Snam successfully concludes turbine tests – Corriere.it

Snam’s experimentation on the use of hydrogen as a fuel to power gas turbines ended successfully. In November, the company completed a series of tests in its compression station in Istrana (Treviso). The experimentation carried out in collaboration with Baker Hughes, a technology company serving energy and industry, has shown that a mixture of 10% hydrogen and methane is compatible with the various components of the system.

The hydrogen-ready turbine

The Istrana plant is one of the thirteen compression stations positioned along the national transport network with the function of giving the gas the necessary thrust to make it travel in the pipelines towards the various consumption points in the peninsula. This is the first Italian compression station in which a hydrogen-ready turbine, the NovaLT12 (with a power of 12 MW) designed and built by Baker Hughes in its Italian plants, has recently been installed. The trials also involved another Baker Hughes turbine already operating at the plant, the PGT25 (with a power of 25 MW), designed for operation with natural gas and tested for the first time with a mixture of natural gas and hydrogen (at 10 %).

20 thousand tons of CO2 less

Snam has installed 39 PGT25 model turbines, out of a total of 73 machines, and these represent approximately 70% of the total power (1,325 MW). The introduction of hydrogen in increasing quantities in current machines (from the 10% tested up to volumes between 15 and 20%) will allow for a greater reduction in CO2 emissions compared to the use of natural gas alone. Based on the operating data for 2021, Snam calculates that a 10% use of hydrogen in all the group’s PGT25 turbines would make it possible to cut almost 20,000 tonnes of CO2 per year.

previous trials

The objective of the ongoing experiments is to continue testing the existing gas infrastructures for compatibility with the use of hydrogen, making them ready to transport a molecule that will play a key role in the energy transition process, explains Snam. Already in 2019, the company had experimented with the injection of hydrogen into a section of its high-pressure gas transport network, with a blend first at 5% and subsequently at 10%. And in 2020, at the Baker Hughes plant in Florence, tests of the NovaLT12 turbine were carried out with up to 10% hydrogen mixed with natural gas. This type of high-performance turbine is capable of burning methane and hydrogen gas blends, from 5% up to 100% hydrogen. The Snam group is also conducting studies on the compatibility of its storage sites with hydrogen, with a view to a complete assessment of its entire infrastructural park.