Potential to develop Green Hydrogen to build a low-carbon economy, fight climate change in Vietnam.

On October 18, a seminar "Green Hydrogen Prospects in Vietnam's low-carbon economy" took place, organized by the Vietnam Energy Transformation Initiative (VIETSE) to discuss the benefits The challenges and challenges revolve around the issue of building green hydrogen raw materials.

Currently, Green Hydrogen is evaluated as a clean fuel source produced from water electrolysis technology using renewable energy, contributing to the goal of emission reduction and economic development. At the Workshop, experts assessed that green hydrogen is expected to be used in industries that use gray or blue hydrogen fuel such as: Petroleum, chemical, steel manufacturing industry and especially in transportation. load. Hydrogen is a substance that can store energy, which can be compared to lithium batteries that store electricity, rather than fossil fuels like natural gas.

In Vietnam, hydrogen is currently used as an input fuel for production in industries, in which it is most used in oil refining, chemicals, nitrogen fertilizer production and iron and steel. In 2020, according to the Institute of Petroleum Research, nitrogenous fertilizer plants use about 316,000 tons of hydrogen, Dung Quat and Nghi Son oil refineries consume 39,000 tons and 139,000 tons/year, respectively. Currently, many countries around the world such as Japan, Korea, China... have announced a strategy to develop green hydrogen with specific goals in the medium and long term as a solution towards the goal of reducing emissions, limit the impact of global warming.

According to experts from VIETSE, Vietnam has the potential to develop green hydrogen from abundant renewable energy sources. Green hydrogen is a clean energy that can replace fossil fuels/materials being used in a number of industrial production and transportation industries, contributing to the energy transition. Developing green hydrogen industry in the future not only contributes to the goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but also helps Vietnam move towards a low-carbon economy. Accordingly, by 2050, each year Vietnam will have a corresponding demand of 58.3 million tons of clean hydrogen (current policy scenario); 4.4 million tons of clean hydrogen (technological lag scenario) and 9.17 million tons of clean hydrogen (accelerated scenario). Experts attending the seminar pointed out that the demand for hydrogen in the current policy scenario is higher than the supply capacity outlined in the draft National Energy Plan. For Vietnam, green hydrogen should be prioritized for use in industrial production (nitrogen fertilizer, oil refining, steel, cement), transportation (long-distance trucks, passenger cars, ocean and air transportation). , energy (flexible source), and for export.

In order to promote the development of green hydrogen by 2030, according to experts, Vietnam needs to develop policies, regulations and guidelines for the development of green hydrogen; Implement pilot projects. At the same time, develop policies to encourage the production and use of green hydrogen; infrastructure and supply chain development. Develop technical standards and guidelines for safety in the production, storage and transportation of hydrogen.

Speaking at the seminar, Prof. David Cebon - Cambridge University (UK) said that Vietnam has abundant energy sources such as solar energy, wind (onshore and offshore), hydroelectricity to produce renewable electricity. create. The best source structure of Vietnam in the future is renewable energy taking the leading role, thereby achieving energy autonomy. This also promotes the fastest, cheapest and least CO2-emission energy transition.

In the short and medium term, Vietnam still has enough natural gas resources to produce gray and blue hydrogen, but in the long term, it will face many difficulties in terms of supply. According to the exploitation progress, gas output from the above fields is gradually decreasing and is expected to decline after 2035, although it is possible to supplement the source of blue hydrogen when the LNG projects come into operation. Vietnam is moving towards a low-carbon economy to realize the Netzero target by 2050, domestic green hydrogen production is considered as one of the important solutions of the energy transition.