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Hydrogen Options For Northern Ireland

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13 Oct 2021

Northern Ireland’s transition to net zero carbon will entail the transformation of the energy sector in how we produce and consume our energy requirements. The focus will be on improving energy efficiency and also replacing fossil fuels with indigenous renewable energy resources.

There is significant debate over the mix of renewables that will be used to replace fossil fuels. While there is a clear role for renewable electricity production and electrification in demand sectors, there is also uncertainty as to the role of the developing technologies for low carbon hydrogen, both in terms of sources of production, but also demand uptake across the various sectors.

NIE Networks commissioned this report ‘Hydrogen options for Northern Ireland’ from Frontier Economics to better understand the opportunities and potential for hydrogen and how these in turn could potentially impact the electricity networks on both the production - in the case of green hydrogen - and the various demand sectors.

This report provides an overview of the options for hydrogen in Northern Ireland considered in two broad timeframes: the near term (up to 2030), and the long term (up to 2050). It describes the opportunities for production and storage and also sets out the potential for low carbon hydrogen demand across key sectors such as transport, industry, buildings and power.

It is important that the energy transition adopts a whole system approach to ensure that the optimum solutions for the customers are realised. This report is therefore a complementary report to the KPMG report on ‘Electrification: Economic Opportunity for Northern Ireland’ available on our External Engagement webpage.

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