It’s a first small victory for Paris, against the tenacity of Berlin and Madrid. This Monday, February 13, the European Commission published two texts defining the conditions under which hydrogen can be considered “green”. Between the lines, these texts take a step in the direction of France and what it seeks to obtain. Indeed, for months, Paris has been fighting for low-carbon hydrogen, produced from nuclear electricity, to be placed on an equal footing with renewable hydrogen, produced from solar, wind or hydraulic electricity. The Commission has therefore just integrated this definition of green hydrogen into these text proposals, but everything is far from over. Germany and Spain are campaigning for a more restrictive definition of “green” hydrogen.
The criteria proposed by Brussels, which will be submitted for approval to Member States and MEPs, are part of European legislation currently being negotiated which sets ambitious objectives for “renewable” hydrogen for the EU-27. industry and transport by 2030. Until now mainly used in chemicals or refining, hydrogen could help decarbonize certain industrial sectors, ensure the storage of electricity or supply the transport sector.
The Commission first defines as “green” hydrogen produced from a “new” renewable electricity source, i.e. additional infrastructure in relation to the current fleet, to encourage the deployment of new renewable energies without monopolizing the existing infrastructures. Another scenario: hydrogen will be defined as “green” if it comes from an electricity network where the share of renewable energies has reached at least 90% the previous year.
Likewise, it will be “green” if the electricity consumption mobilized is equivalent to a new renewable infrastructure, which operates precisely in the same hours and in the area where this hydrogen is produced. A transition period is planned for hydrogen production sites established before 2028.
Finally, hydrogen will be considered “green” if the electrical network used is largely carbon-free, with carbon emissions linked to the production of electricity not exceeding 18 grams of CO2 equivalent/megajoule (once this criterion has been reached, it is considered as valid for five years). A level which Sweden currently meets and which France is close to (19.6 g in 2020). However, other conditions will have to be met: in addition to geographical and time criteria, the hydrogen manufacturer will be required to conclude (future) “purchase contracts” with electricity suppliers using renewable energies (wind, solar, hydraulic).
This provision opens the way to hydrogen produced from a mix based on nuclear electricity, which France is vehemently demanding in the context of legislation on renewables, judging “absurd” not to be able to use to the “low carbon” atom to achieve its green hydrogen objectives. If France wants at all costs that low-carbon hydrogen be recognized as green in the “renewable energy” directive, it is because it imposes very high renewable targets (wind, solar, hydroelectric) for the industry. , to 42% in 2030 and 60% in 2035. Without this agreement, France will have great difficulty in achieving the objectives set by Europe.
In the columns of Les Echos newspaper, the office of the Minister for Energy Transition Agnès Pannier-Runacher is delighted with the new texts. “The texts correct an absurdity: take a Member State which is already almost decarbonized [comme la France, NDLR], when it will deploy hydrogen on its soil, it will not need to build renewables in addition. It will be able to take advantage of the renewables it already has to achieve its European objectives.”
But Berlin and Madrid are formally opposed to it and renewed their mistrust on Monday when the text was published. For them, it is impossible to put on an equal footing hydrogen made from low-carbon energies and hydrogen from renewable energies. “We start from the principle that low-carbon fuels cannot be equivalent to those from renewable sources,” insisted the Spanish Ministry for Ecological Transition. Environmental NGOs are concerned that the production of green hydrogen will seriously undermine the capacities of renewable energies, encouraging them to be replaced by an increased use of gas and coal.
Conversely, the professional federation Hydrogen Europe welcomed on Monday “a boost to the renewable hydrogen market” in the face of the vast subsidies of the United States in this sector, while warning that “these strict rules will inevitably make projects of more expensive green hydrogen and will limit its potential for expansion”.
