Technologies already available today enable hydrogen to produce, store, move and use energy in different ways. A wide variety of fuels are able to produce hydrogen, including renewables, nuclear, natural gas, coal and oil.
Hydrogen fuel has long been seen as a potentially key component of a carbon-neutral future. At the 2022 MIT Energy Initiative Spring Symposium, industry experts describe efforts to produce it at scale.
At the moment, ambition is running ahead of reality. According to the Hydrogen Council, there are now more than 1,400 clean hydrogen projects being planned, but only 7 per cent have reached their
4 · Unfortunately, today, most of the hydrogen that is produced in our society comes from methane, a fossil fuel. It does so in a process (methane reforming) that leads to substantial carbon dioxide
In a fuel cell, hydrogen energy is converted directly into electricity with high efficiency and low power losses. Hydrogen, therefore, is an energy carrier, which is used to move, store, and deliver energy produced from other sources.
Researchers at NREL are developing advanced technologies to lower the cost of hydrogen production via electrolysis, photoelectrochemical conversion, solar thermochemical conversion, and biological conversion.
Dedicated hydrogen production today is primarily based on fossil fuel technologies, with around a sixth of the global hydrogen supply coming from "by-product" hydrogen, mainly in the petrochemical industry.
Key Hydrogen Facts: Most abundant element in the universe. Present in common substances (water, sugar, methane) Very high energy by weight (3x more than gasoline) Can be used to make fertilizer, steel, as a fuel in trucks, trains, ships, and more.
6 · A massive scale-up is underway. According to McKinsey, an estimated 130 to 345 gigawatts (GW) of electrolyzer capacity will be necessary to meet the green hydrogen demand by 2030, with 246 GW of
One of the most promising alternatives is hydrogen fuel cells, which use hydrogen to directly generate electricity via a reaction with oxygen, but the race is still very open as to which