Europe is saying goodbye to natural gas for good with a superturbine that will use the substitute energy. Although demand for natural gas has fallen in recent years, the continent remains dependent on it as an alternative to coal, a fossil fuel it wants to replace. However, to achieve this, a combustion system must first emerge that can work efficiently with pure hydrogen.
Different nations aim to achieve decarbonization through a gradual energy transition. In this search for new alternatives to fossil fuels, hydrogen has many possibilities. Its production for energy purposes is a field of worldwide exploration. Moreover, investment to produce H with low carbon emissions is growing.
Already in 2022, Spain was leading 20% of the world’s new H projects. Just for context, China’s current consumption is 20 million tons of hydrogen. This is the same amount that Europe needs to produce in 2030 to replace Russian gas,” says Africa Castro, head of business development at the firm H2B2, in the H2 podcast.
Europe has a superturbine to accelerate hydrogen deployment
This is no small thing. Talk of a turbine capable of running on 100% hydrogen is a big word, or at least it was until now. The FLEX4H2 initiative is being funded by the European Union and the Swiss government and has shown that this possibility exists in just one year of research.
The Italian company Ansaldo Energia has developed the GT36 turbine, which has been commissioned in Germany with 100% H concentration. It is an H-class turbine, a sophisticated type of gas turbine designed to achieve extremely high efficiencies and operating temperatures.
GT36 has more than 560 MW of power and can supply half a million homes, a population similar to that of Murcia. We found the key to its viability in the revolutionary design of the fuel chamber.
It uses two complementary methods to achieve the high operating temperatures while maintaining very low emissions and requiring no diluents. The turbine in question runs on hydrogen, which it uses to produce clean electricity.
Hydrogen makes its mark with a superturbine we didn’t see coming
The turbine Ansaldo had been working with until now ran on a maximum of 40% hydrogen mixed with natural gas. With a budget of 8.7 million euros, the FLEX4H2 proposal still has three more years to finish developing this promising technology.
The main objective is the design and development of H2 combustion systems. “FLEX4H2 will develop and validate a safe, fuel-efficient and highly flexible combustion system capable of operating with any hydrogen concentration up to 100% H2, at H-class operating temperatures, while still meeting emission targets without using diluents”, they state on their website.
With this initiative ahead of it and funding support, Europe could be saying goodbye to natural gas very soon using hydrogen to produce electricity. This superturbine would come as the savior of mankind and, of course, Europe. Do you marvel how far hydrogen can go? Then you can’t miss the news about this car with two hydrogen engines.
