WHAT KENNEY AND BIG OIL ARE PROMOTING FOR ALBERTA
Touted as clean, ‘blue’ hydrogen may be worse than gas, coal
ITHACA, N.Y. – “Blue” hydrogen – an energy source that involves a process for making hydrogen by using methane in natural gas – is being lauded as a clean, green energy to help reduce global warming. But Cornell and Stanford University researchers believe it may harm the climate more than burning fossil fuel.
The carbon footprint to create blue hydrogen is more than 20% greater than using either natural gas or coal directly for heat, or about 60% greater than using diesel oil for heat, according to new research published in Energy Science & Engineering.
Robert Howarth, professor of ecology and environmental biology at Cornell, together with Mark Z. Jacobson, professor of civil and environmental engineering at Stanford, authored the report.
Blue hydrogen starts with converting methane to hydrogen and carbon dioxide by using heat, steam and pressure, or gray hydrogen, but goes further to capture some of the carbon dioxide. Once the byproduct carbon dioxide and the other impurities are sequestered, it becomes blue hydrogen, according to the U.S. Department of Energy.
The process to make blue hydrogen takes a large amount of energy, according to the researchers, which is generally provided by burning more natural gas.
“In the past, no effort was made to capture the carbon dioxide byproduct of gray hydrogen, and the greenhouse gas emissions have been huge,” Howarth said. “Now the industry promotes blue hydrogen as a solution, an approach that still uses the methane from natural gas, while attempting to capture the byproduct carbon dioxide. Unfortunately, emissions remain very large.”
Methane is a powerful greenhouse gas, Howarth said. It is more than 100 times stronger as an atmospheric warming agent than carbon dioxide when first emitted. The United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report released on Aug. 9 shows that cumulatively to date over the past century, methane has contributed about two-thirds as much to global warming as carbon dioxide has, he said.
Emissions of blue hydrogen are less than for gray hydrogen, but only by about 9% to 12%.
“Blue hydrogen is hardly emissions free,” wrote the researchers. “Blue hydrogen as a strategy only works to the extent it is possible to store carbon dioxide long-term indefinitely into the future without leakage back to the atmosphere.”
On Aug. 10, the U.S. Senate passed its version of the $1 trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which includes several billion dollars to develop, subsidize and strengthen hydrogen technology and its industry.
“Political forces may not have caught up with the science yet,” Howarth said. “Even progressive politicians may not understand for what they’re voting. Blue hydrogen sounds good, sounds modern and sounds like a path to our energy future. It is not.”
An ecologically friendly “green” hydrogen does exist, but it remains a small sector and it has not been commercially realized. Green hydrogen is achieved when water goes through electrolysis (with electricity supplied by solar, wind or hydroelectric power) and the water is separated into hydrogen and oxygen.
“The best hydrogen, the green hydrogen derived from electrolysis – if used wisely and efficiently – can be that path to a sustainable future,” Howarth said. “Blue hydrogen is totally different.”
This research was supported by a grant from the Park Foundation. Howarth is a fellow at the Cornell Atkinson Center for Sustainability.
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JOURNAL
Energy Science & Engineering
DOI
10.1002/ese3.956
ARTICLE TITLE
How green is blue hydrogen?
Study says 'blue hydrogen' likely bad for
climate
"We suggest that blue hydrogen is best viewed as a distraction, something that may delay needed action to truly decarbonize the global energy economy,"
Issued on: 12/08/2021 -
New York (AFP)
Use of "clean" hydrogen has been seen as a viable and environmentally benign energy alternative, but a study released Thursday said it could lead to higher greenhouse gas emissions than coal.
The study takes aim at an energy source touted by President Joe Biden's administration, the International Energy Agency, and some major energy companies.
The authors lambast "blue hydrogen," saying it "appears difficult to justify on climate grounds."
"Blue hydrogen is hardly emissions free," according to an article in academic journal Energy Science and Engineering that alludes to the broad support for the fuel in Washington and beyond.
Biden's $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill which the Senate passed on Tuesday, does not mention "blue hydrogen" but includes $8 billion in funding for at least four "regional clean hydrogen hubs."
But the researchers warned that using the fuel, which involves carbon capture and storage (CCS), as part of a clean energy strategy "only works to the extent it is possible to store carbon dioxide long-term indefinitely into the future without leakage back to the atmosphere."
The US Energy Department in June announced $52.5 million in funding for 31 projects to support "next generation clean hydrogen."
And a 2019 IEA report touted hydrogen's potential "to become a critical part of a more sustainable and secure energy future."
But the production is energy-intensive, with emissions released during the heating and pressuring process and from the use of natural gas as a base fuel to generate hydrogen, according to the study by Cornell's Robert Howarth and Stanford's Mark Jacobson.
While blue hydrogen does contain some of emissions, the paper notes that energy also is needed in the carbon-capture process.
As a result, it "provides no benefit," since the combined emissions of carbon dioxide and methane, another greenhouse gas, are greater for blue and gray hydrogen than for natural gas, diesel oil or coal, the paper said.
"We suggest that blue hydrogen is best viewed as a distraction, something that may delay needed action to truly decarbonize the global energy economy," the authors wrote.
© 2021 AFP
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