Economic Analysis and Stress Test of Off-grid Photovoltaic Hydrogen Production Projects

To solve the problems in renewable energy hydrogen production project as lacking of comprehensive evaluation indicators, accurate cost calculation and so on, firstly, the systemical analysis on the cost of off-grid photovoltaic (abbr. PV) hydrogen production project (abbr. PHPP) was conducted, and the impacts of scale effects and the rates of technological progress on the costs of PHPP were discussed, and the total cost composition was analyzed in detail. Secondly, the stress test for three factors, i.e., the purchase cost of power generation assembly, the electrolytic efficiency and the rate of technological progress, was performed. Analysis result show that under the circumistance of power plant scale of 100 MW in 2020 the levelized cost of hydrogen (abbr. LOCH) was 44.96 CNY/kg, in which the fixed cost of the power plant was of the highest proportion, i.e., 30.39%. Result of the stress test shows that the rate of technical progress exerts a significant influence on LCOH, and under the benchmark scenario, assuming that the rate of technical progress of power plant is 10% and that of the electrolysis plant is 20%, so the LCOH can be reduced to 5.76 CNY/kg in 2050, i.e., lower than 9.5 CNY/kg of hydrogen production from coal gasification, thus, it is proved that the off-grid photovoltaic hydrogen production is competitive.