Turkey's Green Hydrogen Potential Seen as High

Prof. Dr. İbrahim Dinçer stated that the period the world energy sector is currently in is the hydrogen age, and said that Turkey has the potential to produce more green hydrogen annually than the world's current yearly production. While the use of renewable energy sources such as solar, wind and biomass instead of fossil fuels that cause global warming through greenhouse gas effects is important in combating the climate crisis, work related to green hydrogen, which is among alternative energy sources, has accelerated in recent years. Prof. Dr. İbrahim Dinçer, Faculty Member at the Engineering Faculty of Ontario Tech University and the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering at Yıldız Technical University, said that Turkey has a great opportunity in terms of green hydrogen production, and that it should move quickly to convert this into added value and become the world's green hydrogen refinery. Dinçer, who noted that a rapid transformation and sanctions system centered on renewable energy is being established worldwide, stated, "Labeling systems will look at carbon footprint. If you are to be part of world trade, you must replace fossil-based fuels. Within this framework, fossil-based products will continue for some time, when sanctions come into play the price of fossil fuels will increase, and carbon taxes will follow." Dinçer noted that Turkey has a major advantage in terms of renewable energy sources with the energy opportunities to be obtained through maritime means, and characterized Turkey as one of the world's five luckiest countries in terms of owning renewable sources.

Noting that hydrogen energy can only be green hydrogen energy when produced with renewable sources, Dinçer continued his remarks as follows:

"The carbon age has ended. The period we are entering is the hydrogen age and we need to proceed with correct moves along this axis, develop options for production, storage, transportation, market delivery and use, and own these technologies. In our study on Turkey's green hydrogen production potential, the result was 614.2 million tons of annual production. As of August 2023, 118.1 million tons of hydrogen was produced worldwide, but only 5 percent of this is green hydrogen produced from renewable energy."

Production costs

Dinçer explained that hydrogen is obtained through water dissociation, and that the commercial method prominent in green hydrogen is electrolysis, and noted that this electrochemical reaction method requires electricity.

Dinçer provided the following information on green hydrogen production costs:

"It is important how much energy we use and how much hydrogen we obtain. On average, using 45-50 kilowatt hours of electricity from 7.6-8 kilograms of water, we produce 1 kilogram of hydrogen. Wind energy costs 2.5-3 cents per kilowatt hour, solar energy has come down to 2 cents per kilowatt hour. According to this, although the energy costs used on an electrolyzer basis for 1 kilogram of hydrogen are only at the level of 2-3 dollars from renewable energy (particularly solar and wind), the current price per kilogram of green hydrogen at filling stations worldwide is at 10-20 dollars. Germany made one of the most important agreements on this with Australia, and according to the agreement will purchase 5 million tons of hydrogen by 2030 for USD 50 billion." Pointing out that hydrogen energy has three functions: as fuel, energy carrier and raw material, and that the raw material property will come to the fore as time goes on, Dinçer said, "Depending on what you synthesize it with, it will have usage areas. You can synthesize green hydrogen with biomass-based carbon and use it, meaning we can produce everything based on oil. In the coming period, many chemicals, industrial products and fuels will be entirely hydrogen-based anyway."

"What matters is producing and using green electricity"

Dinçer, who is also Chairman of the Hydrogen Technologies Association, Head of the Turkey Academy of Sciences (TÜBA) Energy Working Group and Member of the Board of the Turkey Energy, Nuclear and Mining Research Institute (TENMAK), reminded that many European countries will not allow diesel and gasoline vehicles after the end of 2025.

Dinçer made the following criticisms regarding electric vehicles as an alternative to these vehicles:

"Is using a battery-powered electric vehicle much more environmentally friendly than a gasoline one? If you obtain your electricity from natural gas and coal power plants and use a battery-based electric vehicle, it is possible to reduce these by 10-15 percent in their lifecycle. This rate is not sufficient for it to be environmentally friendly. There is no emission coming from its exhaust, but when you look at lifecycle analysis, the fossil sources you used to produce the electricity already create these emissions. What matters here is producing and using green electricity." Stating that Turkey has written a major success story with TOGG, Dinçer expressed that it should urgently take this one step further by manufacturing hydrogen-powered electric vehicles and get ahead of many countries, recommending that a fuel cell running on hydrogen be put into service for this.

Hydrogen farms

Based on Turkey's advantages in renewable energy sources, Dinçer mentioned that they are working on establishing "hydrogen farms" and concluded his remarks as follows: "The basic philosophy in hydrogen farms is this: Using renewable energy options as a source, we will produce green hydrogen and these will be stored here and then delivered to the point of use. The main source of hydrogen in these farms will be water. Here, it is possible to use sea and wastewater as water sources. Hydrogen can be obtained from wastewater and the water is purified. In the hydrogen ecosystem, on one side you dissociate water as hydrogen and oxygen, and then on the user side we convert it back to clean water. People think this will deplete water sources, but by the end of the day the water produced in fuel cells becomes directly drinkable quality. Water is not lost in the hydrogen ecosystem."   Source