helps inform investment decisions. However, differences in the methodologies and underlying assumptions among institutes can lead to challenges in understanding the technical status. This inconsistency complicates understanding and decision-making.

Key facts

Leaders: Mr. Mark Ruth (NLR) and Dr. Tara Hosseini (CSIRO)
Member institutions:
French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission (CEA), France
Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), South Africa
Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO), Australia
Korea Institute of Energy Research (KIER), Republic of Korea
National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST), Japan
National Laboratory of the Rockies (NLR), United States of America
University College London/UK Energy Research Centre (UKERC), United Kingdom
Sri Lanka Institute of Information Technology (SLIIT), Sri Lanka
Launched: February 2024 (following discussions at the Hydrogen Gigaton Workshop and the 5th RD20 Conference in Japan in October 2023, which highlighted the need to compare hydrogen TEA methodologies and results)
Status: Active

Objectives

The taskforce’s objectives are:
(1) To identify the different methodologies and assumptions used by each country.
(2) To find key factors affecting the cost of hydrogen production, including technical assumptions, economic parameters (discount rate, tax, inflation, etc.), environmental impact considerations, and policy incentives and subsidies.

Research overview

The taskforce members decided to make a comparison of what each of their cost estimates would be for a reference scenario. To streamline the effort, they chose a relatively simple hydrogen-production process: Solar photovoltaics producing electricity that is transmitted to electrolyzers, which in turn produce hydrogen that can then be used by an end-user. They decided the hypothetical site should be placed where none of their countries currently has any projects. They chose southern Sri Lanka. While Sri Lanka is not an RD20 member, given the hypothetical location, the Sri Lanka Institute of Information Technology (SLIIT) was also invited to participate in this study.
For this study, each organization used its own tools and cost databases and assumptions to calculate the levelized cost of hydrogen (LCOH) for this simple scenario. The taskforce members then tried to understand the differences between their calculations and what those differences meant.

Progress and output

The taskforce’s findings show that the resulting LCOH values vary by about $4/kg hydrogen. This is driven primarily by differences in assumptions for costs (both photovoltaic and electrolyzer), photovoltaic solar performance and other cost factors, including installation and financing. The team also found that categories for capital, operations and energy costs are not defined consistently across institutes, which leads to additional challenges in understanding differences.