Suggested citation: Pradhan, Rudhi, Sanyogita Satpute, Disha Agarwal and Karthik Ganesan. 2024. Assessing the Impact of Green Hydrogen Production on India’s Power System. New Delhi: Council of Energy, Environment and Water.
This paper analyses the impact of large-scale renewable energy integration on India's power grid to meet the green hydrogen production target of 5 million tonnes per annum by 2030. The study determines the optimal renewable energy and electrolyser capacities and assesses the impact on grid flexibility, transmission and storage requirements to manage grid operations with green hydrogen production. The analysis models power system dispatch simulation under different scenarios to assess the impact on India's power system, and provides insights to power system planners, regulators, and green hydrogen industry players.
Green hydrogen (GH2) is an essential component for the deep decarbonisation of the economy. India’s National Green Hydrogen Mission targets the production of 5 million tonnes of GH2 per annum by 2030 to abate 50 million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions, which is around 2 per cent of the energy sector emissions (National Green Hydrogen Mission 2022, MoEFCC 2023).
India’s GH2 target will require a significant expansion of grid-connected renewable energy (RE), beyond the 500 gigawatts (GW) of non-fossil-based capacity target for 2030. Currently, over 80 per cent of RE capacity is concentrated in just six states1. However, the GH2 demand will be more dispersed, requiring the transmission of RE generation through the grid. This large-scale integration of RE will have implications for the electricity demand to be served, consumption patterns, transmission network planning, and power system operations.
We must answer the following key questions to plan for the emerging challenges and system needs: What will be the most efficient and cost-effective approach to achieve the green hydrogen production target? What will be the optimal combination of RE resources and electrolysers? What will be the additional grid flexibility, transmission and storage requirements for integrating large-scale green hydrogen production?
To answer these questions, we modelled India’s power system for 2030 under different scenarios2:
Gujarat will contribute the highest share to GH2 production with 42 per cent of the national target catering to domestic (0.49 MT) and export demand (1.6 MT), followed by Tamil Nadu with 23 per cent (1.16 MT). Together, six states—Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, and Odisha—will contribute around 90 per cent of the total GH2 production in 2030.
Meeting the 2030 national green hydrogen production target with ISTS support will result in the following implications on power system planning and operations, relative to the BAU scenario:
Table ES 1: National level dispatch for 2030 scenarios shows the positives of GH2 with ISTS support
We modelled a second scenario that allows India to reach its GH2 target, but without leveraging the ISTS
network and generating RE for producing GH2 within the same state. As one would expect, this led to
suboptimal outcomes.
India should leverage its extensive electricity grid to achieve its green hydrogen production targets cost- effectively. Based on our findings, we recommend the following planning, regulatory, and policy measures.
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