British Columbia Groups Exploring Hydrogen Hubs for Future Decarbonization

The studies identified key supply and demand opportunities across four areas: BC’s Lower Mainland, Northeast, Southern Interior, and Vancouver Island, highlighting their distinct competitive advantages for hydrogen development.
July 22, 2025
2 min read
Vancouver skyline. Image credit By David G. Gordon - Own work/Courtesy Wikimedia Commons
Vancouver skyline. Image credit By David G. Gordon - Own work/Courtesy Wikimedia Commons

The Canadian province of British Columbia is exploring the potential for hydrogen storage and transportation infrastructure throughout multiple regions there.

Clean energy advocacy group Foresight Canada and the provincial government’s Clean Energy and Major Projects Office (CEMPO) has collaborated on several reports focused on the future potential for hydrogen in British Columbia. The studies identified key supply and demand opportunities across four areas: BC’s Lower Mainland, Northeast, Southern Interior, and Vancouver Island, highlighting their distinct competitive advantages for hydrogen development.

Hydrogen is a light, abundant and energy-dense gas which does not contain carbon in its molecular chain and does not emit CO2 at the point of use. Generating hydrogen for commercial or industrial use, however, must done by electrolyzers, which separate the H2 from water, or by the carbon-intensive steam reforming of methane gas.

Map showing British Columbia in red. Image credit By MapGrid - Own work/Courtesy Wikimedia Commons
Map showing British Columbia in red. Image credit By MapGrid - Own work/Courtesy Wikimedia Commons

“British Columbia has tremendous potential to continue to lead in hydrogen innovation and creating these reports and releasing the findings helps fuel this potential,” said Adrian Dix, Minister of Energy and Climate Solutions, British Columbia, in a statement.

The reports highlighted the role of electrification, combined with regional strengths, to help the province lead in hydrogen production and adoption. While scaling the sector offers challenges, including the need for new regulations and infrastructure to ensure its safe transport, the opportunities for BC to drive the clean energy transition through strategic hydrogen hub development are significant.

The U.S. also is exploring hydrogen among its carbon-free fuel resources, and earlier legislation initiated a series of regional hydrogen hubs across the nation. Those seek to interconnect H2 generation with infrastructure and end user applications such as power generation or fuel cell transportation.

The Trump Administration and Republican Congress recently set a deadline for the 45V hydrogen tax credit before it is ended. Qualifying projects in the U.S. must start construction before 2028 to earn the 45V incentive.

Some fuel cell technology firms, however, believe that the current political climate in the U.S. will offer some opportunities for a baseload fuel resource such as hydrogen and fuel cell electric technologies.

 

About the Author

EnergyTech Staff

Rod Walton is senior editor for EnergyTech.com. He has spent 14 years covering the energy industry as a newspaper and trade journalist.

Walton 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.

He can be reached at [email protected]. 

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.

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.

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