Hydrogen: Where Do We Go from Here?

Many predict that a sustainable hydrogen economy will begin to emerge over the next decade or two. Envision clean, quiet fuel cell vehicles gliding through communities whose electric power is supplied by fuel cells. Our air will be cleaner; our climate, more stable; our energy supply, more reliable and secure.

Who could argue with this picture? But it’s easy to make such predictions. Building a practical pathway to that appealing future, successfully anticipating and navigating each step along the way…that’s more difficult.

Still, we at ChevronTexaco are working hard to do just that. Why? Because as a major global energy company, we are committed to meeting our customers’ demand for energy, now and in the future. We are constantly on the lookout for promising new sources of energy, new markets, and new opportunities to enhance and extend our businesses. We installed a 200-kilowatt fuel cell at our headquarters in San Ramon, Calif. to provide power to the facility’s data center where critical computer systems process data 24 hours a day. Since 1999, we have been researching and developing hydrogen energy, along with renewables, such as solar and wind energy.

Few people realize that a hydrogen economy already exists at the industrial level. Energy companies produce hydrogen for use in their own refineries and market it as a specialty chemical to manufacturers. In fact, annual worldwide hydrogen production is equivalent to roughly 10 percent of worldwide oil production.

Now we are working to extend the hydrogen economy to commercial and consumer markets. Drawing on our expertise in fuel conversion technology, we have developed and patented a simpler way to produce hydrogen from natural gas. We see reforming natural gas, onsite at the point of use, in a distributed fashion as the “bridge strategy” that will enable fuel cell technology to mature and hydrogen markets to develop. And, as renewable technology develops, more cost-effective and efficient means of creating hydrogen through electrolysis may emerge. We have also designed a hydrogen energy station that is intended to produce hydrogen onsite for fueling vehicles and uses excess hydrogen to generate electricity from a stationary fuel cell. We are in the process of building demonstration stations in California.

Substantial hurdles remain before hydrogen can become a widely accepted fuel. Among the items on the industry’s to-do list: lower costs system-wide; develop rigorous codes and standards; solve storage and distribution issues; and educate consumers about the benefits and safe use of this potentially new fuel. Over the next five years, we are planning to lead a team in a U.S. Department of Energy program to gather data, demonstrate applications in real-world settings, and determine the most viable route to a hydrogen future. In this pre-commercial stage of development, public-private collaborations are key to advancing hydrogen technology.

For the rest of this decade, we have plans to pursue what we call captured infrastructure projects, in which hydrogen-fueled vehicles are refueled at a central location – municipal bus fleets, industrial forklifts, auto fleets, military vehicles, and the like. By the end of the decade, we expect the results will be in. All of us should have a clearer picture of which hydrogen technologies deserve the green light for further development. And we should have a better sense of if, how, and when hydrogen can become a significant part of the world’s energy supply.

It will take many years to complete the transition to hydrogen as a primary fuel for transportation and power generation. Still, it is hard to conceive of a more important, a more worthy, mission than providing new sources of clean, abundant energy for future generations. We at ChevronTexaco are pleased to help lead this worldwide effort.

Rick Zalesky is president of ChevronTexaco Technology Ventures’ Hydrogen Business, a subsidiary of ChevronTexaco Corp (www.chevron.com).