Powering the Green Transition: How Hybrid Energy Centres Transform Energy Production
Eurowind Energy has worked on the concept of hybrid Energy Centres in recent years. These large renewable energy plants will include wind turbines, solar, batteries, and PtX (hydrogen production). In addition to this, the integration of biogas and hydrogen refining is part of the Energy Centre solution.
The starting point is solar PV and wind turbines. These technologies produce the green power used in the other parts of the energy centre. The battery will provide balancing services to the grid and the electrolyser will produce hydrogen. There is a major need for more locally produced biogas in combination with green electricity production. Additional biogas will help to phase out the use of Russian gas and natural gas from the North Sea.
Creating large energy centres will allow for substantial savings on infrastructure. As some of the power is consumed on-site, large expensive connections to the electricity grid network can be replaced with smaller cables combined with gas pipes. The cost of transporting energy through pipes is approximately 10% compared to cables.
The ability to transform the generated energy to hydrogen, will also create the opportunity to store green power, something that has been seen as crucial for the success of the green transition. Since the electrolysis process generates significant heat, there will be opportunities for the supply of heat for district heating or to accelerate the gasification in biogas plants.
