Are you also being swamped with optimistic articles about how essential it is for Australia to be a leader in greenhydrogen? Greenhydrogen is being spruiked as essential to our decarbonised economic future and as a strategic decarbonised export opportunity.

Greenhydrogen is being distinguished from much cheaper greyhydrogen that we currently produce from gas (natural or fracked) by steam reforming. We also have bluehydrogen which is greyhydrogen with the extremely dubious promise of carbon capture. According toHowarth and Jacobson, when fugitive emissions are considered bluehydrogen has 20% worse emissions than greyhydrogen and only greenhydrogenshould be considered.

But howgreenis greenhydrogen really? Superficially itsgreen, because its made by passing renewable electricity through water to liberatehydrogenand oxygen with no CO2emissions.

But what if we put the same renewable power onto our electricity grids instead of makinghydrogen? This would displace coal and gas fired power every MWh of renewable electricity put onto the grid would displace ~3MWh of fossil fuels being burned to supply grid electricity and eliminate over a tonne of CO2emissions. The electricity used to generatehydrogenreally has the same impact as the electricity that supplies our grid - 72% fossil fuel powered. Greenhydrogenwill only be trulygreenwhen our electricity grid is fully decarbonised.

Hydrogenis being spruiked as a green wonder energy source that can be used for just about anything for vehicles, for ships and planes, for long-term electricity grid level storage, in industry to make steel, fertilisers and chemicals and in homes distributed through existing gas pipelines. It can also be used in fuel cells to regenerate electricity or converted to ammonia which is easier and safer to transport. Lets put these claims under the microscope:

For vehicles:

• 1 kWh of renewable electricity 0.7kWh of compressedhydrogen 0.18kWh of shaft power using ICE, or 0.38kWh using Fuel Cell Electric Vehicle

o18% - 38% efficient (Ammonia 20%)

• 1 kWh of renewable electricity 0.99kWh Li ion battery Electric Vehicle 0.9-0.95kWh of shaft power

o90-95% efficient

Ahydrogenpowered conventional vehicle would use 5 times and a fuel cell electric vehicle 2.4 times the renewable energy of a battery electric vehicle. According to Bloomberg NEF,battery electric vehicles will be the cheapest cars to produce by 2027so why would any consumer choose a more expensive,hydrogenpowered vehicle instead of a battery electric vehicle?

Decarbonising transport and eliminating petrol/diesel vehicles will take 3-5 times as long withgreenhydrogen/ammonia as with battery electric vehicles - the oil industry love it!

For electricity grid energy storage:

• 1 MWh of renewable electricity 0.7MWh ofhydrogencompressed 0.42MWh of Grid Electricity

o42% efficient

• 1 MWh of renewable electricity 47kg of Ammonia 0.31MWh of electricity + 19MWh of heat (CSIRO)

o31% efficient

• 1 kWh of renewable electricity Pumped Hydro Storage 0.8kWh of grid electricity

o80% efficient)

• 1 kWh of renewable electricity Li ion battery storage 0.99kWh of grid electricity

o99% efficient

Usinghydrogenor ammonia for grid level storage wastes 2-3 times as much renewable power, delaying our transition to renewables, delaying decarbonisation of our electricity supply and prolonging our use of coal and gas fired power - the coal and gas industries love it!

To make 1 tonne of steel:

• Traditional blastfurnace/BOS steel requires 0.82tonnes of coal + iron ore

oemits ~3 tonnes of CO2

• Hydrogensteel production requires: 0.6 tonnes ofhydrogen+ iron ore

oGreyhydrogenrequiring 4.9 tonnes of Natural Gas

• emits ~13 tonnes of CO2

oBluehydrogenrequiring 6 tonnes of Natural Gas

• emits 16 tonnes of CO2

oGreenHydrogenfrom 34.4MWh of renewable energy diverted from grid

• superficially emits no CO2
• causes ~38 tonnes ofCO2emission to supply the grid (2020)

Greensteel is only superficiallygreen if the renewable energy used to make thehydrogenwere instead put on the grid then this would prevent 38tonnes of CO2emissions per tonne of so-called Green steel being produced. On this basis, traditional coal fired steelmaking has the lowest CO2emissions, with allhydrogenbased steelmaking having at least 4 times the emissions per tonne of steel, with so-called green steel having over 10 times the emissions.

We are being sold the idea of transitioning from coal produced steel to decarbonised greenhydrogenproduced steel. None of this will actually reduce emissions now compared to conventional steel production the only winners here would be the oil and gas industries delaying decarbonisation under the guise of a transition togreensteel, so they love it!

Decarbonised steel production usinghydrogenWILL be valid but ONLY after our grid has substantially transitioned to decarbonised energy.

What abouthydrogenand ammonia as transportable renewable energy?

• 1 MWh of renewable electricity

oTransmitted by pipeline ~0.7MWhhydrogentransmitted by pipeline

• 70% efficient

o0.5MWh of ammonia 0.4MWh ammonia transmitted by pipeline

• 40% efficient

oTransmitted by Cable HVAC 0.94kWh

• 94% efficient (HVDC 96% efficient)

By truck or ship, the losses depend on distance, but will always be considerably higher than pipeline transmission and certainly never compete with high voltage electric cable transmission.

As a medium for storage or transmission of renewable energy,hydrogen(and even worse ammonia) would waste significant proportions (26-57%) of the stored energy further delaying decarbonisation - the gas industry loves it.

Green hydrogen really is the fossil fuel industries wet dream a superficially green solution to all our problems that will delay the transition out of fossil fuels for our transport, our electricity grids, our industries and our exports. With the release of IPCC AR6 revealing just how extreme the urgency to decarbonise, substantially before 2030 and reach net zero significantly before 2050, we MUST expose this dangerous delay tactic from the fossil fuel industries that have already sponsored 3 decades of climate denial. We must expose the delusion that hydrogen can be green until our grid is fully decarbonised.