It is 11:55 a.m. when the starting signal for a new stage of the German energy transition is given in Emsbüren. It’s actually not a shot, but more of a yelp. With this noise, the so-called mobile compressor begins its important work: This huge pump, mounted on a semi-trailer, sucks the gas out of a section of a natural gas pipeline and introduces it into a parallel line. The operator Open Grid Europe (OGE) wants to transport climate-friendly hydrogen through the then empty tube in just two years – instead of climate-damaging natural gas.
It is a first: For the first time in Germany, a gas long-distance pipeline, i.e. a thick pipeline, is being converted to the green energy source hydrogen. OGE, the country’s largest long-distance network operator, therefore invited people to a small ceremony on Monday in Emsbüren, a municipality in southern Lower Saxony. In the middle of the fields there is an OGE compressor station, a system that gives the natural gas from Norway in the pipeline new impetus on its way south. And since Monday the mobile pump has also been working there, freeing one of the two underground pipelines from the climate killer natural gas.
OGE board member Thomas Hüwener says there has been a lot of talk about a Germany-wide hydrogen network for a long time: “Now the starting signal has been given.” The Essen-based company is initially only preparing 46 kilometers of pipeline there for the conversion to hydrogen. It is therefore just a small beginning, as the German long-distance network operators estimate by 2032 a core network with up to 11,200 kilometers of thick hydrogen pipelines having to connect. According to estimates, 60 percent will consist of repurposed natural gas pipes, the rest will have to be rebuilt by OGE and its competitors. Total cost: 20 billion euros.
That’s a lot of money, but without green – i.e. climate-friendly – hydrogen, the restructuring of the economy will not be successful. The energy source is climate-friendly if it is generated using green electricity in so-called electrolysers. In the systems, electricity splits the water into its components: hydrogen and oxygen. The green miracle molecule will then replace natural gas, coal and oil in power plants or ship engines, in chemical factories or steelworks.
The gas storage facilities are also being converted
The tube in Emsbüren is part of a broader hydrogen project called “Get H2 Nucleus”. One partner is RWE. The energy company wants to produce green hydrogen in electrolyzers in Lingen, just north of the compressor station, using wind power. The first plant is scheduled to go into operation by the end of the year – and will feed its production into OGE’s pipe in the future. South of Emsbüren, the pipeline conveniently runs past the large gas storage facilities in Gronau on the Dutch border. Natural gas is currently stored there in salt caverns. These storage systems will also have to be converted to hydrogen in the future. RWE is already building a storage facility for the energy source here.
The pipe’s path leads to the Ruhr area; it is intended to supply, among other things, the chemical park in Marl and Thyssenkrupp’s steelworks in Duisburg. A so-called direct reduction plant is already being built in Europe’s largest steelworks to replace a blast furnace. From 2029 onwards, the plant will produce pig iron not with coke and coal, but with green hydrogen.
It is also clear that Germany will have to import a large part of the hydrogen from countries where green electricity for electrolysers is cheaper and more plentiful. Therefore, the pipe that runs through Emsbüren should be connected to port terminals in Germany or the Netherlands where hydrogen can be unloaded.
The operators are demanding help from the state
But before network operators like OGE can invest on a large scale, they need to know what the compensation looks like. “We have already made significant advance payments, but we are still running into a dead end when it comes to this issue,” complains board member Hüwener. The corporations receive network fees from users for their services. In the first few years, however, there will be very few users for the expensive hydrogen network. If the costs were only passed on to this small group, the fees would be far too high.
The federal government therefore wants to cap wages at the beginning. The operators should recoup the losses from this start time later once the hydrogen economy has successfully ramped up. The state should use taxpayers’ money to ensure that this calculation works out and that companies actually earn adequately from establishing the network. At the same time, it is clear that the state would not bear all the losses, but that a certain risk should remain with the operators. Network operators and the government are still discussing what share of possible losses should be covered by companies and what share by the state. “We are working very intensively with the federal government and have already made great progress,” says Hüwener.
But energy economist Manuel Frondel from the Essen research institute RWI says this isn’t happening quickly enough. “The development of the network is central to the ramp-up of the hydrogen economy,” he told the SZ. “Investments must now start very quickly, and for this the operators need clarity from politicians.” After all: Frondel considers the planned concept of initially capping network fees and limiting possible losses for the companies to be “pretty good”.
But it’s not just the financing that has to be right for the switch to hydrogen: companies like OGE also have to retrain their staff. Two months ago, the groundbreaking ceremony for the construction of an OGE training center took place in Werne on the northern edge of the Ruhr area. There, pipeline employees from all over Europe will learn from real pipes and systems and with real hydrogen how the pipes are operated and maintained with the miracle gas. The training is scheduled to start next fall – just in time for the switch to hydrogen in 2025.