Environmental and techno-economic viability of using hydrogen in the vehicle sector for a rapid energy transition in Argentina

Argentina has a wide availability of renewable resources, which provides important advantages for the hydrogen vector incorporation. The province of Cordoba is an excellent model case for the study of the rapid incorporation of hydrogen as fuel, to replace 20% V/V of natural gas consumed in vehicular use. This does not involve major changes in infrastructure or modifications to the vehicles. This paper computes and analyzes the levelized cost of hydrogen with the emissions associated for each part of the complete hydrogen supply chain. Two different production sources were used: renewable energies sources and the Argentine electrical grid; and two production pathways: in situ and centralized production. Comparing the same volume of proposed hydrogen compressed natural gas and current CNG, a cost decrease in the majority of the scenarios and a CO(2)eq emission reduction ranging from 19.5 to 8.2% are achieved, even if the hydrogen is produced using the carbon-intensive grid electricity. (c) 2023 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

Argentina has abundant renewable resources that can be used for rapid incorporation of hydrogen as fuel in the transportation sector. This study analyzes the cost and emissions associated with different production sources and pathways in the hydrogen supply chain. The findings show that hydrogen produced from renewable energy sources or the carbon-intensive grid can reduce costs and emissions compared to compressed natural gas.