Synergies in offshore energy: a roadmap for the Danish sector

TL;DR

This paper analyzes future offshore energy synergies in the Danish sector, focusing on electrification, hydrogen production, and floating wind, projecting significant CO2 and cost savings by 2050 through integrated system scenarios.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive roadmap for integrating offshore oil and gas with renewable energy technologies in the North Sea by 2050, highlighting specific technological pathways and economic benefits.

Findings

72% reduction in costs compared to BAU scenario

85% reduction in CO2 emissions compared to BAU

Hydrogen production could meet 2% of European demand in 2050

Abstract

This study sets out to analyze future synergies between the O&G and renewables sectors and explore how exploiting these synergies could lead to economic and environmental benefits. By firstly reviewing and highlighting relevant technologies and related projects, this report synthesizes the state of the art in offshore energy system integration, by focusing on three key technologies in electrification/floating wind, electrolysis/hydrogen production and Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS). With a timeframe out to 2050 and model scope including all North Sea neighbouring countries, this analysis explores a total of nine future scenarios for the North Sea energy system. The main results include an immediate electrification of all operational DUC platforms by linking them to the shore and/or a planned Danish energy island. These measures result in cost and CO2 emissions savings compared to a BAU scenario of 72% and 85% respectively. When these platforms cease production, this is followed by the repurposing of the platforms into hydrogen generators with up to 3.6 GW of electrolysers and the development of up to 5.8 GW of floating wind. The generated hydrogen is assumed to power the future transport sector, and is delivered to shore in existing and/or new purpose-built pipelines. The contribution of the O&G sector to this hydrogen production amounts to around 19 TWh, which represents about 2% of total European hydrogen demand for transport in 2050. The levelized costs (LCOE) of producing this hydrogen in 2050 are around 4 euro2012/kg H2, which is around twice those expected in similar studies. But this does not account for energy policies that may incentivize green hydrogen production in the future, which would serve to reduce this LCOE to a level that is more competitive with other sources.