Power Electronics for Off-Grid Gigawatt-Scale Green Hydrogen Production for Steel Manufacturing—Architectures, Costs, and Efficiencies Analysis Tool¹

The goal of this work is to present an architecture, cost, and efficiency analysis tool of power systems, with emphasis on power electronics, for an off-grid, gigawatt-scale green hydrogen production for steel manufacturing, also known as green steel. The tool analyzes the main possible architectures based on commercially available components, such as wind generators, batteries, and electrolyzers. To reach gigawatt scale, different levels of aggregation are evaluated for DC and AC source-to-load coupling. The overall efficiency is estimated based on the efficiencies of each conversion stage, including transformers, AC/DC, DC/AC, and DC/DC converters, which are inputs to the tool. Similarly, the overall cost is estimated based on the cost per kilowatt of each system component, each of which is also an input. User defined input values, or default values may be used. The tool output is a list of the predefined architectures and its associated costs and efficiencies for decision support. A block diagram overview with the components of such architectures is also provided.