I’ve been talking about the world-changing effect that natural hydrogen could have on the world green economy since at least 2013. It’s easy to see why the use of naturally occurring hydrogen could be world-changing. With the clock ticking on making sure we can become more sustainable ASAP, the development of hydrogen is very much the next step in cleaning up how we get around the world.
Research teams has been meeting globally for some time now, but a major research discussion took place in December 2019. Then, a group from the Center for Energy Research and Training (CERTAIN) from the Ohio State University hosted a symposium. Titled “Energy Solutions for Deep Carbonisation: Hydrogen Energy”, it was a landmark discussion on a vital change in how we can improve humanity.
It discussed mainly hydrogen energy and how it could be used, but also the topic of natural hydrogen. This has been a more and more obvious talking point in the last few weeks, with many researches looking into geological sources of hydrogen gas. With clean energy demands increasing all the time, the need to find something that we can actually use to make this possible has become an essential topic.
This is one of the main talking points from the event, with the need for natural hydrogen to be made available essential to progress. However, it’s only recently been viewed as the next go-to clean energy solution, with discoveries in recent months showing us that natural hydrogen is far more abundant than we previously assumed.
Dr. Eric Tone, a keynote speaker at the event, mentioned that energy consumption and per capita GDP are linked together. With the ‘middle class’ populace expected to continue to boost until 2030, meaning a 3x rise from 2000-2030, we need to do more to make sure that energy consumption is contained.
With more people having access to the kind of features that can make large carbon emissions, we need tech that can off-set that ASAP. That’s why we need to see development both in developed and developing nations. They also speak about the importance of investment both in real financial terms into the sector as well as investment on intellectual capital to improve the speed at which we can find a solution.
Hydrogen gained naturally, then, is seen as the next big revolutionary step forward in the clean energy argument. It was even compared by Dr. Michael Webber as being the next ‘shale boom’ in terms of how strong a revolution this could be for the industry. However, he thinks that the present energy infrastructures that we have must be integrated as part of a new solution to avoid the kind of overly expensive replacement costs that might put people off taking action.
Safe to say, then, that we are seeing action on natural hydrogen in a way that was previously never assumed possible. Let’s hope in the next few years that natural hydrogen takes off so that we can accelerate the cleaning of the planet in the near future. Many thanks to Viacheslav Zgonnik for being a fine leader in the research and development of natural hydrogen.
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