English
 
Privacy Policy Disclaimer
  Advanced SearchBrowse

Item

ITEM ACTIONSEXPORT
Add to Basket
  Local TagsRelease HistoryDetailsSummary

Released
Journal Article

On the climate impacts of blue hydrogen production

Authors

Bauer,  Christian
External Organizations;

Treyer,  Karin
External Organizations;

Antonini,  Cristina
External Organizations;

Bergerson,  Joule
External Organizations;

Gazzani,  Matteo
External Organizations;

Gencer,  Emre
External Organizations;

Gibbins,  Jon
External Organizations;

Mazzotti,  Marco
External Organizations;

McCoy,  Sean T.
External Organizations;

McKenna,  Russell
External Organizations;

/persons/resource/Robert.Pietzcker

Pietzcker,  Robert C.
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research;

Ravikumar,  Arvind P.
External Organizations;

Romano,  Matteo C.
External Organizations;

/persons/resource/Falko.Ueckerdt

Ueckerdt,  Falko
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research;

Vente,  Jaap
External Organizations;

van der Spek,  Mijndert
External Organizations;

External Ressource
No external resources are shared
Fulltext (public)

26512oa.pdf
(Publisher version), 653KB

Supplementary Material (public)
There is no public supplementary material available
Citation

Bauer, C., Treyer, K., Antonini, C., Bergerson, J., Gazzani, M., Gencer, E., Gibbins, J., Mazzotti, M., McCoy, S. T., McKenna, R., Pietzcker, R. C., Ravikumar, A. P., Romano, M. C., Ueckerdt, F., Vente, J., van der Spek, M. (2022): On the climate impacts of blue hydrogen production. - Sustainable Energy and Fuels, 6, 1, 66-75.
https://doi.org/10.1039/D1SE01508G


Cite as: https://publications.pik-potsdam.de/pubman/item/item_26512
Abstract
Natural gas based hydrogen production with carbon capture and storage is referred to as blue hydrogen. If substantial amounts of CO2 from natural gas reforming are captured and permanently stored, such hydrogen could be a low-carbon energy carrier. However, recent research raises questions about the effective climate impacts of blue hydrogen from a life cycle perspective. Our analysis sheds light on the relevant issues and provides a balanced perspective on the impacts on climate change associated with blue hydrogen. We show that such impacts may indeed vary over large ranges and depend on only a few key parameters: the methane emission rate of the natural gas supply chain, the CO2 removal rate at the hydrogen production plant, and the global warming metric applied. State-of-the-art reforming with high CO2 capture rates combined with natural gas supply featuring low methane emissions does indeed allow for substantial reduction of greenhouse gas emissions compared to both conventional natural gas reforming and direct combustion of natural gas. Under such conditions, blue hydrogen is compatible with low-carbon economies and exhibits climate change impacts at the upper end of the range of those caused by hydrogen production from renewable-based electricity. However, neither current blue nor green hydrogen production pathways render fully “net-zero” hydrogen without additional CO2 removal.