Letters To The Editor: How Green Is Green Hydrogen? – CleanTechnica

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There is no such thing as “green hydrogen” (except perhaps “white” hydrogen, if that turns out to be a reality). Any power generated from any source is fungible in the grid. If you use it locally, the green percentage in the grid is lower than what it would have been had you fed it into the grid and then powered your system from that grid. The “greenness” of the hydrogen is the same either way, and it’s not very green at all.

I appreciated your article on the bought and paid for hydrogen pipeline “report.” In it, the author writes, “wind farm…electricity is supposed to be being used to decarbonize the UK’s electricity grid, not make hydrogen for Europe” and explains the insanity and greed associated with hydrogen. Plus you need a tremendous amount of power to create the hydrogen. It is a very energy-expensive storage medium. Few applications can justify the required overuse of power generation.

And yet, there still are these references to “green hydrogen” as though there were such a thing, because it’s made with direct transmission from renewable energy sources. That’s the concept that really needs to be debunked. Most people can easily understand the problem with using carbon-based power, but they never are introduced to the inherent fallacy of the green hydrogen concept itself.

It would be great if people put quotes around green: “green” hydrogen, or refer to it as “so-called green hydrogen” accompanied by a short explanation of why there can be no such thing until every joule in the grid is lifecycle green.

By James Symon

[CleanTechnica is committed to publishing a variety of perspectives on the clean energy transition. If you want to submit a letter to the editor, you may do so here.]