Hydrogen use in the agricultural sector
The Dutch ambition is to switch completely to the use of renewable energy by 2050. The agricultural sector is an important pillar in this because decentralized production of green energy and its use can be directly integrated into agricultural operations. When it comes to generating green energy, many agricultural companies are already well ahead of the rest of the business sector in the Netherlands. They often have large unused areas for the installation of solar energy, and a windmill at an agricultural company is no longer a unicim either.
But how do you use the generated energy within your business operations if the created energy is not directly usable or can be delivered to the electricity grid? Take, for example, a cattle farm equipped with the latest technologies and using milking robots, the energy produced from solar panels, for example, occurs between 8:00 a.m. and no more than 8:00 p.m. The milking times and therefore the higher energy demand of the farm are between 6:00 and 9:00 and between 19:00 and 21:00 and do not match with the production times of green energy.
The production of hydrogen is then a solution, this can easily be produced locally from green energy, stored locally and at a later moment be converted into energy to, for example, milk the cattle, be used as fuel for the machines or generate heat. Meanwhile, the first machines powered by hydrogen are entering the market such as tractors and forklifts.