Israeli startup H2Pro claims to have found a way to make cheap green hydrogen without losing energy. The startup aims for a price of $1 per kilogram. “If it’s $1 per kilogram, you can burn it in a similar way to Putin’s natural gas,” says CEO Talmon Marco.
On a whiteboard in a cold Israeli boardroom, Talmon Marco sketches how he wants to get to that dollar. Marco, in his polo shirt and white glasses, looks like a typical example of a tech start-up CEO. A group of journalists are sitting around a large conference table to hear his story.
Swiss Army Power Knife
Marco starts with a video of Bill Gates. Through his Breakthrough Energy venture fund, Gates is one of the largest investors in H2Pro. “The Swiss army knife of energy,” is how the billionaire(s) describes (green) hydrogen. Vector energy can be used in industry, as fuel for vehicles, to heat homes and store energy for a longer period of time.
Marco is also convinced of the opportunities of green hydrogen, but at the same time he believes we have to make choices. Hydrogen can be used for almost anything. But just because you can do something doesn’t mean you have to do it.” For example, he sees opportunities for hydrogen in making steel and as a jet fuel from 2060.
Green hydrogen challenges
Despite the promises of (green) hydrogen, large-scale production is yet to take place. This is because green hydrogen is currently very expensive to produce. For example, the required machines are very expensive. Additionally, about a third of the energy is lost as heat during the process. Marco compares this process to a light bulb. It also gets hot when it burns for a long time, while the LED stays cool.
H2Pro claims to have found a solution to both the power loss and the price hike. “To understand what we do, I first have to explain what other people do,” says Marco. He asks if the reporters remember a chemistry test with a glass of water, some salt, and a battery. A few of those present muttered yes. Someone says: “But I don’t remember well.” Marco explains it again. By passing current through the water, hydrogen bubbles converge on one side, and oxygen bubbles converge on the other. According to him, this is the most used technique now.
To prevent an explosion, hydrogen and oxygen must not come into contact with each other after separation. This is why there is a dividing line between them: the membrane. The higher the hydrogen production, the more dangerous the process and the more expensive the equipment.
Hydrogen production without a membrane
H2Pro makes hydrogen without a membrane. This is achieved by dividing the process into two phases. In the first stage, they drain hydrogen, while putting oxygen in a kind of battery. When the battery is full, the liquid (ekolyte) is replaced with a warm liquid until the battery is discharged. This is the second stage.
Since hydrogen and oxygen are not released at the same time, the H2Pro requires less expensive equipment. It also uses a raw material found in abundance: nickel. Finally, hardly any energy is lost in the process. “We found that we can achieve almost 100 percent efficiency.” As a result, Marco believes he will be able to produce green hydrogen cheaply in the long term. It aims for a price of $1 per kilogram by 2030.
The importance of a low price
“If it’s $1 per kilogram, you can burn it in a similar way to Putin’s natural gas,” DiMarco says. To explain how he wants to reach that price, he changes his chemistry class into an economics class.
“You have to make sure that OPEX costs, such as energy costs, and capital expenditure costs — equipment costs — together don’t exceed $1 per kilowatt-hour,” Marco explains. Some of the journalists in attendance are now glancing at the whiteboard as the CEO talks about the ways H2Pro is cutting costs.
With equipment, what matters is how much the equipment costs and how often it is used by the buyer. “You can compare it to a rental car. If it’s $100 and you drive it for an hour, the car costs $100 an hour. If you want to get the hourly cost down, you have to use it for longer.”
The other components in his calculation are energy and commodity prices. Renewable energy now costs between $30 and $40 per megawatt-hour. He thinks it will need a maximum of 43 kilowatt-hours to produce 1 kilogram of hydrogen and expects the price to reach $15 per megawatt-hour by 2030. Then his product becomes profitable.
The best technique
He compares his E-TAC technology to other electrolysis technologies such as solid oxide, alkali and PEM. According to him, membrane-free studies are now being conducted using only alkali. He lists the drawbacks of other techniques: “Alkaline and hard oxide don’t work well when the amount of energy varies. PEM can handle that, but it’s more expensive and has problems with raw materials. Hard oxide is very efficient, but it needs a high temperature, so it’s “It’s only interesting if you can use residual heat. You also can’t turn off the technology. Once you buy it, it stays on until you get rid of it.”
Without breathing room, Marco continues to capitalize on the advantages of his technique: “The E-Tac works well intermittent powerIt is more efficient than hard oxide and does not use rare earths, which makes it cheaper than alkali. “It really is an all-in-one technology,” he says proudly. Sees only one problem: it is still in development.
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