12 million euros for research into the impact of green hydrogen

A consortium to study the socio-economic impact of hydrogen, including three researchers at the University of Groningen, has been granted 12 million euros from the NWO.

The consortium, “Hy-SUCCESS: Social, User aCCeptable, Economically Sustainable Systems for hydrogen”, will take an interdisciplinary approach to studying hydrogen from the perspectives of engineering, business sciences, law, social and behavioral science in collaboration with industry.

Staff from the University of Groningen will research the role of energy law and environmental psychology. Goda Perlaviciute, Linda Steg (Department of Environmental Psychology, Faculty of Behavioral and Social sciences) and Lorenzo Squintani (Wubbo Ockels School for Energy and Climate) will carry out the research, along with a number of post docs and PhDs. Patricia Poppendick, hydrogen coordinator with the Wubbo Ockels School at the RUG, will be responsible for project management.

Steg will be the Hy-SUCCESS project leader and says that insights from social and behavioral sciences mean the difference between hydrogen being widely adopted or remaining a small share of the sustainable energy market. “Hydrogen will not be implemented at scale when potential public concerns and legal barriers are not properly addressed.”

Lorenzo Squintani says there are currently cases where companies want to use green hydrogen, but don’t have a clear legal pathway to do so. For example, construction companies may want to use green hydrogen to fuel their construction equipment to avoid emitting nitrogen, but they cannot get small refueling tanks licensed because there is no specific licensing procedure for such small-scale storage facilities. So unfortunately they still have to work with diesel fuel.

Squintani says, “For me, the honoring of this project is wonderful recognition of the leadership role of the University of Groningen in the socio-economic-legal dimension of the energy transition in the Netherlands, in this case specifically for hydrogen.”

From a psychological and legal perspective, "the introduction of hydrogen is a huge social challenge and it is crucial to understand what it means for the population as a whole and how it should be regulated," said Goda Perlaviciute.

The project will have 5 subtasks, and different Dutch knowledge institutions will spearhead each theme:

1. Hydrogen in future energy (University of Utrecht, HAN University of Applied Sciences)

2. Markets and business models (TU Delft, Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica)

3. Legal framework (University of Groningen, Hanze University of Applied Sciences) (Lorenzo)

4. Public acceptability of hydrogen (Leiden University, Utrecht University) (Linda, Goda)

5. Research integration (University of Groningen, Tilburg University)

The proposal to include socieconomic impact is notably the only non-technical academic aspect within GroenVermogenNL, which is part of the Nationale Groei Fonds. GroenVermogenNL sets up hydrogen pilot projects, research projects and educational programmes throughout the Netherlands in collaboration with investors, researchers and educators.

In addition to the University of Groningen, the consortium includes 10 universities, 2 research institutes, 5 universities of applied sciences, one research and technology organization, and 3 industry partners. Henk Akkermans from Tilburg University will serve as the technical manager of the project.