More than 1/3 of the central enterprises have entered, and the pattern of hydrogen energy industry will change?

　　Recently, at the press conference on the economic operation of central enterprises held by the State Council Information Office in the first half of the year, Peng Huagang, Secretary General of the State owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council and press spokesman, said that more than 1/3 of central enterprises have been carrying out the whole industrial chain layout including hydrogen production, hydrogen storage, hydrogenation, hydrogen use and other links, and have achieved a number of technological research and development and demonstration applications.
The goal of carbon peaking and carbon neutralization brings new opportunities for the development of the hydrogen energy industry. The current private enterprises with high market share have accumulated a certain scale and market volume for the hydrogen energy industry through continuous research on technologies and products. How will the settlement of central energy enterprises change the pattern of the hydrogen energy industry?
(Article 1 China Energy News reporter Zhong Rui)
Highlight the importance of hydrogen energy
"The development of China's hydrogen energy industry is from the bottom up. Private enterprises take the lead in entering, and then large central enterprises follow up one after another. At the same time, local governments give strong support to form a certain industrial foundation, and show good prospects for development. After that, the national level finally attaches importance to it, so as to formulate the top-level plan." Jing Chunmei, a researcher and vice minister of the Scientific Research Information Department of the China International Economic Exchange Center, said that the participation of central energy enterprises now means that "the development trend and prospects of the hydrogen energy industry are promising, and its importance is affirmed."
The report of CITIC Securities shows that at present, the emerging application of hydrogen energy in various fields is going through a breakthrough period of "from 0 to 1", and the number of central enterprises and listed companies participating in the hydrogen energy sector is increasing rapidly.
"China's hydrogen energy industry is ushering in an important period of opportunity. As a clean and carbon free secondary energy, hydrogen energy can not only promote deep decarburization in industries, transportation, construction and other fields, but also promote green and low-carbon growth of the national economy." Jing Chunmei believes that hydrogen energy has the advantages of zero carbon emissions, clean and pollution-free, and is expected to be high.
According to relevant statistics, China's industrial, construction and transportation sectors account for 65%, 20% and 10% of carbon dioxide emissions respectively. As the industry with the largest carbon emissions, the pressure on carbon reduction is enormous. Many insiders believe that if the transportation field is taken as the breakthrough point of China's hydrogen energy development and hydrogen energy is used to achieve deep decarburization in the industrial field, it will make a great contribution to China's carbon reduction goal.
In addition, with the rapid development of hydrogen energy industry and increasingly stringent environmental protection policies, Baowu Group, Hegang Group and Jiuquan Iron and Steel Group have started to explore hydrogen energy steelmaking in domestic steel enterprises, and gradually built demonstration pilot projects. Technologies such as hydrogen and carbon monoxide mixed gas iron making, pure hydrogen as reducing agent to iron making are gradually unlocked, Hydrogen metallurgy technology has become one of the effective ways for iron and steel industry to achieve low-carbon green transformation and upgrading.
Stimulate the vitality of industrial development
CITIC Securities believes that with the goal of carbon peaking and carbon neutralization, the position of hydrogen energy has gradually improved, and the industrial participation proportion of energy central enterprises has also increased. With the increasingly clear hydrogen energy policy and the active layout of central enterprises, the hydrogen energy industry pattern may usher in new changes, and the industry rhythm is expected to speed up.
In the hydrogen energy industry, the State Power Investment Corporation has simultaneously carried out the layout of the whole industrial chain of renewable energy hydrogen production and fuel cells; Sinopec will make full use of its own gas station network to vigorously layout hydrogen refueling stations. During the "Fourteenth Five Year Plan" period, Sinopec will accelerate the development of new energy business with hydrogen energy as the core, and plans to layout 1000 hydrogen refueling stations or oil hydrogen co construction stations; In addition, PetroChina officially established a hydrogen energy research institute in May this year, which will focus on the research of hydrogen energy industry related technologies such as PetroChina's hydrogen production, storage, transportation and efficient utilization, fuel cells and energy storage technology. In the future, PetroChina will also put 50 hydrogen refueling stations into operation nationwide.
"When laying out hydrogen energy, energy central enterprises will combine their original industrial base and main business to reconstruct the industrial chain and establish new green and low-carbon development advantages. At the same time, central enterprises are large in size and have significant advantages in capital and technology. Therefore, the presence of central enterprises will have a strong driving effect on the development of hydrogen energy industry and accelerate the breakthrough in core technology, the expansion of application scenarios and the large-scale production of green hydrogen." Jing Chunmei said.
It is worth noting that the entry of central enterprises may aggravate industrial competition. At that time, problems such as whether the original advantages of private enterprises can be maintained and how to solve homogeneous competition will emerge. Jing Chunmei believes that this is also a normal market competition. Maintaining the survival of the fittest in the industry will be conducive to the transformation and upgrading of the hydrogen energy industry and high-quality development in the long run.
In this regard, the person in charge of relevant hydrogen fuel cell enterprises told reporters that, as a hydrogen energy enterprise, the continuous breakthrough in technology research and development and cost reduction and efficiency enhancement is the foundation of private hydrogen energy enterprises. At present, the cost of hydrogen fuel cell stacks has become a trend of decline. Whether central energy enterprises enter the race track or there is still a gap with foreign countries in some key technologies, private hydrogen energy enterprises will not be afraid of competition.
Three major problems still need to be solved
While the central enterprises drive the industrial development, Jing Chunmei pointed out that there are still three major problems to be solved for the hydrogen energy industry itself.
First of all, the core key technologies and materials in the hydrogen fuel cell field have not been fully localized and autonomous, which affects the strength and commercialization of the hydrogen energy industry.
In terms of hydrogen sources, due to the high cost of renewable energy, there has been a lot of debate about whether it is necessary to make large-scale use of fossil energy such as coal to hydrogen in the industry. However, after the goal of carbon peaking and carbon neutralization was put forward, the industry's debate on hydrogen sources was gradually unified. The CCUS technology has not yet been widely used in a large scale, and the way of hydrogen production from fossil energy is not encouraged. The industry must adhere to the direction of green hydrogen development.
At present, relying on the rich scenery and water resources, the renewable energy hydrogen production in Sichuan and the "Three North" regions of China is more economical, and the cost is expected to continue to decline. However, due to the market distribution and hydrogen energy storage and transportation constraints, the hydrogen produced in these regions is faced with the situation of both consumption and export.
"At this stage, hydrogen storage and transportation are mainly carried out by long tube trailers, and the rest includes low-temperature liquid hydrogen and pipeline transportation. The economic radius of long tube trailers for the storage and transportation of high-pressure hydrogen is only 150-200 kilometers, and long-distance transportation will greatly increase the cost. For liquid hydrogen, its technology application is still in a breakthrough stage. Pipeline hydrogen transportation that can solve the long-distance and trans provincial transportation of hydrogen is still in the initial pilot stage in China, even though there are only small-scale pilot projects in the international scope 。” Jing Chunmei said that the pipeline transportation of hydrogen will enable hydrogen energy to break through the regional restrictions, achieve the optimal allocation of resources in a wider range of the country, and form a national market.
CITIC Securities said that the process of hydrogen transportation and storage mainly depends on the popularity of high-pressure hydrogen storage bottles and the reduction of compression costs. On the one hand, technical upgrading is required to continue to improve the power density; on the other hand, the scale effect after large-scale production growth is required to dilute unit costs. In the future, driven by policies, the participation of central enterprises, the localization of key materials and technology iteration, the cost reduction of the hydrogen energy industry chain and the expansion of the market scale are expected to form a positive cycle, and industrialization is expected.