On Tuesday, April 19, 2022, the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) and Hydrogen Forward hosted the second event in their joint virtual Hydrogen Hub Series. Kristine Wiley, Vice President of the Hydrogen Technology Center at GTI, moderated the hour-long panel, “Moving and Storing Hydrogen at Scale,” featuring Jill Evanko, CEO of Chart Industries; Joan Dreskin, SVP and General Counsel of the Interstate Natural Gas Association of America (INGAA); Joe Bushinsky, Sr. Director of Regional Business Development for H2 Infrastructure at Mitsubishi Power Americas; and Yuri Freedman, Sr. Director of Business Development at the Southern California Gas Company (SoCalGas). Conversation focused on pipelines for hydrogen transport and links between hub regions, hydrogen’s multiple pathways (both literal and figurative), and the needed timeframe for widespread hydrogen infrastructure deployment.

Pipelines are Crucial for Transport

Chart’s Jill Evanko started off the event highlighting the “meaningful movement” in the industry from gaseous to liquid hydrogen, done in part because hydrogen is easier to transport in volume in liquid form. She also  detailed efforts to retrofit existing natural gas pipelines and facilities for hydrogen. Yuri Freedman of SoCalGas called pipelines the best choice to  “deliver large amounts of energy at a low cost in a reliable and safe fashion” in his explanation of the utility’s planned Angeles Link project, which will use pipelines to transport hydrogen from rural production sites to the populous Los Angeles Basin. However, INGAA’s Joan Dreskin expressed concern over unclear regulatory jurisdiction – while the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has jurisdiction over interstate natural gas and hydrogen blend pipelines, it is unclear (and in Dreskin’s opinion, unlikely) if the Commission currently has jurisdiction over pure hydrogen interstate pipelines. Further complicating the issue is defining what percentage of a hydrogen blend qualifies a pipeline to be classified “hydrogen” versus natural gas.

There will be “multiple pathways” to low-carbon hydrogen

Mitsubishi’s Joe Bushinsky highlighted the “multiple pathways” to a widespread hydrogen infrastructure. While he detailed Mitsubishi’s Intermountain Power and Advanced Clean Energy Storage (ACES) initiatives that utilize regional attributes, including salt caverns, he also emphasized that the various types and purposes of hydrogen and its transportation methods will vary to fit the production region’s geological attributes, and the needs of the consumer base. Both Bushinsky and Freedman called for a focus on carbon intensity of hydrogen over any other metric, with Freedman underscoring that companies have to serve their customers overall and fit projects to consumer needs.

Private and Public Stakeholders Need to Act Now

All panelists emphasized the short time frame needed to build out a hydrogen economy. Chart’s Evanko said building out currently siloed projects into a sustainable hydrogen economy needs to happen “in 3-5 years” for commercial success, while INGAA’s Dreskin pointed to the lack of clear interstate regulatory jurisdiction as a barrier to the companies currently looking to build out their pilot demonstrations or create new infrastructure projects. Mitsubishi’s Bushinsky agreed that a “sense of urgency” is “critical from a national standpoint” and underscored that action needs to come both from national investment and regulatory clarity, in addition to private investment and expansion.

This was the second of three events in the virtual Hydrogen Hub Series. The first event focused on “Regional Feedstock Opportunities and Challenges,” and the next panel, “Hydrogen Hubs: Decarbonizing Industry, Transport and Power Generation,” will be on May 10, 2022. The registration portal can be found here.