Having done some reading on the topic, I think it would be valuable to explain the basics, like why hydrogen can be described in “colors”, i,e., green, blue, grey, etc. based on how it’s generated. It’s a rapidly evolving industry, and a brief sketch of the growth is also valuable for anyone interested in its huge environmental promise.
lemay50, commenting in a Good News Roundup
The colours of hydrogen
Hydrogen has many colour [names], and we frequently refer to green, turquoise, blue and grey hydrogen.
Sometimes other colours are ascribed to hydrogen, based on how it is produced. For red, pink and violet hydrogen, the electrolysers are driven by nuclear power. Yellow hydrogen refers to hydrogen production from a mixture of renewable energies and fossil fuels. Hydrogen that is merely a waste product of other chemical processes is referred to as white hydrogen. The use of coal as a fuel produces brown hydrogen.
Let’s unpack that, and then get to the news of the week, including carbon capture and emissions disclosure.
Hydrogen is colorless. These color names are only convenient tags. There is no agreement on the meaning of “yellow hydrogen”, and some sources are confused about the colors for hydrogen produced with nuclear power.
The hydrogen colour spectrum
Colors of Hydrogen
color name
|
Method of production
|
green |
cO2-neutral basis through the electrolysis of water |
turquoise |
methane pyrolysis into hydrogen and solid carbon |
blue |
steam reduction of natural gas, with storage of Co2 |
grey |
steam reforming natural gas or coal, and releasing CO2 into the atmosphere |
red |
a thermochemical reaction between water, iodine, and sulfur at a high temperature, around 900°C, using the thermal energy from a next-generation nuclear reactor. |
pink |
electrolysis using nuclear power |
violet or purple |
chemo thermal electrolysis using nuclear power |
Yellow |
hydrogen production from a mixture of renewable energies and fossil fuels, or
electrolysis of water using electricity coming from current nuclear power plants, or
Electrolysis using solar power
|
white |
waste product of other chemical processes, or
naturally occurring hydrogen
|
black |
produced with black coal as the fuel |
brown |
produced with soft brown coal as the fuel |
PWC: The green hydrogen economy
Predicting the decarbonisation agenda of tomorrow
Hydrogen demand by 2050 could vary from 150 to 500 million metric tonnes per year, depending on global climate ambitions and the development of sector-specific activities, energy-efficiency measures, direct electrification and the use of carbon-capture technologies.
PWC is predicting that the cost of green hydrogen will fall to the level of current grey hydrogen production where solar and wind power are abundant. Half a gigatonne isn’t much when we need to get rid of a teratonne of carbon, but it helps a little.
News
The world is approaching a peak in electricity emissions
The biggest source of carbon emissions in the world is electricity production, but a new report suggests the grid’s dirtiest days will soon be behind it.
Data from clean-energy think tank Ember shows that in the first half of this year, global power-sector emissions rose by just 0.2 percent, thanks largely to the planet-spanning embrace of wind and solar.
Carbon-free sources produced 40 percent of global electricity in the first half of the year, with solar and wind accounting for 14 percent of global power production. Other factors, such as lower electricity demand and declining coal use, have also helped reduce grid emissions in certain countries.
That isn’t Peak Carbon, yet, because of other GHG emissions, but I take our tipping points where we find them. Next, transportation, then shutting down gas peaker plants and cleaning up steel, cement, and ammonia, and so on. And, of course, carbon sequestration.
Demand for oil, gas and coal will peak by 2030, but that’s not fast enough to keep global warming within 1.5 degrees, says IEA chief
IEA and other analysts constantly point out that current national targets for decarbonizing are nowhere near enough to hold Global Warming to 1.5℃, but whenever I read such a statement I push back that this is due to gross lack of imagination among government officials and analysts. In reality, government targets are constantly being raised as the public gains more experience with rapidly falling costs and increasing capabilities, while the specialists in these areas and the activist organizations keep on telling us how much better we can do.
The technique could be up to three times more efficient than current carbon capture technology, say the authors of the study, published Wednesday in the journal Science Advances.
But there may be regulatory hurdles to surmount. “Disposing of large tonnages of sodium bicarbonate in the ocean could be legally defined as ‘dumping,’ which is banned by international treaties,” Haszeldine said.
Others remain concerned about negative impacts on the oceans, which are already under pressure from climate change, pollution and other human activity.
Peter Styring, professor of chemical engineering and chemistry at the University of Sheffield, told CNN: “Unless you’ve got a full eco-toxic study, then you don’t know what it’s going to do, even at small concentrations.”
Biogenic Iron Dust: A Novel Approach to Ocean Iron Fertilization as a Means of Large Scale Removal of Carbon Dioxide From the Atmosphere
Fertilizing the oceans to produce plankton blooms is known to work for carbon sequestration, but is controversial because its ecological effects have not been tested sufficiently.
Carbfix: We turn CO2 into stone
Carbonated water is acidic. The more carbon you can pack into water, the more acidic the fluid will become. Carbfix's carbonated water reacts with rocks underground and releases available cations such as calcium, magnesium and iron into the water stream. Over time, these elements combine with the dissolved CO2 and form carbonates filling up the empty space (pores) within the rocks. The carbonates are stable for thousands of years and can thus be considered permanently stored. The timescale of this process initially surprised scientists. In the CarbFix pilot project, it was determined that at least 95% of the injected CO2 mineralizes within two years, much faster than previously thought.
This process has the potential to sequester gigatons of CO2. through reactions with basalts, serpentines, and olivines.
Biden administration to invest $1.2 billion in projects to suck carbon out of the air
The Biden administration will announce on Friday its first major investment to kickstart the US carbon removal industry – something energy experts say is key to getting the country’s planet-warming emissions under control.
Direct air capture removal projects are akin to huge vacuum cleaners sucking carbon dioxide out of the air, using chemicals to remove the greenhouse gas. Once removed, CO2 gets stored underground, or is used in industrial materials like cement. On Friday, the US Department of Energy will announce it is spending $1.2 billion to fund two new demonstration projects in Texas and Louisiana – the South Texas Direct Air Capture hub and Project Cypress in Louisiana.
“These two projects are going to build these regional direct air capture hubs,” US Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm told reporters. “That means they’re going to link everything from capture to processing to deep underground storage, all in one seamless process.”
Granholm said the projects are expected to remove more than 2 million metric tons of carbon dioxide from the air annually once they are up and running – the equivalent of removing nearly 500,000 gas cars off the road.
The machines are being built to essentially supercharge the natural carbon removal already done by trees, bogs and oceans – which is not happening fast enough to capture fossil fuel emissions at the scale humans are emitting them.
White House senior adviser Mitch Landrieu told reporters these will be the first direct air capture projects at this scale in the US and “will be the largest in the world.”
Another project in Iceland that opened in 2021 removes about 10 metric tons of CO2 every day, roughly the same amount of carbon emitted by 800 cars a day. At the time, that project’s operator Climeworks said it was the largest one in the world.
The US direct air capture projects alone could increase global capacity for the technology by 400 times, said Sasha Stashwick, policy director at Carbon180 – an independent nonprofit focused on carbon removal.
“The industry’s very nascent at the moment,” Stashwick told CNN. “These are meant to be the first commercial-scale deployments at the mega-ton scale. It’s a very, very big deal.”
🎩 T Maysle:
California to require big firms to reveal carbon emissions
A groundbreaking California law will force large companies doing business in the state – including major global corporations – to disclose their planet-heating carbon emissions.
The measure will be the nation’s first of its kind, serving as a blueprint for national climate accountability.
The bills faced staunch opposition from the state’s chamber of commerce and powerful oil lobby. Other business interests, however, joined environmental advocates in supporting the measures.
We’re making a lot of money by doing the right thing.
The expansion of a solar-powered steel mill is underway in Pueblo
U.S. Senator John Hickenlooper recently toured the construction site for a new state-of-the-art steel mill in Pueblo.
When operating at full capacity, the facility, owned by the multi-national company EVRAZ, is expected to process more than a billion pounds of steel each year into tens of millions of feet of rail for replacing and building train tracks around North America.
Construction of the new long rail mill is about 15 percent done according to EVRAZ management. It’ll use power generated by 750,000 nearby solar panels.
‘World’s first off-road solar SUV’ just drove across Morocco powered only by the sun
A student-built solar camper van completes a 2,000 km trip across Europe
El Paso seeks $100 million to provide solar power to thousands of households
How solar power revived health care for communities in rural Nigeria
A staggering 45% of Nigeria is cut off from the national electricity grid but after installing a solar power rig Idon Rural Hospital is no longer in the dark.
Solar power fuelling Jordan's Za'atari refugee camp
The UN Refugee Agency has built the largest solar field ever made in a refugee camp in the Za'atari camp, covering the equivalent of 33 football pitches. Found in Mafraq, Jordan, the camp is home to 80,000 Syrian refugees and has been in operation for over 12 years now.
Then there is the Za’atar Music channel, which has nothing to do with the camp. They just perform Hebrew songs to Arabic tunes.
Eshal Elohai Zellerbach Hall
Za'atar is a culinary herb or family of herbs. It is also the name of a spice mixture that includes the herb along with toasted sesame seeds, dried sumac, often salt, as well as other spices.[1] As a family of related Middle Eastern herbs, it contains plants from the genera Origanum (oregano), Calamintha (basil thyme), Thymus (typically Thymus vulgaris, i.e., thyme), and Satureja (savory) plants.[2] The name za'atar alone most properly applies to Origanum syriacum, considered in biblical scholarship to be the ezov of the Hebrew Bible, often translated as hyssop but distinct from modern Hyssopus officinalis.[3]
Used in Levantine cuisine, both the herb and spice mixture are popular throughout the Mediterranean region of the Middle East.[4][5]