On 12 December 2015, 196 parties gathered in Paris to attend COP 27, where they adopted a legally binding international treaty on climate change called the "Paris Agreement". The main goal is to limit global warming to below 2º compared to the pre-industrial levels. Consequently, countries started to set the required policies and strategies to achieve the goal of protecting our planet from climate change impacts on various areas.
Renewable energy sources attracted policymakers to consider the renewable energy ratio in the national and regional energy mix for future strategic plans. One of the trendy clean energy directions is "Green Hydrogen" which is produced by splitting the water using an "Electrolyser" that is operating using clean electricity which means that electricity is generated from renewable energy resources such as Solar or Wind.
As renewable energy requires vast locations for solar parks or wind farms, some countries have plans to import the energy from others and one of the very optimistic visions is exporting Green Hydrogen from North African countries to Europe, especially after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
The current production cost of Green Hydrogen represents a challenge for the mega projects that are targeting higher production rates soon to achieve the plans that are set by the North African countries regarding Green Hydrogen. The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) announced an official program called "Hydrogen Shot" which aims to reach a Green Hydrogen production cost of $1/kg by 2030.
This study introduces two scenarios based on Green Hydrogen Production costs. One of them is the "reference scenario-Business As Usual" and the other is the "$1/kg scenario". Therefore, the forecasted production rates of Green Hydrogen would be estimated based on the change in the production cost. Moreover, other markets and sectors would be affected as renewable energy attracts more investments with cheaper costs among other factors. In addition, IEA explored a scenario for the Levelized Cost of Energy, and it was published under the name of "Sustainable Africa Scenario" SAS, which was used for the Levelized cost of electricity by technology in Africa as input for the modified scenario
The study was conducted in the North African region using an assessment model called The Global Change Analysis Model (GCAM); targeting a medium-term scope from 2020 to 2030.
The results show that the production of green hydrogen energy at the production cost of $1/kg and the SAS Levelised Cost of Energy will not be enough to satisfy a ratio of the European demand as planned by the North African region. And the study recommends the change of production rates be implemented for the domestic demand inside the North African region countries until achieving more development in renewable energy resources such as more solar and wind energy ratios in the national energy profile.