Trinidad and Tobago eyes green hydrogen production

Trinidad and Tobago is looking into the possibility of diversifying into hydrogen production, Prime Minister Keith Rowley said.

Speaking during the virtual opening ceremony for a conference hosted by the Trinidad and Tobago Energy Chamber last week, Rowley noted that hydrogen fuel could play an important role in reducing carbon emissions. To this end, he said, various state agencies are examining proposals for promoting green hydrogen production.

“Hydrogen, along with carbon capture and storage [CCS], will be [a] catalyst for deep decarbonisation and hard-to-abate sectors as heavy industry,” he commented. “The Ministry of Energy and Energy Industries has established a multi-disciplinary committee to develop a hydrogen economy framework for TT. [The] committee should be presenting the preliminary report in the near future.”

As a first step, he said, Port of Spain has secured funding from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) to cover the costs of a hydrogen study. The funding will be used by the Ministry of Energy and Energy Industries and the Ministry of Planning and Industry for a feasibility study of plans to establish green hydrogen production capacity in Trinidad and Tobago, he explained. This study, along with subsequent studies, will help the government assess the advantages and disadvantages of focusing on hydrogen as a means of reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.

Rowley noted that the Caribbean state was already a major producer of natural gas, the cleanest-burning type of fossil fuel. It sells gas to buyers around the world and also uses domestic production to fuel its own thermal power plants (TPPs), he noted. This focus on gas has helped Trinidad and Tobago keep its carbon footprint very small, but the country is also looking for ways to improve its own performance, he said.

To this end, he said, National Gas Co. (NGC) is striving to reduce its own emissions. NGC took a step in this direction last month by becoming a member of the Oil and Gas Methane Partnership (OGMP), a group established by the UN Environmental Programme (UNEP), he reported. It is also working with a Dutch company to gain access to satellites that will allow it to monitor methane emissions from space, he stated.

“I must commend the NGC for taking such definitive and proactive steps that will allow the company to generate tangible data sets, which can then be used in generating data-driven solutions to achieve our climate change targets,” he commented.

Rowley also stressed, though, that making the transition away from fossil fuels to other sources of energy would be a gradual process. Gas is still a desirable fuel for world energy markets, since it does generate fewer harmful emissions than other fossil fuels. As such, it’s no surprise that the Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF) expects annual gas demand to rise from 3.95 trillion cubic metres in 2019 to 5.92 tcm in 2050, he said.

“Demand for natural gas is expected to be boosted by cumulative economic and population drivers, environmental concerns, positive policy support in many countries, and increasing availability of supply,” he added.