As California prepares for a carbon-free future, SoCalGas is preparing a new hydrogen pipeline to propel the state forward.
As the first project of its kind in California, Angeles Link would provide renewable hydrogen to a wide range of industries, including power plants, heavy-duty manufacturing, transportation fueling stations, and energy storage.
“We believe this will be an anchor project that will kick off many different hydrogen projects,” SoCalGas Vice President of Customer Solutions Don Widjaja told Spectrum News.
Hydrogen can serve as an energy storage medium, thus the pipeline might not only assist electric utilities generate clean energy as they shift away from natural gas and toward renewable alternatives, but it could also improve resilience. In addition, it would boost the emerging hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicle industry, which includes heavy-duty vehicles.
“If we could displace all that diesel and clean the air and at the same time reduce the greenhouse gases in this area, we’re excited to be able to contribute to that as part of our goal,” Widjaja said.
Already, SoCalGas has set a goal of carbon neutrality by 2045, the same year the state of California has set as its objective for net-zero emissions. As the natural gas supplier for half the state, SoCalGas has a significant role in decarbonization if it can replace the fossil fuel that serves as its principal product with a renewable alternative: hydrogen. Hydrogen is more sustainable than fossil fuels since it can be created using renewable resources and produces only water vapor when used to generate energy.
Despite its name, SoCalGas sees itself as an infrastructure company. “We’re agnostic to the field that we serve because we have a network of pipelines to supply our customers with natural gas today or renewable natural gas or hydrogen,” Widjaja said.
Currently, the corporation has more than 100,000 miles of pipeline spanning its 24,000-square-mile service area from Visalia in the state’s central region to the Mexican border. The exact length and path of Angeles Link have not yet been defined, but Widjaja stated, “we have the opportunity to utilize some of the existing right-of-ways in our system.”
Certainty the hydrogen that SoCalGas will transport through the proposed Angeles Link pipeline will be produced using a renewable energy-based electrolysis technology to generate hydrogen from water.
“All the renewables today, they’re not in the LA basin,” Widjaja said. “A lot of the wind farms, a lot of the solar farms, they’re outside of LA, so the hydrogen is likely to be produced in those locations,” he said. “But the demand is here in LA, and today there’s no way to transport it in an efficient manner. The pipeline is one way to get there.”
The California Public Utilities Commission is anticipated to determine by the end of the year whether to approve SoCalGas’ request to plan, permit, and execute preliminary work for the proposed hydrogen pipeline. A representative for the state’s utility regulator stated that SoCalGas is the sole utility in California proposing a hydrogen-transport pipeline.
The U.S. Department of Energy released a notice of intent to fund $8 billion for the development of regional clean hydrogen hubs across the country on Monday, as mandated by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Act signed by President Biden last year. In an effort to accelerate the usage of hydrogen, the so-called H2Hubs would build localized networks of hydrogen makers, infrastructure, and customers.
Over the next five years, $8 billion will be committed to assist the creation of four or more H2Hubs that can show the generation, processing, delivery, and use of clean hydrogen as a model for a clean hydrogen economy.
California is likely one of the four H2Hubs that the DOE has not yet selected. It already contains the bulk of hydrogen stations in the nation. There are now 54 retail hydrogen fuelling stations in the state. This year, nine additional facilities, including those in Seal Beach, Anaheim, Burbank, and Santa Ana, are scheduled to open.
More than two-thirds of the additional thirty are located in Southern California. ten more have been suggested. According to the Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development, there will be roughly 200 hydrogen filling stations throughout the state by 2026.
“We absolutely need hydrogen in the mix, and we need cost-effective ways to get hydrogen from where it’s produced to where it will be consumed,” said Tyson Eckerle, deputy director of zero-emissions vehicle market development for GoBiz. “Pipelines are a really key component of the mix.”
Currently, the majority of hydrogen supplied to retail filling stations is transported in diesel tanker trucks, according to Eckerle. However, attempts are being made to shift them to big rigs powered by hydrogen fuel cells to reduce their carbon impact.
Eckerle emphasized the significance of pipelines when discussing the adoption of hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles by the public.
As part of gaining scale, “large adoption in the heavy-duty vehicle market” contributes to cost reduction. Consequently, a decrease in the cost of the fuel facilitates the increased use of hydrogen fuel cell electric passenger vehicles. When the number of passenger vehicles on the road increases, the cost of fuel cells falls.
“Hydrogen at scale can be very economically competitive,” he said. “The trick is getting it to scale.”
The success of achieving scale is dependent on people signing up to purchase hydrogen, which in turn depends on the availability of hydrogen. Thus, Angeles Link.
“We can launch the market without a pipeline, and that’s what we’re doing.”
Gov. Gavin Newsom aims to reach 100 percent zero-emission sales of new passenger vehicles by 2035 and 100 percent zero-emission operations of heavy-duty vehicles by 2045, according to Eckerle.
According to the California Energy Commission, battery-electric vehicles already account for 1.75 percent of registered light-duty vehicles in the state, whereas hydrogen fuel cell vehicles have been slower to catch on due to their greater cost and lack of fueling stations. Only three hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles are now available on the market: the Toyota Mirai, Hyundai Nexo, and Honda Clarity. According to the CEC, they account for 0.034 percent of all registered vehicles.
“There’s 30 miles of pipeline already at the Port of Long Beach, so we can take advantage of that existing infrastructure, but to get to scale, pipelines are crucial,” Eckerle said. “It’s one of the best ways to move a lot of energy in an economically efficient way.”
Eckerle thinks that federal investment in a California H2Hub is possible in 2024 and that it might not only be completed by 2026, but also be economically self-sufficient by that time. Tens of thousands of hydrogen fuel cell passenger vehicles will be on the roads of California by 2026, and thousands of hydrogen fuel cell trucks and buses will be “under active development with signed contracts,” he claimed.
By the end of 2021, there will be 10,127 hydrogen fuel cell passenger vehicles on California highways and a handful of hydrogen heavy-duty trucks at the Port of Los Angeles.
Approval of the SoCal-Los Angeles Link by the California Public Utilities Commission Widjaja stated, “it could be two, three, or four years before we could even begin constructing the trenches for the pipeline, but we must begin.” “We’re taking a really audacious step. We believe we are the best firm to construct this. As our chief executive officer likes to say, “we want to shape the future, and this is one way we’re doing it.”
SoCalGas plans to replace its entire fleet with zero-emission cars by 2035, as part of its NetZero 2045 climate promise. Widjaja added that the company is transitioning some of its heavy-duty trucks from diesel to renewable natural gas produced from collected methane. It presently possesses fifty Toyota Mirais. It teamed with Hyzon Motors for hydrogen-powered fuel cell electric utility trucks in September of last year.
“SoCalGas is one of the most aggressive natural gas companies not only here in the U.S. but around the world in terms of their pursuit of renewable hydrogen,” said California Fuel Cell Partnership Spokesperson Keith Malone. “Every natural gas company around the globe recognizes the need to decarbonize their pipelines. Hydrogen is one of those tools in the decarbonization toolbox. It’s a Swiss army knife.”
