In recognition of National Hydrogen Day, I thought that I’d share results of a poll sponsored by GE Power that asked the following question, “When thinking about the future of energy, what pathway do you believe can make the greatest impact in reducing carbon emissions?” The vast majority of the responses (75%) were in favor of hydrogen. Why? It’s an incredible molecule with huge potential, sometimes being called the swiss army of decarbonization solutions as it can play a versatile role in the energy transition. And, we already make huge volumes of hydrogen (over 70 million tonnes per year) and have the technology to dramatically reduce the carbon emissions from these processes. Plus, the use of electrolysis has the potential to generate hydrogen from water.

Once generated, hydrogen can be used as a fuel for transportation and power generation, it is an energy storage medium and has the potential to help reduce the carbon footprint of some industrial sectors. In the power sector, gas turbines have accumulated more than 17 million hours of operation on hydrogen (and similar low heating value fuels). We have demonstrated the operation of a gas turbine on fuel with ~100% hydrogen and have multiple projects that will demonstrate the use of hydrogen for power later this year.

What about the remaining poll responses? They were divided between direct air capture (DAC), carbon capture & storage (CCS) and other. Carbon capture & storage (some think of the “s” for sequestration) will be critical for the transition to a decarbonized world. In 2020 Fatih Birol, the head of the International Energy Agency said that “without it [carbon capture], our energy and climate goals will become virtually impossible to reach.” The good news is that this technology is available today and (underground) carbon storage has been happening safely for decades. In fact, in 2020 the world captured and sequestered nearly 40 million tons of CO2!

Direct air capture (DAC) is an exciting but nascent technology that is gaining support. For industries where traditional methods of decarbonization aren’t viable, DAC may be the answer.  It is also one of the few technologies that can be scaled up to remove the CO2 that we have already emitted or will emit while we transition to near zero and zero carbon fuels, wide scale use of CCS, etc.

What about the remaining votes? Based on 80+ comments, many of the participants were actively supporting nuclear energy, which is the largest provider of carbon free power in the world. Other comments favored the use of renewable sources (wind, solar and hydro), biogas, increasing energy efficiency and conservation.

These are all great ideas and I believe that we need all of these solutions in order to accelerate our transition to a decarbonized world. Do you agree?

Link:https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/national-hydrogen-day-future-energy-jeffrey-goldmeer/