Economic comparison of offshore wind-to-hydrogen production routes based on a unit energy transmission assessment model

At present, offshore wind-to-hydrogen development primarily follows three technical routes: offshore distributed wind-to-hydrogen, offshore centralized wind-to-hydrogen, and onshore wind-to-hydrogen using offshore power. Building on existing techno-economic models for power transmission, transformation, hydrogen production, and transportation, this study incorporates scenarios that combine transmission lines with hydrogen pipelines to establish a comprehensive economic model for offshore wind-to-hydrogen production and delivery. The economic performance of different hydrogen production routes is evaluated under various scenarios using combinations of seven installed capacities (1–1000 MW), offshore distances (50–150 km), and capacity factors (0.3 and 0.4). The results indicate that higher capacity factors significantly reduce costs, particularly for large-scale projects (≥400 MW). For projects with a capacity ≤400 MW, scale has a pronounced effect on costs, but this effect diminishes beyond the threshold. Moreover, a cost crossover point between distributed and centralized routes appears when the offshore distance is ≤ 90 km, and higher capacity factors narrow the cost gap for near-shore distributed systems. This study elucidates the effects of installed capacity, offshore distance, and seawater desalination technology on economic feasibility, providing valuable insights for the optimization of offshore wind-to-hydrogen infrastructure.