Comment: Pressing ahead with hydrogen power

Hydrogen energy looks to have been sidelined by big industry players, with Airbus, BP and Shell all announcing delays to hydrogen research investments and projects. It's the Trump effect: the renewed support for fossil fuels that’s had a sudden and immediate influence, in terms of the mindsets and policies of both businesses and governments globally. 

On the surface at least, that means a serious reversal of progress being made towards replacing black with green technologies, removing the confidence and sense of a common, clear direction that’s so essential to turning research concepts into working solutions. 

But it’s at this moment that Cranfield has pushed ahead with closing down its specialist oil and gas research facilities. The multi-phase flow lab, for example, which has been the basis of decades of work on subsea drilling, is being stripped out and sold off. Simultaneously, they’re creating space for a full-service hydrogen lab, including an engine test centre focused on hydrogen, not oil.

Significantly, the majority of financial backing behind the new CH2i facility on campus (Cranfield Hydrogen Integration Incubator) comes from a range of businesses, £46 million from across transport, aerospace, energy and among those industries with targets for decarbonisation, such as steel, food and ceramics (with the remaining third funded by Research England). Hydrogen-power is high on the agenda for industry internationally, particularly in Europe, the MENA region and nations such as India etc.

The reality is that US policy on fossil fuels is very short-term. As a businessman, Trump is thinking in terms of maximising returns from his assets, making the most of low-cost, in-house fuel stocks before the inevitable dwindling in supplies, global demand and value. In the context of the evolution of the world’s energy infrastructure, now more than 120 years old, the Trump years are a blip, and will do nothing to change the direction of travel towards new energy sources and solutions. If large energy companies have pulled back from their commitments to hydrogen then it’s also because of the short-term opportunity from pushing oil and gas, and also because of temporary market conditions, windfall taxes, instability, reduced profit margins.

The momentum behind hydrogen research and the bid to establish viable systems for production, transportation, storage and different forms of low and zero carbon uses is unaffected. Whatever delays and distractions there might be, in whatever sector, the same need for workable alternatives isn’t going anywhere. And meanwhile, the UK has taken on a leading role in hydrogen, making it internationally competitive, especially when it comes to the use of feedstocks in hydrogen production, the use of electrolysis and catalysts, biomass and fermentations, and sorbent enhanced methane, as well as in our work on finding practical applications for industries of all sizes. 

Cranfield’s CH2i is due to be fully operational by March 2026. Building on 30 years of hydrogen research at the University, there will be a full hydrogen ecosystem on campus, linking projects and facilities in production, storage, materials, propulsion, usage, aircraft design and airport operations. The technology incubator will accelerate hydrogen research through to delivery. Some of the first projects to use the facilities have included testing developing the designs and new materials needed for aircraft to carry on-board liquid hydrogen fuel tanks, dealing with the issues of leakage. Other work is focused on creating a new composite cycle engine technology for aircraft, estimated to deliver up to 90% reductions in climate impact per passenger (through efficiencies in terms of reduced fuel burn, limited CO2 and NOx emissions) when used with SAF and hydrogen. There’s ongoing development of a new generation ‘blue’ hydrogen production plant on campus: the  sorbent-enhanced steam reforming approach that’s integrated with carbon capture, meaning a 97% reduction in carbon emissions compared with traditional hydrogen production methods. 

There are a host of challenges standing in the way of a working hydrogen economy for industries. There has to be mass production, grounded in green energy supplies and without putting unsustainable strains on water resources. There also need to be guarantees around safety in storage and transport to ensure public confidence (although, it should be said that hydrogen was flowing through gas pipelines for decades between the 1940s and 1970s in the UK without incidents, and before the kinds of standards and technologies we have available now).

 Some of the timescales for transition might look something for the future, but in the context of both our history of energy technologies and the urgency of net zero targets and climate change hydrogen is imminent. Delivery on research investments is needed now. Based on current progress, we’d expect to see industries decarbonising through hydrogen within the next 10 years; a network of hydrogen-HGVs on roads in less than 15 years, and for hydrogen aviation to be the dominant, low-carbon tech in less than 30.

Professor Phil Longhurst is Director of Automotive, Energy & Photonics in the Faculty of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Cranfield University.

Click here for more information on involvement with the Cranfield Hydrogen Integration Incubator (CH2i)