Will agriculture have to compete with green hydrogen for the use of regenerated water?

Teresa López Pavón Sevilla

Seville

Updated Thursday, February 15, 2024-02:30

• Economy Race against the most expensive drought: "We must avoid the social crisis"

For every problem, a solution... and a new problem. The

green hydrogen

industry

, to which all administrations largely rely for the energy revolution of the coming years, will require significant quantities of a resource, water

,

which is increasingly scarce due to climate change. And everything indicates that it will have to compete with agriculture for the use of

regenerated water

in spaces where fresh water is insufficient to satisfy growing demand.

A report prepared by the

consulting firm Red2Red

for the company

FACSA

- with 150 years of experience in water management - has emphasized the need to

review and standardize rates

in Spain and to assume the construction of new infrastructures to face the challenge of limited resources and increased demand as a consequence of the extension of irrigation or the growth of new productive sectors that will require significant volumes, such as the

green hydrogen industry

, whose production process requires large quantities of

ultrapure

water

.

It is estimated, the FACSA report points out, that

between 60 and 95 liters of water are needed per kilogram of green hydrogen produced

, including the needs to carry out the chemical reaction and cooling, the treatment of raw water to meet the requirements of

high purity

and elimination of residual effluent. This amount can decrease to 20 liters of water per kilogram of hydrogen if air cooling is used.

These calculations have been carried out taking into account the reuse of good quality fresh water, because, if brackish water were used, the volume of raw water would increase between 2.5 and 5 times, in addition to producing a greater amount of effluent.

According to the

National Integrated Energy and Climate Plan (PNIEC),

in its revised version in 2023, Spain will reach 11 GW of electrolysis power to produce green hydrogen by 2030, which would allow the generation of up to 1.65 million tons of green hydrogen . "If we consider a water consumption of 20 liters per kg of hydrogen produced, this production of green hydrogen would be equivalent to 33 Hm3 of water," the experts note.

Purifiers

The industry is already responding to this challenge by betting on the use of wastewater. Thus, for example, Cepsa and the public company of Water and Services of Campo de Gibraltar (Arcgisa) have recently signed an agreement so that the

San Roque Energy Park

can be supplied with wastewater from urban effluents from both San Roque and Los Neighborhoods.

According to the information provided by the refinery company, the treatment and purification of urban water for industrial use will be carried out in the new wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) that the Association of Municipalities and Arcgisa plan to build on land near the facilities. of the Energy Park. This new facility in

Campo de Gibraltar

will have tertiary treatment for municipal wastewater, which will amount to 4.2 million m3/year, which would be equivalent to the consumption of a municipality of approximately 35,000 inhabitants for one year.

The wastewater will be recycled and reused for Cepsa's industrial use, which will significantly reduce current water consumption, the company notes. In fact, Cepsa has set the goal of

reducing freshwater withdrawal by 20% in areas of water stress in 2025,

compared to its use in 2019, one of the most ambitious commitments in the energy sector on an international scale.

And yet, the message is beginning to get through to farmers that they will have to compete with the industry for the use of reclaimed water. "If there is water for green hydrogen, there will have to be water for the countryside," said very graphically before the television cameras one of the farmers who were blocking the A-4 highway in Andalusia during one of the protests in recent days.

In the report prepared by FACSA, analysts highlight how despite the increase in irrigation efficiency, which applies increasingly sophisticated technological solutions to reduce

losses

, the increase over decades in irrigated hectares has caused an increase in the demand for water in Spain, becoming one of the countries with the greatest water stress in the European Union.

Strawberry farmers have been clamoring for years for investments that would allow them to use regenerated water from the purification plants of the

Huelva water ring

, which could contribute around 40 hectometres. Finally, the Doñana pact is committed to a reduction in irrigated hectares (both legal and illegal) in the area of ​​the National Park to reduce pressure on the aquifer. Even so, farmers demand the promised transfers and reservoirs from the Government. In parallel, Huelva has become one of the vertices of the triangle that comprises the future

Green Hydrogen Valley,

together with the provinces of Seville and Cádiz.

The writers of the report for FACSA recall that Spain has had to face significant sanctions for not complying with the European directive on wastewater treatment in urban areas. To meet European requirements, the

III Hydrological Planning Cycle 2022-2027

estimates that a public investment in water and the environment of at least

23,825 million euros

would be required . Regarding drought and desertification, the basin plans estimate that it would be necessary to invest more than 4,850 million euros, of which 3,232 million would be for irrigation and 1,590 million for supply.

Available resource

The country, the report recalls, has a reservoir capacity of

56,000 cubic hectometers

. At this time, the volume of dammed water barely exceeds 50%. "In this situation, water stress (relationship between extracted fresh water and resource availability) reaches 42%, which places our country in third place in the EU ranking, only behind Malta and Belgium" .

On the contrary, Portugal is on the other side of the classification with a ratio of 12%. "This is a paradigmatic case, since it is also facing a similar situation in terms of drought," the experts note. In fact, the Government of

Portugal

has just approved a contingency plan that will affect agriculture and domestic consumption in the Algarve region.

José Claramonte, general director of FACSA.EL MUNDO

"It is urgent to invest in infrastructure for the integral water cycle and renew the existing ones, making them more efficient, as is it to invest in those that allow increasing the supply of water through non-conventional uses, such as reuse

or desalination,

and that at the same time reduce the impact of the scarcity of fresh water as a conventional resource. Especially, in a complex scenario where we already see the effects of climate change added to population increases and the increase in crop area. Without this advance, the water management system in Spain

will be unsustainable

", assures

José Claramonte

, general director of FACSA.

Currently, the sector that consumes the most water is agriculture and livestock, (80%), followed by the domestic sector, with 15.5%. In global terms, public investment in water transportation, purification or supply fell by half between 2010 and 2020. Investment per inhabitant is at the bottom of EU countries, only ahead of Cyprus and Slovenia. And that could be due, according to the study, to the fact that Spain has one of the lowest water rates in the European Union, ranking seventh from the bottom.

The FACSA report points in this sense to another urgency: that of generating a

single tariff structure

, which is homogeneous for the entire national territory, and which includes the operating costs and the amortization of investments.