Expanding decarbonization efforts beyond the power sector are contingent on cost-effective production of energy carriers, like H₂, with near-zero life-cycle carbon emissions. Here, we assess the levelized cost of continuous H₂ supply (95% availability) at industrial-scale quantities (∼100 tonnes/day) in 2030 from integrating commodity technologies for solar photovoltaics, electrolysis, and energy storage. Our approach relies on modeling the least-cost plant design and operation that optimize component sizes while adhering to hourly solar availability, production requirements, and component inter-temporal operating constraints. We apply the model to study H₂ production costs spanning the continental United States and, through extensive sensitivity analysis, explore system configurations that can achieve $2.5/kg levelized costs or less for a range of plausible 2030 technology projections at high-irradiance locations. Notably, we identify potential sites and system configurations where PV-electrolytic H₂ could substitute natural gas-derived H₂ at avoided CO₂ costs (≤$120/ton), similar to the cost of deploying carbon capture and sequestration.

将脱碳努力扩展到电力部门以外，取决于具有成本效益的生产能源载体（如H _2），并且其生命周期碳排放量几乎为零。在这里，我们通过整合用于太阳能光伏，电解和储能的商品技术，评估了2030年工业规模（约100吨/天）连续H ₂供应（95％的可用性）的平均成本。我们的方法依赖于对成本最低的工厂设计和运营进行建模，以优化组件尺寸，同时遵守每小时的太阳能可用性，生产要求以及组件跨时运行限制。我们将模型应用于研究H ₂整个美国大陆的生产成本，并通过广泛的敏感性分析，探索在高辐照度地区合理的2030年技术预测范围内可以达到2.5美元/千克平准化成本或更低的系统配置。值得注意的是，我们确定了潜在的场所和系统配置，在这些场所和系统配置中，PV电解H ₂可以以避免的CO ₂成本（≤120美元/吨）替代天然气衍生的H ₂，类似于部署碳捕获和封存的成本。