In a joint, interdisciplinary policy brief, a team from EWI and EWIR discusses economic and legal aspects of a possible regulation of hydrogen networks in the light of the planned market ramp-up. This analysis shows that there is no clear answer to the question whether hydrogen networks should be regulated. Instead, regulation of the networks could on the one hand prevent future abuse of market power. On the other hand, it could also inhibit the development of a hydrogen network through additional regulatory costs and inefficiencies. Depending on how politics decides, a legal embedding can be achieved either by an amendment of the EnWG, a hydrogen infrastructure law or possibly even a new energy code.
