Social cost-benefit analysis of hydrogen mobility in Europe

Carmen Cantuarias (1) , Benno Weinberger (1) , Leonardo Roses , Alexis Vignes (1) , Jean-Marc Brignon (1)

1 INERIS - Institut National de l'Environnement Industriel et des Risques

The deployment of hydrogen technologies in the energy mix and the use of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles (FCV) are expected to significantly reduce European greenhouse emissions. We carry out a social cost-benefit analysis to estimate the period of socio-economic conversion, period for which the replacement of gasoline internal combustion engine vehicles (ICEV) by FCV becomes socio-economically profitable. In this study, we considered a hydrogen production mix of five technologies: natural gas reforming processes with or without carbon capture and storage, electrolysis, biogas processes and on-site production. We estimate two external costs: the abatement cost of CO2 through FCV and the use of non-renewable resources in the manufacture of fuel cells by measuring platinum depletion. We forecast that carbon market could finance approximately 10% of the deployment cost of hydrogen-based transport and that an early economic conversion could be targeted for FCV. Almost ten years could be saved by considering externalities.

Keywords: HYDROGEN ECONOMY; HYDROGEN FUEL CELL VEHICLES; SOCIAL COST-BENEFIT ANALYSIS; EXTERNAL COSTS; CARBON ABATEMENT COST; PLATINUM DEPLETION

Domains: Environmental Sciences; Environmental Sciences; Environmental Engineering

Carmen Cantuarias, Benno Weinberger, Leonardo Roses, Alexis Vignes, Jean-Marc Brignon. Social cost-benefit analysis of hydrogen mobility in Europe. International Journal of Hydrogen Energy, 2016, 41 (42), pp.19304-19311. ⟨10.1016/j.ijhydene.2016.07.213⟩. ⟨ineris-01863846⟩