Ballantine opined in April, 2021 that countries with evolving responses to climate change and companies' shifting investments and different visions of the future are evaluating one technology that is attracting attention from groups on all sides is hydrogen.
Different visions of energy's future
As the world's population and economies grow, energy demand is expected to increase by as much as 50% over the next 30 years, so making the right long-term investments is crucial. Energy demand is in megatons of oil equivalent. OPEC scenario is for 2045. The Conversation/CC-BY-ND Using data from IEA, Exxon, BP, OPEC Energy companies and policymakers have widely different visions of that future. Their long-term scenarios show that most expect fossil fuel demand to remain steady for decades and possibly decline. However, many are also increasing their investments in cleaner technologies.
The International Energy Agency—which countries often look to for future scenarios, but which has a history of underestimating demand and clean energy—forecasts that renewable energy will meet about one-third of the global energy demand by 2040 in its most optimistic scenario. That would be in a world with higher carbon taxes and more wind power, solar power, electric vehicles, carbon capture and storage. Greener technologies may come close to keeping warming under 2°C, but not quite.[Note no mention of nuclear power as a clean and green energy (no burning), see: Campbell (2020)].
Exxon, on the other hand, forecasts a path dependent on a fossil fuel-based economy, with slower transitions to electric vehicles, steady demand for oil and gas, and a warmer world. Exxon is also investing in carbon capture and storage and hydrogen, but it believes oil and gas will provide half the global energy supply in 2040 and renewable energy will be less than one-fifth.
OPEC, whose members are among the most exposed to climate change and dependent upon oil and gas, also sees oil and gas dominating in the future. Nonetheless, several Gulf nations are also investing heavily in alternative technologies—including nuclear, solar, wind and hydrogen—and trying to transition away from oil.
BP proposes a more focused shift toward cleaner energy. Its "rapid scenario" forecasts flat energy demand and a more dramatic swing to renewables combined with a growing hydrogen economy. The company expects its own renewable energy to go from 2.5 gigawatts in 2019 to 50 GW by 2030, and its oil production to fall by 40%.
Others [such as the UK] are also exploring hydrogen's potential. [The U.S. evaluating generating hydrogen via the existing nuclear plants and new SMRs]. Much as with utilities' shift from coal to natural gas, hydrogen may ease the transition to cleaner energy with enough investment. Since this fuel is getting so much industry attention, let's look more closely at its potential.
How realistic is hydrogen as a climate solution?
Hydrogen has the potential to fuel cars, buses and airplanes, heat buildings and serve as a base energy source to balance wind and solar power in our grids. Germany sees it as a potential substitute for hard-coal coke in making steel. It also offers energy companies a future market using processes they know. It can be liquefied, stored, and transported through existing pipelines and LNG ships, with some modifications. So far, however, hydrogen is not widely used as a clean-energy solution. First, it requires a upfront investment—including carbon capture capacity, pipeline modifications, industrial boilers for heat rather than gas, and fuel cells for transportation—plus policies that support the transition.
Second, for hydrogen to be "green," the electricity grid has to have zero emissions. Most of today's hydrogen is made from natural gas and is known as "gray hydrogen." It is produced using high-temperature steam to split hydrogen from carbon atoms into methane. Unless the separated carbon dioxide is stored or used, gray hydrogen results in the same amount of climate-warming CO2 as natural gas.
"Blue hydrogen" uses the same process but captures the carbon dioxide and stores it so only around 10% of the CO2 is released into the atmosphere. "Green hydrogen" is produced using renewable electricity and electrolysis, but it is twice as expensive as blue and dependent on the cost of electricity and available water.
Many electric utilities and energy companies, including Shell, BP and Saudi Aramco, are actively exploring a transition to a hydrogen-mixed economy, with a focus on blue hydrogen as an interim step. Europe, with its dependence on imported natural gas and higher electricity costs, is setting ambitious net-zero energy targets that will incorporate a mix of blue and green hydrogen coupled with wind, solar, nuclear (both large plants and SMRs) and an integrated energy grid.
China, the world's largest energy user and greenhouse gas emitter, is instead investing heavily in natural gas [Fact Check needed here]—which has about half the carbon dioxide emissions of coal—along with carbon capture and storage and a growing mix of solar and wind power [Fact Check: Nuclear is a major player in China energy build-up]. Russia, the second-largest natural gas producer after the U.S., is expanding its gas production and exports to Asia [and is attempting to market to Europe as well]. Some of that gas may end up as blue hydrogen.
Ramping up blue and green hydrogen as clean-energy solutions will require substantial investments and long-term modifications to energy infrastructure. In my view, it is not the magic bullet, but it may be an important step. But natural companies some have begun to think about transporting hydrogen in existing natural gas lines (more).
Distribution of hydrogen through the natural gas grid
The HYPOS project partners are pursuing the idea, among other approaches, of transporting the hydrogen (H2) along with the natural gas (the principal component being methane, CH4). After all, Germany does have a 511,000 kilometer long gas grid and 33 gas storage locations. "The advantage of this infrastructure is that it allows hydrogen to be fed into the natural gas grid as well. The two substances can be transported together in one line. Once they arrive at the destination, we can separate them from one another again as needed," explains Dr. Adrian Simon, Group Manager at Fraunhofer IKTS.
How does a membrane work in principle? The gas mixture is surrendered to the input side of the membrane. The small hydrogen molecules pass through the membranes and the larger methane molecules are held back. This is where carbon comes in. It forms an ultrathin layer on porous, ceramic substrates where it acts as a membrane, separating natural gas and hydrogen from one another. There are various processes involved in membrane production, starting with custom polymer synthesis. Polymers are substances consisting of branched macromolecules. These are then applied to the porous substrate. When the polymer is heated up and starved of oxygen at the same time, it forms a layer of carbon on its surface. The pores in the carbon are less than a nanometer in diameter, and this makes them effective for gas separation. Physical and chemical processes can be employed to adapt the membrane's separation behavior even further. Fraunhofer IKTS has been collaborating with Leipzig-based DBI Gas- und Umwelttechnik GmbH to develop tubular carbon membranes.
During the separation process, hydrogen and natural gas are pushed through the tubular modules. The smaller hydrogen molecules are forced through the pores in the membrane and reach the outside in the form of gas, the larger methane molecules on the other hand are held back. "This gives us hydrogen with an 80 percent degree of purity. We then filter the residual natural gas in a second separation step. The end result is a purity of over 90 percent," explains Simon.
Finding solutions amid messy politics
Of course, technology investments cannot assume away the messy politics of the world. People and leaders around the globe still have differing views on the urgency of the climate crisis and need for greener energy investments. Perhaps the leaders gathered will find some common ground as seas rise and temperatures break records. What is critical for meeting the Paris goals is that countries invest now in a cleaner future.
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