Alberta Trying To Keep Hydrogen "Revolution" Alive, Wants To Mix Up To 5% Hydrogen In Household Natural Gas

[hatrack]

EDIT

The province is now pursuing an ill-conceived idea to allow hydrogen to be mixed with natural gas for home heating. Hyping the increasinglydebunked “hydrogen revolution” might be politically expedient for Alberta Premier Danielle Smith and her friends in the oil patch, but it is terrible public policy that ignores some fundamental properties of the lightest element known to science. Alberta tabled a bill last month allowing utilities to blend up to 5 percent hydrogen with natural gas (mostly methane) that is delivered to homes and businesses. “Hydrogen presents an enormous opportunity and we want to ensure our province can remain a global leader,” said Alberta Utilities Minister Nathan Neudorf at the time.

However, experts warn that blending hydrogen with heating gas provides minimal climate gains, increases the rate of pipeline leakage, and is more dangerous than methane alone. Toronto-based chemical engineer Paul Martin has written extensively on the subject including a recent peer-reviewed paper in which he concluded that hydrogen blending “offers only a small reduction in greenhouse gas emissions” while creating “serious safety and environmental risks.”

When asked by Desmog why he thinks the Alberta government might be moving towards mixing hydrogen with methane for heating he suggested the following possible reasons: “desperation, bad advice, lobbying?”

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Using existing gas pipes for delivering hydrogen bumps into a series of physical limitations. To deliver the same amount of energy as methane gas, hydrogen needs to be pumped at a rate three times higher than methane. This results in higher rates of leakage of both hydrogen and methane, which is 28 times more damaging as a greenhouse gas than CO2. Hydrogen also requires 13 percent more energy to be compressed than natural gas and loses 10 percent more pressure per unit length of pipe compared to gas, adding additional expenses and emissions. Because hydrogen burns hotter than methane, it creates higher amounts of indoor nitrogen oxides that have been linked to increased rates of childhood asthma. Hydrogen is notoriously leaky and is itself a powerful greenhouse gas because it increases the lifespan of methane in the upper atmosphere.

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https://www.desmog.com/2025/05/15/albertas-hydrogen-strategy-is-money-losing-climate-failure/

[creon]

1. dangerous

his is dangerous.
THe principlw of calculated risk says NO

[Bernardo de La Paz]

2. Danielle Smith is stupid in multiple ways beyond this idiocy. . . . . nt