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Earth Day coordinator Denis Hayes grew up in Camas, Washington, surrounded by natural beauty and unchecked pollution.

Hydrogen has long been hyped as the “Swiss army knife” of the energy transition, but today – despite billions in investment – it largely remains limited to niche industrial applications.

In a new review article, published in Nature Reviews Clean Technology, we look at where hydrogen could plausibly become competitive – and the applications where it is unlikely to ever be a viable solution.

For each use case, the review looks at the cost and carbon emissions of using hydrogen relative to alternative solutions, identifying the barriers which stand in the way of uptake.

For example, high-profile applications, such as home heating and fuelling cars, are still widely promoted, but are failing to take off.

Fundamentally, this is because hydrogen is an inefficient and costly option in these cases, with Ferraris globally outselling all makes of hydrogen fuel-cell cars combined.

Finally, the review looks at the current state of government hydrogen policy around the world, plus the ways that its potential could be maximised in the future.

This post uses a gift link which has a view count limit. When it runs out, there is an archived copy of the article

This post uses a gift link which may have a view count limit. If it runs out, there is an archived copy of the article

cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/62057136

Archived copies of the article:

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Record-high solar and wind bring the US to a clean power tipping point

Over the past 20 years, Paris has undergone a major physical transformation, trading automotive arteries for bike lanes, adding green spaces and eliminating 50,000 parking spaces.

Part of the payoff has been invisible — in the air itself.

Airparif, an independent group that tracks air quality for France’s capital region, said this week that levels of fine particulate matter (PM 2.5) have decreased 55 percent since 2005, while nitrogen dioxide levels have fallen 50 percent. It attributed this to “regulations and public policies,” including steps to limit traffic and ban the most polluting vehicles.

Air pollution heat maps show the levels of 20 years ago as a pulsing red — almost every neighborhood above the European Union’s limit for nitrogen dioxide, which results from the combustion of fossil fuels. By 2023, the red zone had shrunk to only a web of fine lines across and around the city, representing the busiest roads and highways.

The change shows how ambitious policymaking can directly improve health in large cities. Air pollution is often described by health experts as a silent killer. Both PM 2.5 and nitrogen dioxide have been linked to major health problems, including heart attacks, lung cancer, bronchitis and asthma.

Paris has been led since 2014 by Mayor Anne Hidalgo, a Socialist who has pushed for many of the green policies and has described her wish for a “Paris that breathes, a Paris that is more agreeable to live in.”

Her proposals have faced pushback — from right-leaning politicians, a car owners’ association and suburban commuters, who say that targeting cars makes their lives more difficult.

But last month, Parisians voted in a referendum to turn an additional 500 streets over to pedestrians. A year earlier, Paris had moved to sharply increase parking fees for SUVs, forcing drivers to pay three times more than they would for smaller cars. The city has also turned a bank of the Seine from a busy artery into a pedestrian zone and banned most car traffic from the shopping boulevard of Rue de Rivoli.

Carlos Moreno, a professor at Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University and a former adviser to the city, said the French capital has developed “an urban policy based on well-being.”

correction

A previous version of this article misidentified Carlos Moreno's affiliation. He is a professor at Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University, not Paris's Sorbonne University.

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Criminalizing the protection of water, not its degradation, is a sign of things to come—but Water Protectors are here to stay

I think the National Observer has a view count cap on gift links. In case this one runs out, an archived copy of the article should show up here once it is done loading

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/28499504