hydrogen-trainset
March 22, 2020
Innovations

How Close Are We to a Hydrogen Economy?

Hydrogen Fuel

Hydrogen fuel is a zero-emission fuel burned with oxygen. When hydrogen burns in air, it produces nothing but water vapor. It is therefore a totally nonpolluting fuel. This fact has led some people to propose an energy economy based entirely on hydrogen.

Hydrogen can be produced in two ways. First, it can be separated from oxygen molecules in water through the process of electrolysis. Electrolysis can be powered by renewable energy such as wind, hydropower and solar energy, so that it produces no emissions. The downside is that it’s very expensive to do this without using fossil fuels. It can also be produced by splitting it off hydrocarbon chains in fossil fuels (steam reforming), a process that itself creates greenhouse gas emissions. As of 2018, approximately 95% of it is produced from fossil fuels. Currently, to get this clean energy affordably, you have to use “dirty” energy.
 

Current uses

Of the hydrogen currently produced around the world, 55% is used for ammonia synthesis, in refineries (25%) and for methanol production (10%) with all other applications accounting for only about 10% which includes use in fuel cells or internal combustion engines.

Hydrogen is thought of as an energy source of the future. However, proven large-scale and low-emission hydrogen production is already here through hydrogen production from natural resources coupled with carbon capture and storage, a suite of emission-reduction technologies that store CO2 underground. As such, alongside other key mitigation options, the large-scale deployment of hydrogen production can kickstart the energy transition.

Trends

The International Energy Agency (IEA) says that clean hydrogen is currently enjoying unprecedented political and business momentum, with the number of policies and projects around the world expanding rapidly. It concludes that now is the time to scale up technologies and bring down costs to allow hydrogen to become widely used. Current global government policy support for hydrogen deployment is greatest in buses, passenger cars and fueling stations.

The IEA found that the future of hydrogen depends on government support as more than 70% of all investments in the energy transition will either come directly by governments, or will be driven by government policy.

Transportation

In transport, the competitiveness of hydrogen fuel cell cars depends on fuel cell costs and refueling stations while for trucks the priority is to reduce the delivered price of hydrogen. Automakers and environmentalists have long hailed fuel cells as a revolutionary technology that can reduce tailpipe emissions, and a fuel cell is two to three times more efficient than an internal combustion engine running on gasoline. The next challenge is building networks of hydrogen stations so owners can refuel their cars.

California has 30 such stations, enough to enable owners to drive throughout the state without worry of running out of hydrogen, and it intends to expand that to 100 by 2020. Sales of fuel-cell vehicles have been limited to that state so far.

Japan, which is seeking to promote the development of hydrogen energy worldwide, has received support from 30 countries for a plan to set up 10,000 hydrogen refueling stations worldwide within 10 years.

 

Conclusion

The more serious problem in developing a hydrogen economy is that hydrogen is currently expensive relative to other energy solutions, both in money and in energy cost. It would have to be produced by burning coal or oil in the generation of the needed electricity, which are hardly nonpolluting, or by nuclear power. In any energy-production scheme, the entire process must be considered, from beginning to end, with all of its ramifications.

A hydrogen economy might be possible with great efforts by governments worldwide, a scaling up to make it affordable, and a leader like Japan making scientific and logistic inroads and setting a course for others to follow.

More likely it will depend on our use of current energy resources becoming scarce or politically unsustainable. The leader in a hydrogen economy will likely be a country like Japan that is self-motivated, scientifically advanced and is already importing most of their energy so that a homegrown solution seems a risk worth taking.

 

 

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