The report identifies that to meet future hydrogen demand, the scale of renewable electricity demand for green hydrogen production is unprecedented and leads to once-in-a-generation opportunities and challenges. Infrastructure, demand support incentives, power supply access and an enabling environment with long-term certainty is required for 'new sectors' to uptake green hydrogen.
Guy Platten, ICS Secretary General states: "For global hydrogen demand to keep the net-zero by 2050 scenario within reach, demand for hydrogen-based fuel sources would need to scale five times from current levels to reach approximately 500 million t from 2030 to 2050. One of the main takeaways in this report is the high variability in potential demand. Industry will dominate the hydrogen demand. Shipping however can play a key role as an enabler to the hydrogen economy."
The report highlights three economies as the main markets to initially drive hydrogen demand – South Korea, Japan and the EU. Europe has a target of 20 million tpy of hydrogen by 2030, with half of that volume to come from imported sources.
Professor Ulreich added: "What we are seeing is that the annual hydrogen demand would mean increasing the fleet to transport hydrogen by ship. To meet a global increase if 30 million t of hydrogen traded worldwide, we could need up to 411 new hydrogen vessels (for long distances) or up to 500 vessels if transported as ammonia."