Scotland’s new rural green hydrogen group met face-to-face for the first-time last week, on David Smith’s Cloffrickford Farm, near Ellon in Aberdeenshire.

The new body has evolved from SAOS’s C2 Network, which has been looking at opportunities around decarbonising the rural economy. Participating organisations include SAOS, NFUS, the James Hutton Institute, Scottish Government, University of Strathclyde and other academic based centres, all looking at how green hydrogen can play a part in the farming and rural economy.

On the day the 30 attendees representing these bodies toured Mr Smith’s wind turbines, which he uses to produce green hydrogen, which in turn powers farm vehicles. The visitors then had a wide-ranging discussion on how the technology could be applied on farm. From the discussion it was clear that there are many applications from vehicles, to energy storage or producing fertilisers.

However, the technology is still very much evolving, and there was a call for more demonstrations to give confidence in how it could work on farm. Mr Smith is a great believer that hydrogen is a sensible solution for farm machinery if fossil fuels are phased out, as currently battery technology makes vehicles too heavy with short working hours. He was also adamant that prices will tumble if the technology is embraced.

The dramatic rise in the price of electricity was also a hot topic – as the rocketing price is making hydrogen generation less attractive for people with existing renewables, as just feeding into the grid can now be worth over four times the cash. However, the group felt that there was a role for hydrogen storage of energy from renewables which have generation capacity that the grid cannot take.

Further, farmers looking to generate their own electricity are being told it may take years to get connected to the grid, so producing hydrogen in the meantime could help get projects off the ground.

SAOS’s Helen Glass said: "The topic of green hydrogen production, storage and use on farms is gaining momentum across a wide range of Scottish stakeholders. The group was established to bring the necessary new thinking, collective needs and farm to catchment scale opportunities together, and use that to drive forward the green hydrogen roadmap for Scottish agriculture and the rural communities in which they are located.

"It is exciting to see agri co-ops and their farmer members joining together with research centres of excellence, trade bodies, enterprise agencies and cross sector SMEs to explore the potential for green hydrogen and make the economic and investment case for adoption.

"By working together as a collective we can make the case to Scottish Government for innovation and business support for green hydrogen being a viable option for farming and rural purposes, whilst enabling the farming sector to collaborate and co-innovate with Scotland’s engineering and technology sectors."