Across the globe, clean hydrogen production is on the rise. For former coal towns like Vernon, Texas, it could provide a lifeline.
From the article:
The [green hydrogen] facility has become an example of how oil-rich states like Texas — which leads the nation in annual wind power production and is behind only California in annual solar power production — are buying into the renewable energy boom. Much of this investment was spurred by former President Joe Biden’s administration and his legislative goals, such as the roughly $500 billion that Congress set aside through its approval of the bipartisan Inflation Reduction Act in 2022. This eagerness to invest in renewable energy has come at a time when climate change has driven average global temperatures to roughly 1.1 degrees Celsius (and steadily climbing) above pre-industrial levels. To stave off the worst of the ongoing climate crisis’s effects, domestically and abroad, renewable sources like green hydrogen bear promise, scientists say. And that promise is already being fulfilled in nations like China, Saudi Arabia, and Sweden, all of whom are global leaders in green hydrogen production facilities that are in final planning or financing phases, according to a hydrogen projects data tracker published by the International Energy Agency last year. Meanwhile, in the U.S., some 67 green hydrogen projects are planned through at least 2029, according to an energy transition paper published by the workforce solutions company Airswift. The alternative fuel has always had promise, says Dr. Alan Lloyd, a renewable energy researcher at the University of Texas. It’s not a future pipe dream, he adds. But rather, now, “it’s happening.”
