The story of hydrogen and its color spectrum
Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe. However, it is not readily available as gas and needs to be 'extracted' first. Today, 99% of the hydrogen is made through coal gasification and steam methane reforming which are energy intensive processes with huge carbon dioxide emissions - which is why we need greener hydrogen solutions!
To account for the various processes and origins of hydrogen, industries often use colors to describe hydrogen:
Black or brown hydrogen is hydrogen made from coal.
Grey hydrogen when made from natural gas.
Blue hydrogen is grey hydrogen when the majority of released carbon dioxide is being captured.
Green hydrogen is hydrogen made with electrolysis, a process that splits water into oxygen and hydrogen using renewable energy such as solar or wind.
Today, less than 1% of global hydrogen is green hydrogen due to high costs and commercial non-readiness of more efficient electrolyser technology.
Our hydrogen is green hydrogen. At HydGene Renewables, our unique technology converts biomass to hydrogen in a very clean manner - similarly in purity to hydrogen from electrolysis. Our process is also carbon-negative. The carbon dioxide released from the biomass has been sequestered within the natural carbon cycle - also called biogenic - we don't increase the total amount of carbon in the atmosphere.
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Hydrogen has many applications which is why it is poised to become the fuel of the future. Hydrogen can be used to produce electricity, heat, and as a fuel for transport. Currently, hydrogen is mostly used to make ammonia for fertiliser production, oil refining and methane production. Dominating applications in the future will include industries that are 'hard to decarbonise'. This includes hydrogen for fertiliser production, steel manufacturing, long-distance/heavy-duty transportation and aviation.
The main challenges for establishing a renewable hydrogen economy are mostly associated with the need to transport the hydrogen to its site of use and/or the storage of hydrogen. Storage costs can add up to $0.3/kg to the price of hydrogen. Transport costs also add significantly more to the costs of hydrogen with road transport estimated at $0.23/kg for every kilometer of transport. This can add substantially to the cost of hydrogen - often more than 90% of the final cost to get it to the end user. And, nearly 80% of the energy stored in hydrogen is then used up for its storage and transport processes alone!
If we want to decarbonise our industries, we need to decarbonise the hydrogen first. It's essential that the entire green hydrogen supply market - from production to getting it to the end user - IS affordable and WILL compete with low cost hydrogen from the fossil fuel industry.
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