Trying to reload OS X Yosemite

The certificates for several of Apples OS's expired in October 2019, Apple haven’t bothered getting these updated on 

their Recovery Servers with valid certificates. 

This may be the problem you are experiencing. 

Try this workaround, we are going to set the time and date on your mac to a date previous to the expiry date of the certificates.

Connect your mac to your router via cable, not WiFi

Boot to your Recovery HD, click on Utilities in the menubar select Terminal.

Make sure WiFi is switched off, it can reset the date back to today.

Enter a new date, for example or just copy and paste

sudo date -u 011421002017

press Return

enter your password

press Return

If Terminal returns an error saying sudo : command not found, then try again without sudo.

just enter 

date -u 011421002017

press Return

You won't be prompted for a Password if you did not need to use sudo

Once the date has changed you can quit Terminal.

Now try downloading the OS.

Click on Install OS X, press Continue.

If this works then when the OS is installed and booted up you can Open System Preferences> Date & Time

and reset the time back to today.

To stop you having this problem again you should download a copy of Mac OS X Yosemite or any other macOS

your mac can run and create a bootable USB flash drive installer. Keep this in a safe place so you can reinstall

the OS at any time without relying on outside sources.

Here are the instructions for Mac OS X Yosemite.

Click on the link below,

How to get old versions of macOS – Apple Support

Go to Download macOS and click on OS X Yosemite 10.10

this downloads InstallMacOSX.dmg to your Downloads folder.

The next section can only be done on a mac that is capable of running Yosemite,

a mac that came preinstalled with an OS later than Yosemite will refuse to do the next bit.

When downloaded open to InstallMacOSX.pkg, double-click on

that and an installation window will open, this does not install Yosemite

but converts the InstallMacOSX.pkg to the Install OS X Yosemite.app which 

you will find in your Applications folder.

 (If the installation window asks which disk you want to install to, you must pick 

the disk that you are booted to at the time. Not any internal or external disk that 

you want to eventually install Yosemite on, that is for later.)

To start the installation of Yosemite double click on the Install OS X Yosemite.app.

The copy of the install app self deletes after installing Yosemite, so make sure you keep a copy of the InstallMacOSX.dmg

if you need it in future, or you could just make a copy of the Install OS X Yosemite.app prior to installing and moving it to

an external drive for safe keeping. It is also possible to create a bootable USB installer disk using the Install OS X Yosemite.app

in the Applications folder and the createinstallmedia command in the Terminal app. 

Read the instructions here,

How to create a bootable installer for macOS – Apple Support

sudo /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Yosemite.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/MyVolume --applicationpath /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Yosemite.app