The New Oil

In February this year, I had written a piece on the Energy transition towards Hydrogen that is taking place. Specifically Blue Hydrogen.

Blue hydrogen is sourced from fossil fuels. However, the CO2 is captured and stored underground (carbon sequestration). Companies are also trying to utilise the captured carbon called carbon capture, storage and utilisation (CCSU). Utilisation is not essential to qualify for blue hydrogen. As no CO2 is emitted, so the blue hydrogen production process is categorised as carbon neutral.

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Apart from GAIL, IOC and several other Indian giants have made announcements to the effect. The UK based Ineos has announced plants across Norway, Belgium and Germany.

Source

The Carbon capture movement that is gaining speed and finding investment discovered that Hydrogen is a byproduct of the process. Now, that there is going to be a large amount of fuel available, we need to find a way to use it.

There is already so much available that export has started.

India will for the first-time export green energy from 2025, with the first shipments going to a Singapore power plant under an MoU signed by an India-based dispatchable renewables company and Singapore's energy business here on Tuesday.

The MoU to explore opportunities in green hydrogen potential in India will see Greenko group and Singapore's Keppel Infrastructure working towards a 250,000 tonne per annum contract to be supplied to Keppel’s new 600Mw power plant in Singapore.

Source:?Business Today

Singapore is a country with few land resources and no energy resources of its own and therefore it makes sense for them to source it from outside. In the case of Europe, what is their excuse?

Wind and solar power generated in Western Australia's Midwest could be helping to power Europe by the end of the decade.?

The state government will partner with the German government and Europe's largest port in a trilateral study to fast-track hydrogen exports from the planned Oakajee strategic industrial area (SIA).

WA is working to establish 6,000 hectares at Oakajee, north of Geraldton, as one of the largest renewable hydrogen producing areas in the world.

Source:?net.au

This energy is going to be in no way clean. Imagine producing all this Hydrogen with renewables and then putting that in ships that burn diesel of a grade worse than your car and then shipping it 15,000 Km. Thankfully the English language has a word to describe this - Lunatic.

Instead, this might make more sense… Relatively speaking.

Morocco is considering partnering with Gautam Adani — Asia’s richest person — on a large-scale hydrogen project amid a renewable energy push to meet demand at home and in Europe.

Authorities are thinking of signing final investment decisions for “at least two competitive industrial projects” in 2023, Moroccan Energy Transition Minister Leila Benali told Bloomberg in an interview over the weekend. Benali cited Indian private conglomerate Adani Group as among the firms interested in the Moroccan hydrogen

Source:?Bloomberg

If this is the greatest externality of the Russian war in Ukraine, in the long run, we will have Russia to thank. The only way to wean Europe off oil was… well there was no way to “wean” them off. It had to be forceful.

It should be evident to everyone that almost all power needs in the industry will be met by Hydrogen by 2040. Aviation is a huge industry and…

Britain's Rolls-Royce?(RR.L) ?said it has successfully run an aircraft engine on hydrogen, a world aviation first that marks a major step towards proving the gas could be key to decarbonising air travel.

The ground test, using a converted Rolls-Royce AE 2100-A regional aircraft engine, used green hydrogen created by wind and tidal power, the British company said on Monday.

Rolls and its testing programme partner easyJet?(EZJ.L) ?are seeking to prove that hydrogen can safely and efficiently deliver power for civil aero engines.

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Planemaker Airbus is working with French-U.S. engine maker CFM International?to test ?hydrogen propulsion technology.

It said in February it planned to fit a specially adapted version of a current generation engine near the back of an A380 superjumbo test plane.

Source:?Reuters

Rolls Royce and CFM would probably represent 50% of aircraft engine manufacturing capacity in the world. This is one industry that might transition quite soon if these engines are found to be viable.

In terms of energy storage density, fossil fuels give us about 40 MJ/Kg energy density. This is the reason you can fill up 40 Litres of petrol and go a greater distance than with 500 Kg of battery. Li-Ion battery has an energy density of about 1 MJ/Kg. By comparison, Hydrogen has an energy density of about 120 MJ/kg.

Given all these facts, Hydrogen is the best battery we have today.