PARLIAMENTARY WRITTEN QUESTION
Heating: Hydrogen (24 February 2020)

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what discussions his Department has had with representatives of the domestic heating industry on the future role of hydrogen as a heating fuel.

Asked by:
Matt Western (Labour)

Replacing natural gas in the gas grid with hydrogen may be an option which could contribute to decarbonising heat, along with other options including heat networks, electric heat pumps and biogas. The Government’s December 2018 report on Clean Growth: Transforming Heating concluded that there is currently no clear consensus on the best approach to decarbonising heat at scale and that further work is required on the hydrogen option to prove the safety and feasibility case and to better understand the costs and benefits.

The Department is working with the gas and heating industries, including representatives of the domestic heating sector, to ensure that all the R&D, testing and trialling work required to achieve this has been identified.

The Government is also spending up to £121m on hydrogen innovation, including £25m on the Hy4Heat programme which is investigating whether it is technically possible to replace methane with hydrogen in residential and commercial buildings and gas appliances.

Answered by:
Kwasi Kwarteng (Conservative)
27 February 2020