Vattenfall has been awarded GBP 9.3 million in innovation funding from the Net Zero Innovation Portfolio Low Carbon Hydrogen Supply 2 fund by the UK Government. The funding will be used to develop the world’s first hydrogen-producing offshore wind turbine, with the electrolyzer sited directly onto an existing operational turbine.
The pilot project at Vattenfall’s Offshore Wind Farm in Aberdeen Bay will have an output of 8 MW and will be able to produce enough hydrogen every day to power a hydrogen bus to travel 24,000 kilometers. The hydrogen will be piped to shore at Aberdeen Harbor.
If there was a market for the hydrogen produced being used as fuel by shipping then perhaps ships could moor near the turbine and 'fill up' with hydrogen. If an electrolyser was in the turbine then it may not need to export the power to land and may save on cable laying and possibly transformers as well which are a significant cost and also a use of scarce resources such as copper.
I suspect that electrolysers on individual are probably too complex and a centrally located (but still at sea) electrolyser will be used as I think the water for the electrolyser will need to be produced by desalinating sea water by some means.
