According to SERC Chile researcher Francisco Gracia, it is possible to identify some significant barriers to the massive deployment of green hydrogen-based solutions.

“Chile has some of the best solar and wind resources in the world, which establishes a unique potential for generating clean and cheap energy,” said the principal investigator of SERC Chile, Francisco Gracia, who explained the three main existing challenges for promoting green hydrogen in Chile: economy, technology, and the regulatory system.

The researcher and director of the Department of Chemical Engineering, Biotechnology and Materials at the University of Chile identified these three main pillars to improve in the country in order to aim for a massive deployment of green hydrogen-based solutions.

The first of these is economic, “given the high investment costs involved, which has delayed investment decisions, as the final demand for green hydrogen is not completely clear.” In this sense, he maintained that “a convinced and decisive drive from political and executive authorities is required to establish efficient coordination that facilitates the necessary investments, pools demand, and moves decidedly toward a position of global leadership in the field, as we are already falling behind on the global green hydrogen stage.”

The second challenge is technology, “but it is not a barrier related to individual equipment or technologies involved in the green hydrogen value chain, but rather the lack of evidence and experience with integrated green hydrogen systems that are fully renewable or sustainable.”

Finally, the principal investigator of SERC Chile explained that “there is a regulatory challenge in determining how substances traditionally handled as chemical industry inputs (hydrogen, ammonia, methanol, among others) now also adopt a dual role as energy inputs.”

“Solar hydrogen production is positioned as a way to harness and store energy”

According to the Ministry of Energy, the main contributions in terms of capacity (net MW) in Chile come from solar (54%; 2,177 MW) and wind (37%; 1,498 MW) technologies. “In this way, given the availability of the resource in our country, solar-green hydrogen is a candidate to be among the cheapest in the world,” mentioned Francisco Gracia.

In this regard, he added that “the solar photovoltaic industry in Chile is already deployed on a large scale. However, the challenge remains to coordinate and harness the limited hours of solar radiation—also known as the capacity factor—for efficient and optimized use of electrolyzers for as much time as possible.”

“Nowadays, there is a lot of solar energy that goes unused due to constraints in transmission systems; therefore, solar hydrogen production is positioned as a way to harness and store energy,” he indicated.

Meeting the goal: To be the leading green hydrogen exporter

“The Pacific Ocean is Chile's gateway to the world.” This was noted by the principal investigator of SERC Chile, Francisco Gracia. This represents an advantage for the country to become the world's leading green hydrogen exporter.

“Our country has already signed treaties that allow for preferential treatment in trade with the Asia-Pacific region. In particular, China, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, and California are emerging as the primary destinations for exports of hydrogen derivatives. Also, there are already agreements with the ports of Rotterdam and Hamburg, which would allow preferential entry for Chilean energy products into the European market,” said Gracia.

Along these lines, Gracia mentioned that there is “a wide range of options for export, but we must position ourselves as leaders in the green hydrogen economy to secure preferential conditions over other potential competing producers.”