'Hydrogen Fever' Erupts after Discoveries of Large Deposits of the Clean Gas

[OKIsItJustMe]

2. I really don't worry that much about it

https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-023-00857-8

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Abstract

With increasing global interest in molecular hydrogen to replace fossil fuels, more attention is being paid to potential leakages of hydrogen into the atmosphere and its environmental consequences. Hydrogen is not directly a greenhouse gas, but its chemical reactions change the abundances of the greenhouse gases methane, ozone, and stratospheric water vapor, as well as aerosols. Here, we use a model ensemble of five global atmospheric chemistry models to estimate the 100-year time-horizon Global Warming Potential (GWP100) of hydrogen. We estimate a hydrogen GWP100 of 11.6 ± 2.8 (one standard deviation). The uncertainty range covers soil uptake, photochemical production of hydrogen, the lifetimes of hydrogen and methane, and the hydroxyl radical feedback on methane and hydrogen. The hydrogen-induced changes are robust across the different models. It will be important to keep hydrogen leakages at a minimum to accomplish the benefits of switching to a hydrogen economy.

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Considering the tremendous volumes of CO₂ and methane we’re pumping into the atmosphere, I just don’t see hydrogen playing that major a role.

Then again, we might reasonably expect hydrogen leaks to be more common than natural gas leaks, unless better care is taken.