Techno-economic assessment of on-farm hydrogen production and utilisation for agricultural field operations

There is growing interest in hydrogen as an energy carrier for decarbonising various sectors, including agriculture. However, decentralised and farm-scale solutions for producing and using hydrogen where fuel demands fluctuate significantly throughout the year, remain poorly understood. Based on the estimated hourly energy demand for field operations of a virtual 200-ha cereal farm in Uppsala, Sweden, an on-farm hydrogen production plant via electrolysis was assessed for supplying the hydrogen gas for powering the agricultural field operations, using different configurations of photovoltaic (PV) generated and grid electricity. The selected configurations were economically assessed and compared to a scenario where farm operations are powered by diesel. All hydrogen production systems resulted in higher capital and operating costs compared to the diesel system, with the most economical hydrogen case costing about three times more than the diesel system, across a 30-year lifetime. However, with favourable conditions for the hydrogen system, meaning the existence of an external local hydrogen demand that helps utilise the hydrogen production system with a high capacity, resulted in considerably lower costs for the produced hydrogen, making it comparable to the diesel system.