The fuel burns with zero carbon emissions. It is here to stay. Approximately 90 per cent of all atoms are hydrogen. However, they need to separate from other atoms.
Most hydrogen produced in 2021 is produced from fossil fuels. It is referred to as "brown", "blue" or "grey" hydrogen. Water electrolysis produces "green" hydrogen. It separates the bound atoms of oxygen form the hydrogen with an electric current. It leaves only oxygen and hydrogen.
Julio Friedmann, senior research scholar at Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy, believes that hydrogen is a panacea for the future.
Freidmann insists that "there's lots of ways to make zero-carbon hydrogen, blue and green. We can even make negative carbon hydrogen with biohydrogen. Twenty years ago, we didn't really have the technology or the wherewithal to do it. And now we do …
"It's exciting because we can use it in every sector. It's exciting because it tackles the hardest parts of the problem — industry and heavy transportation. It's interesting, because the costs are coming down."
In research funded by the EU it is estimated that 40 per cent of the European aviation fleet would be powered by hydrogen within 30 years.
Hydrogen is also an efficient method of the storage of excess energy from renewables. For example, wind and desert solar farms near water sources could produce plentiful stored hydrogen using water electrolysis.
The US Department of Energy claims that in a single hour, the amount of power from the sun that strikes the Earth is more than the world consumes in a year … some of which could be turned into hydrogen through electrolysis. This hydrogen could be a useful energy source during the downtime of wind or solar farms when the wind stops blowing and sun stops shining.
As an added benefit, hydrogen production through low-cost solar-to-hydrogen cells in desert regions near a sea would even have the remarkable added benefit of growing plants. A 2018 study in the journal Science finds that large collections of solar panels appear capable of bringing rains to the desert.
The storage of hydrogen is quickly becoming safer, lighter and greener. In a 2007 report The Canadian Hydrogen Safety Program suggested "that hydrogen fueling is as safe as, or safer than, compressed CNG (natural gas) fueling".
Safety measures for storage have progressed significantly in the last 14 years. Additionally, unlike most fuels it is not toxic and it will not harm the environment if accidentally leaked.
Producing cost-effective and plentiful hydrogen is still at least 10 years off. We will need significant investment from government and business to reach this goal, as hydrogen holds a crucial piece to the complex puzzle of mitigating climate change.
- Brit Bunkley is an internationally exhibiting artist, retired from UCOL. He has taught various political science courses.
