Geologic Hydrogen: The Future of Clean, Abundant Energy or a Costly Dream?
Key Highlights
- - Geologic hydrogen is abundant and potentially cost-effective, with estimates suggesting production costs as low as 50 cents to $1 per kilogram.
- - Current exploration efforts in the U.S. and Canada aim to locate and extract natural hydrogen from subsurface deposits, with promising early results.
- - Challenges include understanding where hydrogen is generated, how to economically extract it, and building the infrastructure needed for widespread use.
Hydrogen is like an energy rose. It’s a beautiful, to energy nerds anyway, but difficult to pick because of symbolic thorns and embedded within a thicket of tangled energy conversions brambles.
H2 is energy dense, incredibly abundant and carbon-free. But it’s difficult to separate, transport and even ignite without huge infrastructural adaptations.
OK, we’ll lose the horticultural analogies and drive this story straight into the ground. Geologic hydrogen is buried and ready with trillions of metric tons embedded in the earth’s crust, more than enough to satisfy multiple lifetimes of future energy demand.
Let’s go get it, right? There’s no doubt we need it.
Slow that H2 roll a minute...or a decade
No one has produced commercial-scale geologic hydrogen in the U.S. yet, although the U.S. Geological Survey has done research indicating reserves below the Great Plains and elsewhere.
It's there. Problem is exactly where and how to get it out and use it economically.
“The key challenge to making geologic hydrogen a beneficial reality is understanding where hydrogen is being generated and how,” reads a report from the Sandia National Laboratory. “While data documenting the natural occurrences of large volumes of geologic hydrogen are scant, our best current understanding is that hydrogen should accumulate in the subsurface like other gases (e.g., methane, helium, nitrogen, hydrogen sulfide). This reasoning stems from previous discoveries of hydrogen when drilling for other resources like water and hydrocarbons. Furthermore, the hydrogen molecule is larger than helium, so if helium can be trapped in subsurface deposits (which we have found in thousands of wells in the U.S.), hydrogen should as well.”
Easy peasy, right?. Numerous undaunted companies are deep into early phases of that work, including companies such as Koloma, Vema Hydrogen and MAX Power Mining Corp. The last of those mentioned has started drilling what it’s called Canada’s first-ever well dedicated solely to “natural hydrogen” in Saskatchewan.
Earlier this year, MAX Power said it had confirmed hydrogen concentrations of up to 286,000 parts per million (PPM) at the Lawson site. And it was MAX Power’s first well along that trend in Saskatchewan.
“Lawson is no longer a concept – it’s a discovered geological system with gas flow, pressure, and the key ingredients required for future commercial natural hydrogen development,” Ran Narayanasamy, MAX Power president and CEO, said in the January 16 statement about the initial natural H2 drilling success. “This is an important milestone that positions Saskatchewan at the forefront of a rapidly emerging new clean energy industry.”
Time will tell if the enthusiasm of early success can be scaled into sustainable and commercial-scale hydrogen production.
Vema Hydrogen has joined MAX Power in Canada, although its subsurface exploration is focused on Quebec. Vema is testing its method in trying to extract engineered mineral hydrogen from the subsurface ophiolite and banded iron formations of the earth’s crust.
Geologic hydrogen could be an economic game changer
The U.S. Energy Information Administration earlier this year estimated the cost of carbon-intensive hydrogen production at a competitive cost of about $3 in capital per kilogram, while green hydrogen—which would be separated from water by electrolyzers powered by carbon-free energy—was estimated at closer to $15 per kilogram.
These are tough costs and infrastructural challenges which have also made commercial-scale hydrogen for power generation seem like it’s always five or more years away from reality.
Could geologic hydrogen be a game changer? The Sandia National Lab report estimated its cost could be competitively low at 50 cents to $1 per kilogram. One kilogram could deliver 120 megajoules of potential energy, equivalent to about 33 kWh, according to various estimates.
The average U.S. home consumes less than that on a given day, according to U.S. EIA and other research. So, if the forecasts around geologic hydrogen prove true eventually, this could power a residence for less than a dollar per day.
Geologic H2 sounds homey, but . . .
You can’t get there from here yet. And while the promise of cheap home electricity is attractive, it must pass the industrial value test to attract true long-term investment.
“These vital areas of research must be framed by a commonsense approach to the economics of making geologic hydrogen a reliable and affordable part of U.S. energy security,” reads the Sandia National Lab report. “A key economic question is whether stimulated hydrogen can be produced in sufficient quantities to capture and drive industrial processes, thereby incentivizing private investment.”
So, while there may indeed be enough natural hydrogen in the earth’s crust to power the earth’s economy for 170,000 years, as a recent OilPrice.com story energetically noted, the reality will take time and probably millions and perhaps billions of dollars in sustained investment.
It’s kind of like nuclear fusion—a dream of nearly unlimited and carbon-free power. But the path there involves a whole lot of reality checks on the road to get there, if ever.
It seems worth the try for geologic hydrogen. If it holds ground, no pun intended, it could change the world.
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About the Author
Rod Walton, EnergyTech Managing Editor
Managing Editor
For EnergyTech editorial inquiries, please contact Managing Editor Rod Walton at [email protected].
Rod Walton has spent 17 years covering the energy industry as a newspaper and trade journalist. He formerly was energy writer and business editor at the Tulsa World. Later, he spent six years covering the electricity power sector for Pennwell and Clarion Events. He joined Endeavor and EnergyTech in November 2021.
Walton earned his Bachelors degree in journalism from the University of Oklahoma. His career stops include the Moore American, Bartlesville Examiner-Enterprise, Wagoner Tribune and Tulsa World.
EnergyTech is focused on the mission critical and large-scale energy users and their sustainability and resiliency goals. These include the commercial and industrial sectors, as well as the military, universities, data centers and microgrids. The C&I sectors together account for close to 30 percent of greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S.
He was named Managing Editor for Microgrid Knowledge and EnergyTech starting July 1, 2023
Many large-scale energy users such as Fortune 500 companies, and mission-critical users such as military bases, universities, healthcare facilities, public safety and data centers, shifting their energy priorities to reach net-zero carbon goals within the coming decades. These include plans for renewable energy power purchase agreements, but also on-site resiliency projects such as microgrids, combined heat and power, rooftop solar, energy storage, digitalization and building efficiency upgrades.