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Flexible sector coupling of heat and electricity is a well-documented way of facilitating efficient and renewables-based energy systems. Heating is characterised by substitutable heat sources, where some facilitate flexibility and sector coupling, while others do not. Earlier studies indicate sector coupling hindrances from competing biomass-based heat sources. The scientific contribution of this study is an investigation of heat source substitution as a general route to sector coupling. We explore the impacts of constraining biomass use, applying the Danish heat sector as a case, to see impacts on indicators such as power-to-heat deployment. We do so by introducing taxes on biomass use, ban biomass boilers and entirely prohibit use of biomass. These constraints are modelled in the Balmorel model. The results show that system costs decrease along with biomass use. Power-to-heat use, CO2-emissions, tax- and electricity tariff revenue and end-user heat cost increase, in some cases substantially. It appears that a CO2 price signal is sufficient to obtain CO2-reductions, whereas other motivations, including increased electrification of the heating sector, may justify constraints on biomass use.

This study analyzes future synergies between the Oil and Gas (O&G) and renewables sectors in a Danish context and explores how exploiting these synergies could lead to economic and environmental benefits. We review and highlight relevant technologies and related projects, and synthesize the state of the art in offshore energy system integration. All of these preliminary results serve as input data for a holistic energy system analysis in the Balmorel modeling framework. With a timeframe out to 2050 and model scope including all North Sea neighbouring countries, this analysis explores a total of nine future scenarios for the North Sea energy system. The main results include an immediate electrification of all operational Danish platforms by linking them to the shore and/or a planned Danish energy island. These measures result in cost and CO2 emissions savings compared to a BAU scenario of 72% and 85% respectively. When these platforms cease production, this is followed by the repurposing of the platforms into hydrogen generators with up to 3.6 GW of electrolysers and the development of up to 5.8 GW of floating wind. The generated hydrogen is assumed to power the future transport sector, and is delivered to shore in existing and/or new purpose-built pipelines. The contribution of the O&G sector to this hydrogen production amounts to around 19 TWh, which represents about 2% of total European hydrogen demand for transport in 2050. The levelized costs (LCOE) of producing this hydrogen in 2050 are around 4 €2020/kg H2, which is around twice those expected in similar studies. But this does not account for energy policies that may incentivize green hydrogen production in the future, which would serve to reduce this LCOE to a level that is more competitive with other sources.