A site analysis for biological hydrogen production in biogas plants in Germany

Abstract There are many developments in sustainable hydrogen production, like the increasing usage of electrolysis, which accounts for 5% of the hydrogen produced worldwide, as well as the current research into biological production methods. One of these methods is the usage of microorganisms to produce hydrogen through the biological pathways of dark fermentation. It can use renewable raw materials or biomass, such as municipal waste, liquid manure or sewage water as substrate to produce a hydrogen‐rich gas. Hydrogen generation through dark fermentation is a promising method because the process can be integrated into existing biogas plants to use the existing infrastructure to produce biogas and hydrogen as an additional product. However, modifying the existing biogas plants is not feasible or economical for the operator in every case. This paper reports a site analysis conducted to find the most suitable biogas plants in Germany for integrating dark fermentation and assesses the potential costs of hydrogen production via dark fermentation. The site analysis was based on Marktstammdatenregister, Biogas Datenbank, and the Biogaspartner database.