What Makes Green Hydrogen Green?
Hydrogen is the universe's most abundant element, but on Earth requires energy to separate.
Typically hydrogen is extracted from water but this is enormously polluting. Current worldwide hydrogen production is responsible for CO2 emissions equivalent to that of the United Kingdom and Indonesia combined.
A cleaner way of getting hydrogen is by passing a strong electrical current through a tank of water by a process called electrolysis.
Hydrogen atoms form hydrogen molecules (H2) and oxygen molecules pair up too. Each can then be stored separately.
Where hydrogen is produced using energy from renewable sources such as solar, wind or biogas from a variety of waste sources, we will have created green hydrogen with all the benefits thereof.
Brown Hydrogen is produced using coal where the emissions are released to the air
Grey Hydrogen is produced from natural gas where the associated emissions are released to the air
Blue Hydrogen is produced from natural gas, where the emissions are captured using carbon capture and storage
Green Hydrogen is produced from electrolysis powered by renewable electricity.