Optimization is a term that gets thrown around often in engineering and project development. But what does it actually mean in the context of green hydrogen, ammonia, and other power-to-X projects?
At its core, hydrogen project optimization is about making the best possible decisions under a set of constraints. It’s a way of making sense of complex tasks: choosing the right system size, energy sources, and operating strategy to maximize profitability while meeting regulatory and environmental requirements.
We sat down with energy expert and co-founder Felipe Gallardo to discuss what optimization really involves, how it’s typically done, and why it’s becoming increasingly essential in the early stages of clean energy project development.
Optimization 101: Finding the best configuration
Hydrogen project optimization in energy systems is essentially a mathematical search for the most effective system setup, often the one that maximizes profit or minimizes cost.
This might mean figuring out:
- What size of electrolyzer should be installed
- How much storage is needed
- When and how the plant should operate
- Which mix of energy sources (solar, wind, grid) should be used and how
These are complex tradeoffs that depend on technical, economic, and regulatory factors. The challenge is that most of these variables are interconnected: make the electrolyzer larger, and you might reduce the need for storage, or vice versa. Change the electricity price, and everything shifts.
“Optimization helps you take everything you know about your project, like electricity prices, carbon limits, offtaker demands, or land availability, and find the best possible system design” Felipe explains.
Why optimization is critical for clean energy developers
Project developers often begin with an idea: a steel plant needs hydrogen, or a fertilizer facility needs ammonia. They know what the offtaker wants, but not how to deliver it in the most efficient or profitable way.
This is where hydrogen optimization plays a critical role. Instead of starting with a guess, like deciding on a 200 MW electrolyzer without knowing if it’s the right fit, developers can start from project requirements and let the optimization process determine the best design.
“You don’t need to know the size of the electrolyzer upfront,” Felipe explains. “The key is to understand what you need to deliver and the constraints around your project and use optimization to find the configuration that works best.”
Optimization vs. simulation: two sides of the same coin
While optimization tells you what the best configuration is under given assumptions, simulation helps you understand how that configuration performs in practice.
Felipe describes optimization as a “big-picture” tool: it helps you narrow down thousands of possible designs to one that makes sense. But once you’ve identified a promising option, you still need to simulate how it behaves hour by hour, accounting for things like equipment degradation, seasonal variations, or cash flow projections.
Hydrogen project optimization is the answer to “what should I build?” and simulation is the answer to “how will it behave – and what will it cost – once I build it?”
Ideally, both tools are used together: optimization to make the big design decisions, and simulation to evaluate and refine them.
How hydrogen project optimization is usually done (and why it’s difficult)
There are generally three ways companies approach hydrogen project optimization today:
- They skip it entirely. Developers make educated guesses, build Excel models, and manually compare options. It works, but it’s slow, prone to errors, and risks missing better configurations.
- They outsource it to consultants. This can yield high-quality results, but it’s expensive and slow to iterate. If conditions change, like electricity prices or land availability, the entire process often has to be repeated.
- They build in-house models. Larger developers may have optimization teams that run internal tools, but these models are often siloed and not connected to the rest of the design and simulation workflow.
In all cases, the process tends to be time-consuming, opaque, and hard to repeat. “You might pay thousands for a consultant to run one optimization,” Felipe notes. “And if you want to ask a simple ‘what-if’ question later, you’re back to square one.”
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The rising importance of optimization in hydrogen projects
As energy markets evolve and pressure to decarbonize grows, optimization is no longer a nice-to-have. It’s becoming essential for identifying viable projects early and avoiding costly mistakes.
In particular, Felipe emphasizes the importance of transparency and repeatability. Optimization should not be a black box. Project teams and their stakeholders need to understand why a certain configuration was chosen, and how assumptions affect the outcome.
“It’s not just about finding the answer,” Felipe explains. “It’s about building confidence in that answer, being able to revisit it later, and showing your team, your investors, or your regulators that you’ve done your homework.”
Optimization isn’t everything, but it’s where everything starts
It’s easy to get excited about the power of hydrogen project optimization, but Felipe is careful to clarify its role.
“Optimization helps you get to the right starting point. But that’s just the beginning,” he says. “You still need to simulate the performance, refine the design, compare technology providers, and assess financial outcomes. That’s why project development is iterative.”
Still, it’s hard to overstate the impact of starting from a solid foundation, and that’s what optimization provides.
In summary:
- Hydrogen project optimization is the process of finding the most effective system design under real-world constraints.
- It is essential in the early stages of clean energy project development, particularly when offtaker needs and input assumptions are known, but the best configuration is not.
- Paired with simulation, optimization enables developers to move from big-picture decisions to detailed, hour-by-hour analysis.
- Most companies still rely on consultants or internal models, but fast, accessible hydrogen optimization tools are beginning to change how the industry works.
We know that developers struggle to identify the most profitable project setup early on. It’s time-consuming, expensive, and often uncertain. Our optimization feature helps solve that by giving clear, data-driven answers to critical design questions, fast. No more guesswork, no need to rely on external consultants. Just confident decisions from day one.
