PROJECTSHIGGS

HIGGS

Hydrogen In Gas GridS: a systematic validation approach at various admixture levels into high pressure grids
January 2020 - December 2023

SUMMARY AND OBJECTIVES

The HIGGS project main objective tackles the potential of hydrogen injection into the transmission high pressure natural gas grid as a way to decarbonise the gas system and gas uses.

The European Union strategy towards greenhouse gas emissions reduction is based in key areas of action, including:

• The deployment of renewable energy production.

• The decarbonisation of heating and cooling applications with huge reliance on fossil fuels.

• The reduction of the emissions on the transport sector.

Hydrogen produced by electrolysis can play a pivotal role as energy vector, allowing coupling the energy sectors. Besides, it is an alternative fuel in sectors where electrification is hard to fulfill.

So as to facilitate that high amounts of hydrogen can be produced by renewable energies, existent gas infrastructure should become a way of transporting hydrogen, connecting production centers and final users. Therefore, hydrogen injection into the gas grid could support gas-electricity sector coupling, giving hydrogen a key role.

The HIGGS project aims to pave the way to decarbonisation of the gas grid and its usage by covering the gaps of knowledge of the impact that high levels of hydrogen may have on the gas infrastructure, its components and its management. In order to reach this goal, several activities are being developed in this project. They include the mapping of technical, legal and regulatory barriers and enablers, the testing and validation of systems and innovation, the techno-economic modelling and the preparation of a set of conclusions as a pathway towards enabling the injection of hydrogen in high-pressure gas grids.

FOUNDATION ROLE

The Foundation for the Development of New Hydrogen Technologies in Aragon is the coordinator of the project and participates actively in all work packages, leading one of them. Apart from the tasks of project coordination, its activity is mainly focused on the design and implementation of a test loop for pressures up to 80 bar to retrieve information on the impact of several concentrations of hydrogen in gas network equipment, as well as the design and assembly of a hydrogen injection facility.

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