Pioneering the safe use of blended hydrogen in gas networks to reduce carbon emissions.

In December 2023, the Government has taken a strategic policy decision to support blending of up to 20% hydrogen by volume into GB gas distribution networks. 

The HyDeploy project is proud to support the Government in their decision making process and we will be working to deliver the final evidence to support the final decision.

Great Britain has a world class gas grid and currently fossil gas provides heat for around 22 million consumers, with heat contributing to around 14% of UK carbon emissions.

Delivering low carbon heat through blended hydrogen would make the most of the existing gas grid network and means that customers do not require disruptive and expensive changes in their homes.

Blending hydrogen into the gas grid will contribute to the UK Government’s target of net zero carbon emissions by 2050.

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Enormous environmental benefits can be realised through blending low carbon hydrogen with fossil gas. Carbon savings from blending low carbon hydrogen are equal to taking 2.5 million cars off the road or removing the total carbon emissions from all the homes in Wales.

 

The summary video below explains the journey HyDeploy has taken and the types of evidence that have been gathered to support the Government with making their strategic policy decision to blend hydrogen into the gas networks:


In our homes

In our homes

Blending low carbon hydrogen offers a way of providing energy to homes without any changes to our appliances, buildings, or heating patterns. We know people love to use gas for cooking and heating. To date, HyDeploy has already shown that hydrogen can be blended safely into existing networks without any disruption to consumers.

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In industry

In industry

Industrial processes are energy intensive and often require high temperatures, such as glass or ceramics manufacturing. Gas does a lot of the heavy lifting in terms of supplying industrial users with heat in manufacturing processes.

Blending low carbon hydrogen provides a viable pathway to maintain our industrial baseline, whilst enabling industry to transition to decarbonise and reach net zero.

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The HyDeploy partnership developed and delivered in a consortium partnership between:

Cadent
Northern Gas Networks
Progressive energy
HSE
Keele University
ITM POWER

1st Trial

HyDeploy is generating evidence to demonstrate how blended hydrogen can be used safely. The first trial took place at Keele University on a private gas network, where their campus site received blended gas between November 2019 and March 2021. Read more here about the first HyDeploy trial at Keele University.

The second trial took place in the village of Winlaton near Gateshead, in North East England. The trial ran from August 2021 for a ten-month period. You can find out more about the HyDeploy blending trial in Winlaton here.

The next step is to continue evidence gathering on safety of blended hydrogen through industrial trials to complement evidence gathered from trials in Keele and Winlaton. This will complete safety evidence needed to allow the UK Government to make decisions on the future role of hydrogen blending within the gas networks. For more details on how we are preparing industrial and commercial users to get blended gas click here.

Click below to see a short animation about why hydrogen is being explored for UK energy.


Click below to see a video of the HyDeploy2 report launch event in the House of Lords on 01/11/2022.


HyDeploy timeline