Hydrogen guinea pigs of Winlanton

[Stan]

The residents of Winlanton, near Newcastle upon Tyne, knew it was coming but not the actual day.
Last Wednesday, 650 homes became the first on the gas grid to get part hydrogen to burn in their unmodified appliances. They were deliberately not told the day to prevent any blaming for boiler problems.
It started as a 2% mix and over the coming days will be increased to 20%, the maximum that can be used with old appliances.

[Mr Gus]

https://www.gateshead.gov.uk/article/13 ... ergy-pilot

https://hydeploy.co.uk/faqs/who-is-invo ... -hydeploy/

So the initial batch is apparantly 100% GREEN hydrogen, however the plans within the statement is

https://hydeploy.co.uk/about/technology/

"We can produce Hydrogen in many ways. We can use renewable power to produce it through electrolysis. To produce larger quantities we would use methane reforming along with carbon capture.

Methane Reforming with CCUS provides a pathway for low-cost bulk hydrogen production. This process involves splitting methane into hydrogen and carbon dioxide (which is captured and stored) leaving a stream of hydrogen. Methane Reforming is best suited for bulk production due to its economies of scale and efficiency"

[Stinsy]

Wonder what happened WRT leaks! Hydrogen gushes out of teeny gaps that CH4 can't get through.

[Bugtownboy]

From the article (appreciate it doesn’t address the overall issues of leaks)

Across the UK, old iron mains gas pipes are being replaced by new plastic ones.

This UK wide programme is over 50% complete. The new plastic pipes can transport hydrogen and other green gases.

The gas network is complex and there are lots of other pipe materials underground. These need to be tested with hydrogen so HyDeploy and other projects are investigating this as part of their work.

Does this mean the gas network is going to be maintained for a significant period ? The push for ASHP will only be for new-build and not replacement ?

Presume there’s no point in experimenting with Hydrogen/Methane mix for domestic supply if it’s not going to be a significant part of our infrastructure.

[Stinsy]

From the article (appreciate it doesn’t address the overall issues of leaks)

Across the UK, old iron mains gas pipes are being replaced by new plastic ones.

This UK wide programme is over 50% complete. The new plastic pipes can transport hydrogen and other green gases.

The gas network is complex and there are lots of other pipe materials underground. These need to be tested with hydrogen so HyDeploy and other projects are investigating this as part of their work.

Does this mean the gas network is going to be maintained for a significant period ? The push for ASHP will only be for new-build and not replacement ?

Presume there’s no point in experimenting with Hydrogen/Methane mix for domestic supply if it’s not going to be a significant part of our infrastructure.

Hydrogen gushes through Iron and is fine with plastic gas mains that mush is easy to say. However the quality of copper pipe and the quality of soldered joints in customer houses varies a lot. I've heard of substandard copper pipe so porous it sweats water. Hydrogen is exceptionally dangerous, the flamefront moves much faster and ignites much more readily than CH4, resulting in hugely damaging explosions from comparatively small leaks.

[spread-tee]

I must say I've never heard of porous copper pipe to that extent, it probably does exist as you say but I doubt it's very widespread, in any case a simple tightness test would flag up the fault. From what I read in the gas-rag the safety of Hydrogen isn't that much different to Methane, true it does have a lot lower ignition energy than Methane, and the flame speed is a bit higher, but being much lighter than air and a small molecule it readily escapes through the structure of a building so it has to be a massive leak to build up to a dangerous level.

Apparently up to a twenty per cent blend in Methane doesn't change the overall characteristics much, all our present tests, equipment and procedures will still be applicable. The feeling is, from what I read in the trade press, that taking all factors into account the safety aspect is more or less the same.

Desp

[dan_b]

Steam reformation of methane is highly energy intensive, and of course maintains reliance on natural gas supply. Plus commercial-scale CCS is also both highly energy intensive and also essentially a myth in any sense of the word. The inefficiency of this process beggars belief.

Argh. Such guff. When's Elon going to start flying people to colonise Mars? I think I'd like to be on that one-way trip the way things are going here.

[Ken]

I just dont see where they are trying to get too with this tech. There will never be enough produced in the UK green H for the steel,cement etc etc so to just burn it is a waste of a valuable product. This is the FF industry at its worst and needs to be stopped pronto. FF need to stay in the ground, they are not wanted. Actually i think i prefer nuclear to this.

[Stinsy]

I just dont see where they are trying to get too with this tech. There will never be enough produced in the UK green H for the steel,cement etc etc so to just burn it is a waste of a valuable product. This is the FF industry at its worst and needs to be stopped pronto. FF need to stay in the ground, they are not wanted. Actually i think i prefer nuclear to this.

The FF companies have very large budgets to lobby politicians. It all looks "slick" and "green" in the glossy videos.

[nowty]

That's why Boris seems to be on the hydrogen band waggon, you can foresee it all now,

Where going to have green hydrogen, hype, hype, hype.

Then it will be, in the interim we are going to use our existing resources and make blue hydrogen but with carbon capture. But until we get the technology sorted, we will start the process by experimenting with brown hydrogen.

Then it will be we have to have a balance between the types of hydrogen we use but we are working on it and increasing to greener hydrogen all the time.

Etc, etc, etc............