It’s a massive industry that emits more carbon dioxide than the UK and France combined. So the test of any government or corporate hydrogen agenda is the nature, if not the very existence, of its 96% decarbonisation plan.exist some cases This is starting to happen. But if the focus is on producing more “blue” and more “green” for other purposessomething is wrong.
fail
When you look closely at green hydrogen, some of it breaks down into shades of gray. It’s not just that its production is extremely energy-intensive, or that so much energy is wasted in its double conversion—from electricity to hydrogen to end use.
This is partly because, if burned, it emits nitrogen oxides, and, if scaled up to play important Economic role to 2050 (as recently projected International Energy Agency), its freshwater demand will be more than a quarter It accounts for a portion of today’s annual global consumption, causing water shortages in some regions.
Most importantly, green hydrogen is meaningfully Green is only green if the renewable energy produced cannot be fed into the grid to replace electricity from natural gas or coal-fired plants.
A similar but more harmful trick of light happens with blue hydrogen. Look closely and you’ll see that it’s actually either a checkered blue/gray, or even blank, which is pure fiction.
For hydrogen to turn truly blue, the emissions must be captured and safely stored.In theory, CCS is feasible, but almost all Plants use captured carbon pump more oil many people have closure as fail.
cost
only one few operations Storing carbon instead of using it to produce oil, even here it is very energy intensive And capture only part of the carbon dioxide.it can also leaked once in storage.
Also, the main feedstock for blue hydrogen is methane, a powerful greenhouse gas infamous leak: in drilling and from the pipeline. recent research indicating that the blue hydrogen is worse More important for climate than fossil gases.
Blue hydrogen is still in its infancy, and we don’t yet know if most of the CCS costs will be borne by taxpayers because gas company requirements.
Price predictions should be treated with the utmost skepticism.A booster paper cites blue hydrogen from Alberta (Canada) $1.50 to $2.0 per kg. It added that blue hydrogen production will help Canada meet its decarbonization goals.
In fact, research at Shell’s CCS plant in Alberta found that it emitted more carbon Than it catches. This is not a “low carbon” product in any sense for the foreseeable future. This is a hypothetical solution, the cost of which remains unknown, as the project has been slow and costly to develop, few have been realized, and future operating costs are unclear.
Electrolyzer
Given the question marks surrounding blue hydrogen, it is widely hoped that the silver lining to today’s high oil prices is that green hydrogen becomes cost competitiveness.
In terms of inputs, the price difference between green and blue comes down to the cost of electricity versus fossil gas. With Russia’s war on Ukraine exacerbating the global energy crisis, many are asking: Are high oil prices good for green hydrogen? Spoiler alert: probably not.
In the EU, as in many economies, electricity prices are based on marginal cost principle, which usually means the price of electricity from fossil natural gas power plants. When it’s high, renewable energy generators will be looking to sell to the grid. In this way, blue and green prices are essentially intertwined in the current market structure; their inputs move in sync.
Of course, there are geographical and temporal differences. On sunny days, electricity prices can plummet as solar PV-based generation picks up.
This decouples electricity and gas prices, but only temporarily, usually for a few hours—not enough to justify investing in electrolysers to produce green hydrogen. Overall, the price gap between blue and green will remain fairly small until there is a fundamental restructuring of the electricity market.
transition
There are worse. High prices for hydrocarbons have fueled the industry’s expansion.The U.S. government is exhorting oil and fracking companiesdrill baby drill.’ The UK government has issued more than a hundred additional drilling permits. Huge new fossil fuel investments have been announced in the Middle East and Africa.
All of this will have long-term effects. First, gas and oil will become cheaper again within a few years of new production coming on stream, especially if the current slowdown in growth dampens demand significantly – until the next price spike triggers a new round of investment, the hellish cycle continues continue.
Second, owners of new drilling and other infrastructure will go to great lengths to defend these assets and delay the decarbonization agenda.The particularity of hydrogen is that it is both a means of stalling and decarbonization.
The latter can be said simply. Green hydrogen is important for the decarbonization of certain industries, such as steel and ammonia used in fertilizers, and possibly shipping and trucking.
The role of hydrogen in procrastination Transitions are complex, but equally important. The first is the recognition that fossil fuel companies are reinventing themselves as “carbon management“
the slope
The goal is to keep their assets from getting bogged down by repurposing them, most importantly by marketing gray and blue hydrogen as a “bridge” fuel; locking in hydrocarbon production for decades to come; and spreading the cost to taxpayers people.
For this, hydrogen provides the perfect vehicle, given its chaos of hues and colours. Fossil Fuel Equity Use it to combat opposition to new investment in fossil gas in a positive way Marketing and Lobbying Touting a largely fictional substance, blue hydrogen, as a low-carbon “bridge” to a truly green transition to an unspecified future.
Other sectors have also joined the oil-led coalition. as engineer Tom Baxter Observedit is considered by gas network operators and boiler manufacturers as their way of life.
Likewise, power companies are keen because hydrogen’s inefficiency means they will sell more power. Relatively conservative trade unions, such as the GMB (General, Municipal, Boilermakers) in the UK, are also involved.
To address this stalled action, the powerful role of public policy is to essential. Governments will need to regulate or tax blue carbon on the market, while increasing renewable energy.
defamation
Fiscal and subsidy programs need to shift from pro-fossil fuels to pro-renewables. The way electricity is priced must change, decoupling electricity and fossil gas prices.
Instead of a marginal pricing system, it takes incentive reward Based on generators’ average costs plus a slight surplus, either through a heavily regulated market system or by nationalizing energy companies and setting prices and production.
Such an intervention would provide green hydrogen with a competitive advantage that could be further enhanced by other subsidies, such as tax credits on the US model Inflation Reduction Act. Most importantly, there is a need to reduce energy demand. The lower the demand, the less upward pressure on prices.
In any future energy system, hydrogen will play a role. But its expansion needs to be carefully designed to prevent the promise of green hydrogen from being abused, opening the back door to its ecologically harmful blue and gray cousins.
these authors
John Szabo is a research fellow at the Center for Economic and Area Studies at the Institute for World Economic Studies and an assistant lecturer at the Department of International Relations and European Studies at Eolland University. His research focuses on the relationship between energy and society, especially in the context of the energy transition.
Gareth Dale Professor of Political Science at Brunel University, many of his articles have appeared in website. He tweeted at @Gareth_Dale. This article first appeared in edited form at dialogue.
