As per Recharger News, Europe urgently needs to start planning a \u201cmulti-billion euro\u201d distribution network fit for green hydrogen produced offshore if it wants it to play a major role in decarbonisation, said one of the leading figures developing wind technology for renewable H2<\/sub> as he called on the EU to take a lead role.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Poul Skj\u00e6rb\u00e6k, chief innovation and product officer at Siemens Gamesa, said that while work on the technical challenges of integrating electrolysers and offshore wind turbines is already well underway, massive deployment of projects in the North Sea will be impossible without the means to send the output to where it is needed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe technology [of renewable production] I\u2019m not so worried about,\u201d Skj\u00e6rb\u00e6k told Recharge<\/em> at WindEurope’s Electric City event in Copenhagen. \u201cInfrastructure is the challenging part. We know the challenges of the electricity grid \u2013 this is just so much bigger.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Although the existing natural gas network could be upgraded to some extent, the Siemens Gamesa official claimed major new additional capacity will be needed to tap the full potential of offshore green H2<\/sub>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While there is some tentative exploratory work by the gas industry, Skj\u00e6rb\u00e6k claimed ultimately \u201csome sort of political push\u201d will be needed to spur what would be \u201ca multi-billion investment to make a central connection into the North Sea to serve Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany\u201d, with backing from the EU \u201ca good place to start\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n