Green hydrogen may be less clean than we think
Interchange Recharged
Wood Mackenzie
4.8 • 535 Ratings
🗓️ 13 August 2024
⏱️ 35 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The Environmental Defense Fund wants changes made to the way the industry analyses hydrogen emissions data.
A recent study from the Environmental Defense Fund asserts the energy industry is miscalculating the true impacts of deploying hydrogen. Hydrogen systems, with new analysis, could prove to be better – or worse – than the fossil fuels they intend to replace.
“Clean, green” hydrogen deployment can be considerably better or worse for the climate based on factors typically overlooked in standard assessments. That’s the finding of a new study from the EDF. The climate benefits of hydrogen vary depending on factors such as methane emissions, carbon capture, and hydrogen loss. Steve Hamburg is Chief Scientist at the EDF. He joins us to discuss his findings, and to examine the impact on the energy industry of these new analyses, as hydrogen continues to gain traction as a reliable source of clean energy.
Improvements are needed for standard hydrogen life cycle analyses as they currently don’t account for all climate warming emissions and impacts over time. By including the warming effects of three crucial and frequently overlooked factors in determining the climate impact of hydrogen deployment pathways the results of an assessment can look surprisingly different. Just how different? Listen to find out.
Subscribe to the Interchange Recharged so you don’t miss an episode. Find us on X – we’re @interchangeshow.
To keep up to date with everything we talk about on the show, sign up for our weekly Inside Track newsletter. You’ll get extra analysis from Wood Mackenzie and be notified when a new episode of the podcast is out.
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Wood McKenzie's Solar Energy and Storage Summit is back in Denver on the 29th and 30th of April, |
| 0:06.2 | 2026. It's co-located with the brand new North American Power and Renewables Forum, |
| 0:11.9 | which features senior speakers from across the U.S. power sector. Come and join over 450 senior |
| 0:18.2 | leaders from U.S. power developers, utilities, and independent power producers |
| 0:23.3 | to tackle the industry's biggest challenges. From navigating life after tax credits to capturing |
| 0:29.7 | the load growth boom, discover how the energy mix is evolving and how the U.S. is going to meet |
| 0:34.9 | that power demand. Seats are limited, so register now at woodmack.com. |
| 0:40.3 | This is the interchange recharge. |
| 0:43.1 | A Wood McKenzie production. |
| 0:45.1 | I'm David Banmiller. |
| 0:50.6 | A recent study from the Environmental Defense Fund claims the energy industry is miscalculating the true impact of deploying hydrogen. |
| 0:58.8 | Clean, green hydrogen deployment can be considerably better or worse for the climate based on factors typically overlooked in standard assessments. |
| 1:07.2 | That's the finding of a new study from the EDF. |
| 1:10.0 | The climate benefits of hydrogen vary depending on factors such as methane emissions, |
| 1:15.1 | carbon capture, and hydrogen loss. |
| 1:17.7 | Steve Hamburg is chief scientist at the EDF. |
| 1:20.0 | He explains how real-world data collection is crucial to understanding the true implications |
| 1:25.2 | of hydrogen design systems to minimize emissions. |
| 1:28.6 | The initial analysis, so we replicated an analysis that had done previously. |
| 1:33.1 | And when we did that, they made very simple assumptions. |
| 1:35.9 | And in so doing, they overestimated the net climate benefit of deploying hydrogen. |
| 1:41.6 | And I think that's the lesson we need to learn. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Wood Mackenzie, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Wood Mackenzie and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.