Large-scale hydrogen supply chain vision with blended pipeline transportation of China

Hydrogen energy earns considerable development potential in today's era. Given that the energy system is in the transition stage, utilizing the existing natural gas pipeline network has both economic and safety advantages. This study presents an optimization model for the hydrogen supply chain (HSC), encompassing hydrogen production, transportation, and consumption. Taking China as an example, aiming at the divided 29 regions and simulates the HSC configurations under different scenarios. The results indicate that pipeline transportation has both economic and environmental advantages, but due to technical limitations, the transport scale of hydrogen in natural gas pipeline is really limited. As the hydrogen blending ratio decreases, the overall transportation cost of HSC will increase. In the future, the establishment of dedicated hydrogen pipelines may become a necessary option. At the same time, when the carbon price is lower than 70 $/ton, the policy will have a significant impact on the decarbonization of the transportation sector. When it is higher than 70 $/ton, low-carbon hydrogen produced through renewable energy or combined with carbon capture will gradually demonstrate market competitiveness. It is advisable for policymakers to set a strategic target for the market penetration of hydrogen cell electric vehicles at a level of 6.25 %.