DeepSummary
The transcript covers a discussion between Chris Nelder and Dr. Simon Evans of Carbon Brief about the potential of hydrogen as an energy carrier in the transition away from fossil fuels. They discuss the current state of hydrogen production and use, different methods of producing hydrogen, and the various potential applications of hydrogen across different sectors like transport, shipping, and aviation.
A major point of discussion is the challenge hydrogen faces in competing with other low-carbon alternatives like electric vehicles and batteries, especially for light-duty road transport. While hydrogen may have niche applications, issues like high costs, energy losses from conversion steps, and lack of infrastructure pose hurdles for widespread adoption in sectors like passenger vehicles.
The conversation also explores the geopolitical implications of a potential global hydrogen trade, with renewable energy-rich regions potentially becoming exporters. However, transporting hydrogen over long distances adds significant costs. Sectors like shipping and aviation are seen as more promising for hydrogen or hydrogen-derived fuels like ammonia due to the difficulty of electrifying these heavy, long-range transport modes.
Key Episodes Takeaways
- Hydrogen faces major challenges in competing with battery electric vehicles for light-duty road transport due to higher costs, energy losses from conversion steps, and lack of refueling infrastructure.
- Transporting hydrogen over long distances adds significant costs, potentially making domestic production more economical than importing it for many regions.
- Shipping and aviation are seen as more promising sectors for hydrogen or hydrogen-derived fuels like ammonia due to the difficulty of electrifying these heavy, long-range transport modes.
- A potential global hydrogen trade could shift geopolitical dynamics, with renewable energy-rich regions like Chile and Australia becoming exporters and energy-poor regions like Europe becoming importers.
- Major automakers and countries like Japan and South Korea still have ambitious targets for adoption of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles despite the dominance of electric vehicles.
- Hydrogen's low energy density by volume poses challenges for applications like shipping, requiring larger storage volumes and reducing cargo capacity compared to current marine fuels.
- Significant policy interventions like carbon pricing or low-carbon fuel standards may be needed to drive adoption of hydrogen-based solutions in hard-to-abate sectors like shipping.
- The future hydrogen economy faces a "chicken-and-egg" problem, where lack of demand hinders infrastructure investment and vice versa, requiring scaled production to achieve cost competitiveness.
Top Episodes Quotes
- “Genuinely, that obviously that's the thing people tend to think about. And we already talked about the fact that this focus on hydrogen as an alternative to fossil fuels in transport specifically, that's got a history dating back to the very earliest waves of enthusiasm for hydrogen and actually even earlier when it was promoted as an alternative to oil.“ by Simon Evans
- “Anyway, coming back to this geopolitics thing, so the argument goes, Chile, Australia, wherever they're going to become exporters, and then say, like european nations, perhaps they don't have the space or the resources to have sufficiently cheap renewables, so we might end up being importers of green hydrogen.“ by Simon Evans
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Episode Information
The Energy Transition Show with Chris Nelder
XE Network
3/17/21