Materials Needs for Energy Sustainability by 2050: Is Hydrogen the Fuel of the Future?

Mitch Ewan
Hawaiʻi Natural Energy Institute

Jennifer Glenn
Nel Hydrogen

James Vickers
U.S. Department of Energy

Brian Weeks
Gas Technology Institute (GTI)

Anthony Ku
NICE America Research
(Moderator)

In 2020, the world used about 90 million tons of H₂ with over 90% of it generated from fossil fuels. Hydrogen has the potential to play a role in:

• Decarbonization of transportation through fuel cell vehicles
• Industry in chemicals and metals production
• Power generation, including long-duration energy storage

Large-scale use in these sectors by 2050 could increase annual H₂ use by up to an order of magnitude and would require H₂ production to shift to carbon-neutral pathways, such as electrolysis powered by renewable or nuclear energy, fossil fuel reforming or gasification with CO₂ capture and storage, and methane pyrolysis.

There are high hopes for the use of hydrogen to help decarbonize transportation, industry and power generation. Materials science has an important part to play. Materials advances are needed to improve the performance and affordability of existing H₂-based technologies, enable new technologies capable of replacing fossil fuel-based systems and provide alternatives for materials that may have economic or sociopolitical limitations in their supply chains.

In this MRS TV interview from the 2022 MRS Spring Meeting, panelists Elizabeth Kocs, Anthony Ku, and Ashley White take a look at the big picture of where H₂ can and cannot play a role on paths to net zero, explore the practical aspects of deploying H₂ technologies at scale, and drill down into specific technologies expected to be important over the next decades across the value chain from clean H₂ production to effective storage and distribution to end uses.