Shanxi will vigorously promote hydrogen production from coal and gasification

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Shanxi will vigorously promote hydrogen production from coal and gasification. Author/Source: Gasification World. Date: 2022-03-03. Clicks: 19. In recent years, faced with the international demands for a low-carbon environment as well as the requirements for high-quality development within the country, China is facing unprecedented challenges and difficulties in its energy transition. Shifting from a fossil fuel-based system to one based on new energy sources is of paramount importance in the transformation of China’s energy system, and it is also the key measure for the country to achieve its \"dual carbon\" goals. In the process of charting a path for the high-quality development of the coal industry amid the low-carbon energy transition, hydrogen energy in Shanxi has made a strong debut. Coal-dominated, green development: \"China’s energy production and consumption structure has long been dominated by coal. This is related, on the one hand, to the country’s energy resources and their geographical distribution, and on the other hand, to the extensive development of the energy system and its unrestrained consumption patterns that emerged as a result of economic development since the reform and opening up.\" ”**Han Wenke, former director and senior advisor at the Energy Research Institute of the National Development and Reform Commission, explained. “In line with China’s goals of achieving carbon neutrality and promoting green development, on the production side it is necessary to accelerate the greening, digitalization, and intelligent transformation of the coal industry, increase the proportion of advanced production capacities, and strive to boost output without increasing consumption of water resources, land, and other resources ； On the consumer side, greater efforts must be made to establish a clean and low-carbon energy consumption pattern, ensuring that the share of coal in energy consumption decreases year by year. ”Han Wenke said so. Han Wenke believes that, under the ‘dual carbon’ goals, the share of coal in China’s energy system will continue to decline. At the same time, it must be recognized that China will remain the world’s largest producer and consumer of energy for the time being and for a long period to come. The complexity, difficulties, and challenges associated with China’s energy transition and ensuring a stable supply of energy are of a nature that no other country has encountered. ”Therefore, promoting a green transformation in coal production and consumption, and fully leveraging the role of coal in facilitating the green and low-carbon transition of the entire energy system, is key to ensuring that the energy system achieves the \"dual carbon\" goals. Developing hydrogen energy: a new path for coal in Shanxi. The world’s energy transition looks to China, and China’s energy transition looks to Shanxi. As a major province for coal production and consumption, Shanxi needs to properly understand the role of coal in China’s energy transition, and it is highly necessary to actively seek paths for the high-quality development of its coal industry. In recent years, Shanxi has seized the opportunities associated with hydrogen energy and focused on developing this sector; hydrogen energy industry clusters are rapidly taking shape in cities such as Datong, Changzhi, Jinzhong, and Taiyuan, with an increasing range of application areas. Speaking of the advantages of Shanxi’s hydrogen energy industry development, Cheng Zhang, president of the Shanxi Energy Research Association, explained that there are currently four main methods for producing hydrogen: hydrogen production from fossil fuels such as coal, hydrogen production from industrial by-products, hydrogen production through water electrolysis, and hydrogen production from biomass. Among these methods, hydrogen production from coal and coal gasification has the lowest costs. Shanxi boasts abundant coal resources, and the by-products generated during coal coking process produce large amounts of hydrogen. Taking Datong as an example, the coal-to-hydrogen project with an annual production capacity of 110,000 tons that is currently under development has a cost of about 0.8 yuan per cubic meter of hydrogen produced, which gives it an advantage over hydrogen produced from natural gas or through water electrolysis. At the same time, Shanxi’s abundant resources of coke oven gas and coal chemical process exhaust gases also offer significant cost advantages for large-scale hydrogen production. In recent years, many leading companies in the new energy sector have rushed to Shanxi to develop its hydrogen energy industry. With a number of key projects such as those for producing hydrogen from coke oven gas and chlorine-alkali process emissions being launched and constructed, Shanxi’s hydrogen energy industry is growing at a rapid pace. In particular, within Shanxi Province’s already formulated 14th Five-Year Plan, hydrogen energy will be given priority for development as one of the province’s “seven key emerging industries of the future”. It is foreseeable that, in the near future, hydrogen energy will, just like coal, become another impressive symbol of Shanxi’s promising future.