Comparative study of electric and hydrogen mobility infrastructures for sustainable public transport: A PyPSA optimization for a remote island context

Decarbonizing road transportation is vital for addressing climate change, given that the sector currently contributes to 16% of global GHG emissions. This paper presents a comparative analysis of electric and hydrogen mobility infrastructures in a remote context, i.e., an off-grid island. The assessment includes resource assessment and sizing of renewable energy power plants to facilitate on-site self-production. We introduce a comprehensive methodology for sizing the overall infrastructure and carry out a set of techno-economic simulations to optimize both energy performance and cost-effectiveness. The levelized cost of driving at the hydrogen refueling station is 0.40 €/km, i.e., 20% lower than the electric charging station. However, when considering the total annualized cost, the battery-electric scenario (110 k€/year) is more favorable compared to the hydrogen scenario (170 k€/year). To facilitate informed decision-making, we employ a multi-criteria decision-making analysis to navigate through the techno-economic findings. When considering a combination of economic and environmental criteria, the hydrogen mobility infrastructure emerges as the preferred solution. However, when energy efficiency is taken into account, electric mobility proves to be more advantageous.