Biden administration adds exemptions into new climate rules for hydrogen energy

[Think. Again.]

19. A small mistake you made...

...you said "Half the CO2 potential as methane, but twice of it entering the atmosphere." when the CO2 potential is actually less than half (methane is 28%, H2 11%) and only twice as leaky, making H2 a better bet.

Also, the amount of H2 that would have to leak to have that effect on atmospheric methane is around 9%, considering the cost of producing Green H2, that's quite a bit of loss that the industry would want to avoid, but of course a brand new infrastructure built specifically to avoid H2 leakage would be needed anyway (our current methane infrastructure sucks).

"For hydrogen referred to as green hydrogen, which is produced by splitting water into hydrogen and oxygen using electricity from renewable sources, Bertagni said that the critical threshold for hydrogen emissions sits at around 9%. That means that if more than 9% of the green hydrogen produced leaks into the atmosphere -- whether that be at the point of production, sometime during transport, or anywhere else along the value chain -- atmospheric methane would increase over the next few decades, canceling out some of the climate benefits of switching away from fossil fuels."

- https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2023/03/230313162740.htm

Also,

"The researchers emphasized the importance of the time scale over which the effect of hydrogen on atmospheric methane is considered. Bertagni said that in the long-term (over the course of a century, for instance), the switch to a hydrogen economy would still likely deliver net benefits to the climate, even if methane and hydrogen leakage levels are high enough to cause near-term warming."

(Both quotes from: - https://engineering.princeton.edu/news/2023/03/13/switching-hydrogen-fuel-could-prolong-methane-problem

So, knowing that the only possible goal is to replace all fossil fuel burning with alternative forms of supplying energy, Hydrogen is still something we must pursue.

(And as a personal disclaimer, I only consider Green H2 as a viable consideration in the advancement of a Hydrogen economy.)