Institute of Bio- and Geosciences, Agrosphere (IBG-3)

Climate and land use change are key drivers influencing terrestrial environmental systems that need to be managed by society in the coming decades. These changes act on all compartments of terrestrial systems and provoke system reactions on different spatial and temporal scales. The development of management and adaptation strategies to cope with these changes defines the key research fields in the Agrosphere: 1) Modelling of terrestrial systems, 2) Environmental processes and technologies and 3) Terrestrial biogeochemistry. The institute`s research findings can be translated into management options that can be used by political organizations and decision makers to address pressing societal challenges.

Contribution to the H₂Atlas-Africa project
Work Package 4 and 5 (WP4/5) will focus on evaluating the availability of water and energy resources and the suitability of environmental conditions for green hydrogen production in Africa. This includes especially the potential of local water resources (e.g., surface water and groundwater) for ensuring sustained water supply, but also the availability of wind and solar radiation for renewable energy production. Moreover, understanding climate change impacts on local water resources and green energy in Africa is highly relevant for planning a sustainable production of green hydrogen. WP4/5 will additionally assess climate change impacts on the live cycle of green hydrogen installations related to future reliability and long-term availability of water, wind, and solar energy.

To this end, experts in the Institute of Bio- and Geosciences: Agrosphere (IBG-3) of Forschungszentrum Jülich will employ various modeling and remote sensing tools and products to quantitatively assess available water and energy resources within the project. Further, IBG-3 will utilize integrated terrestrial system modeling to investigate various climate change scenarios and quantify the impacts on local water resources and green energy. The results will contribute to an atlas, depicting the potential of green hydrogen in Western (WASCAL/ECOWAS regions) and Southern Africa (SADC region) in space and time.