Yesterday, on September 02, 2021, a meeting of EUEA member companies of the Green Hydrogen working group took place. The guest of the meeting was Ms. Yulia Rybak, Advisor to the Minister of Energy of Ukraine, Co-Coordinator of the Secretariat of the Ukrainian-German Energy Partnership. Ms. Yulia Rybak mentioned that, Germany and Ukraine work jointly on enhancing energy efficiency, promoting modernisation of the electric power and heating systems and expanding the use of renewable energy. The Energy Partnership addresses vital issues such as the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and transforming the energy sector.
Ukraine and Germany have set themselves ambitious energy transition targets. Ukraine has significant natural potential for a “green” transition and is fully capable to reach 70% share of renewable energy sources in electricity production by 2050. Interim goals are set at 25% by 2035. Germany aims to reach at least 80% share of renewable energy in electricity supply by 2050 and up to 45% by 2025.Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (BMWi), the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMU) and the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), are already involved in the field of energy and energy efficiency in Ukraine with several projects. The Energy partnership is managed by the German Energy-Agency (dena) in cooperation with GIZ.
According the core opinions from various forums and speeches of representatives to this Partnership, Germany is interested in developing projects regarding green hydrogen, and is ready to provide about 2 billion euros to support pilot projects round the world, so Ukraine will have the right to compete with other countries for this funding. However, members of the association mostly had the same issues that are directly related to funding, but unfortunately, the Partnership does not have clear information on the creation of financial instruments that will facilitate the implementation of pilot projects.
It will be recalled that the working group under the auspices of the Ministry of Energy of Ukraine was established in August 2021 to develop a Green Hydrogen Strategy in Ukraine up to 2030, chaired by Yulia Pidkomorna, Deputy Minister of Energy of Ukraine. As of now, the preparation of materials necessary for the development of the Startegy is underway, in particular: detailed calculations of investment costs for the organization of hydrogen production; information on the amount of required water resources; environmental impact assessment of such production; assessment of the technical capacity of the gas transmission network for hydrogen exports; determination of the structure of electricity production from RES; proposals for cooperation and funding of such projects. These materials should be sent by the responsible institutions during September, and the State Agency for Energy Efficiency has been responsible for summarizing the information received and providing it to the Ministry of Energy.
EUEA member companies have declared their readiness to participate in workshops, seminars, meetings on the topic of green hydrogen. It should be noted that the current topics on which the EUEA working group on Green Hydrogen is working is the study of the potential audience of domestic consumers in Ukraine, as well as an equally important topic – the creation of a mechanism for guaranteeing the origin of electricity.
