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How hydrogen could help decarbonize
transportation — Net-Zero Carbon
Bakken Energy captures 95% of carbon emissions from
hydrogen production, CEO says
On this episode of Net-Zero Carbon, Danny Gomez, managing director of
financial and emerging markets at FreightWaves, is joined by Mike
Hopkins, CEO of Bakken
Energy, to discuss the basics of hydrogen and why hydrogen is an
attractive fuel source for hard to abate emissions in long-haul
trucking.
About 95% of hydrogen produced in the U.S. today is considered gray
hydrogen, which is made by natural gas reforming, according to the Department
of Energy. This process produces hydrogen and releases carbon
monoxide and carbon dioxide.
In terms of environmental impacts and greenhouse gas emissions,
hydrogen produced from natural gas is better than that produced from
coal but not as clean as green
hydrogen, which is produced by using renewable energy.
A lot of natural gas in the U.S. gets flared, meaning it gets burned
off at oil fields. That releases large amounts of methane, a
superpotent GHG, into the atmosphere. Bakken Energy is on a mission to
end flaring and instead use that natural gas to produce hydrogen.
The company uses an energy-efficient technology called auto reforming
to produce hydrogen. About 95% of the carbon dioxide emissions are
then captured and sequestered underground locally, according to
Hopkins.
He said the industry is starting to move away from using
colors to describe hydrogen and instead relying on the carbon
intensity of producing hydrogen in different ways.
Using hydrogen in trucking
There has been an understanding that ramping up renewable energy
production and electrifying everything would decarbonize the economy,
Hopkins said. But those solutions don’t work for every sector,
especially those such as shipping, aviation and
long-haul trucking. That’s where clean hydrogen comes in.
“If you look at … where most of the innovation is going, it’s in these
difficult to decarbonize segments of the economy that are prime
candidates for hydrogen. And then it’s all about how do you make it
available? How do you make it affordable?” Hopkins said.
Two ways that hydrogen is being considered for trucking is by using it
in internal combustion engines or by feeding hydrogen into a fuel cell
that would run a motor in an electric truck. In the latter case, you
wouldn’t need a large, heavy battery in order to power an electric
truck, Hopkins said.
One of the limiting factors in terms of hydrogen adoption is the lack
of a “midstream transportation distribution system,” which exists for
diesel, gasoline and natural gas. However, Hopkins and Gomez discussed
how hydrogen could be more than a transition fuel.
“The beauty of hydrogen, once you have it … is it’s an amazing energy
source. It’s truly zero carbon. It has no emissions other than water.
It’s a perfect energy source. But you have to look at how it was
made,” Hopkins said. “If in the process of getting that, you’re
incredibly polluting, that’s not helping anybody.”
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