The Clean Hydrogen Program aims to increase the scale and reduce the costs associated with clean hydrogen production and subsequent use. This solicitation will support large-scale (AN annualized average of at least 5 metric tons per day), centralized hydrogen production by co-locating renewable energy production, clean hydrogen production, delivery networks, and storage facilities. These requirements can help encourage economies of scale, knowledge transfer, and cost competitiveness for clean hydrogen deployment in California.
To ensure opportunity for stakeholder input regarding the scope and organization of this solicitation, CEC staff presented initial ideas and elicited input by way of the following:
Projects that emerge from this solicitation must meet the following objectives:
- Demonstrate or scale up clean hydrogen production, processing, delivery, and storage;
- Leverage existing technologies for large-scale production;
- Demonstrate cost-effectiveness of centralized hydrogen production, processing, delivery, and storage;
- Monitor and minimize hydrogen leakage; and
- Develop a hydrogen workforce.
Funded projects must demonstrate technologies for the purpose of:
- Hydrogen production, which must not have a carbon intensity greater than 0.45 kilograms carbon dioxide equivalent per kilogram of hydrogen produced using a well-to-gate boundary;
- Hydrogen storage, such as compressed gaseous tanks or cryogenic liquid dewars; and
- Hydrogen delivery, such as gaseous tube trailers or cryogenic liquified hydrogen trucks.
Applicants may submit multiple applications, though each application must be for a distinct project (i.e., no overlap with respect to the tasks described in the Scope of Work).
The overall goal of this solicitation is to support the adoption of commercially available hydrogen technologies and kickstart large-scale, centralized clean hydrogen production through demonstration and scale-up in California. The awards resulting from this competitive solicitation will address challenges and opportunities to deploy large-scale quantities of clean hydrogen at centralized locations by leveraging economies of scale and co-locating renewable energy resources to reduce overall system costs and distribute hydrogen to diverse end users. By deploying clean hydrogen production at a large scale, this endeavor can benefit communities, workforce, air quality, and natural environments should hydrogen be used to replace diesel, fossil gas, or other fossil fuels. Projects must avoid any benefit to facilities associated with fossil fuels, such as oil refineries. Additionally, offtakers must not be located on the same site as the production facility.
There is up to $45 million available for grants awarded under this solicitation for the Clean Hydrogen Program. The minimum funding amount for each project is $20 million. The maximum funding amount is $22.5 million. A minimum of $20 million of total funds available under this solicitation is set aside for ARCHES DOE Hub Projects. Entities with ARCHES DOE Hub status must be the primary applicant to be eligible for the set-aside award funding and include a support letter from ARCHES to reflect confirmation of DOE Hub status in the Commitment and Support Letter Form (Attachment 10). This set-aside funding is to be awarded to the highest-ranking ARCHES DOE Hub Project with a passing score, if any. The remaining funds, or all $20 million if no passing ARCHES DOE Hub applications are received, would then be allocated to the next overall highest scoring application regardless of entity type, in ranked order until all funds available under the solicitation are exhausted.
Match Funding Requirement
Match funding is required in the amount of at least 50% of the requested CEC funds.
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