Musk dismissed it; Bill Gates regarded it as a treasure! Will hydrogen energy be the savior of sustainable development?
Has Musk’s “silly theory of hydrogen energy” been slapped in the face?
Musk has repeatedly asserted that developing hydrogen energy is a foolish decision, and even said that hydrogen will not appear naturally on the earth.
However, in July this year, the American start-up company Koloma received a total of US$91 million in financing from Bill Gates and other investors to prepare to mine underground hydrogen. In September this year, geologists discovered a large amount of hydrogen directly underground in France, with a total amount estimated at 46 million tons.
And compared with green hydrogen and gray hydrogen, which can only be produced with green energy or thermal cracking equipment, the price of this hydrogen will be very low. Is the era of hydrogen coming? To protect the environment, we have to dig and dig and dig?
Is there really still hydrogen on earth?
Can this photo prove that there is hydrogen gas in the ground?
This was taken in the Perth Basin in Australia. Large and small circles are called fairy circles. No plants grow in the fairy circles, and they even sink inward to form salt lakes. When scientists investigated these fairy circles, they unexpectedly discovered that the soil contained hydrogen gas. The exact relationship between hydrogen gas and fairy circles is unknown. Some people speculate that hydrogen gas may inhibit the growth of plants or microbial colonies, leaving the area bare or even soil loss.
We know that hydrogen is the lightest gas in the world. Once it enters the atmosphere, it will float upward until it is thrown into space and leaves the atmosphere. However, there is still a small amount of hydrogen bound in the earth’s atmosphere, with the atmospheric concentration being about 0.55 ppm, which is 13 times that of ozone.
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However, as long as it does not enter the atmosphere, the hydrogen gas is still sealed underground because it is not easy to escape, so it is still abundant today. Hydrogen gas leaking from the ground to the surface has been observed not only in Australia but also around the world.
Is the first Olympic flame still burning?
Located in the valley of Mount Olympus in Turkey, just above the ruins of the temple of Hephaestus, the Greek god of fire, large and small flames burst out from the earth and rocks, as if Hephaestus still exists there today. Same. There were more than a dozen fires in the area, with a total burning area of 5,000 square meters.
Geologists estimate that this flame has been burning for 2,500 years. Based on comparison of historical data, it is likely to be the birthplace of the earliest Olympic flame.
Geologists investigated the cause of the flames and found that in addition to 87 percent methane, the gas ejected from the rock also contained 7.5 to 11 percent hydrogen. According to geologists’ estimates, this gas that has been continuously emerging for 2,500 years is not caused by biological causes such as remains or microorganisms, unlike oil and natural gas. Rather, it is what the mother earth, the earth, continuously provides to us. What is going on?
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How much do you know about hydrogen: Where does so much underground hydrogen come from?
Where does hydrogen come from underground?
This is closely related to the metamorphism of rocks. We know that igneous rocks and sedimentary rocks will undergo metamorphism under high temperature and pressure and transform into metamorphic rocks with completely different properties. Silicate minerals rich in magnesium and iron, such as olivine and pyroxene, will turn into serpentine, brucite, magnetite and other minerals when they interact with water in a high temperature environment. This process is called For serpentinization.
This effect is a chemical reaction that draws large amounts of water into the rock, making the rock less dense. After the reaction is completed, in addition to changes in mineral properties, a by-product, hydrogen, is also produced. If there happens to be carbon dioxide in the formation, it will be further methanized in a high-temperature environment, converting hydrogen and carbon dioxide into methane.
Scientists currently believe that most of the hydrogen and methane produced by non-biological causes in the formation are produced by such a process. It is speculated that the sacred fire of Mount Olympus was created in this way.
For geologists, it also means that the goal of finding natural hydrogen can shift from a blind search to a narrow search for strata that have experienced serpentinization.
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But besides serpentinization, nature has two main ways of producing hydrogen: deep reservoirs and radiolysis of water.
Hydrogen in the Earth
Deep underground, it is speculated that there are large amounts of hydrogen gas. They reach deep underground and may even exist in the mantle and core of the earth.
Of course, our current technology cannot directly explore the center of the earth to mine these gases, but scientists have successively observed from rock drilling results in the United States, Russia, Eastern Europe and other places that the concentration of hydrogen is higher in deeper places. Therefore, geologists speculate that the hydrogen may come from deeper places and is slowly diffusing from the peridotite into rock formations near the surface.
However, because we don’t yet have access to the Earth’s surface, we don’t yet know how this hydrogen forms, even if we know they exist. Some scientists look at the formation process of the entire solar system and speculate that when the primitive earth was formed, hydrogen existed in the entire planet including the core. Others believe that the iron element in the earth’s core reacts with water to form two material forms, iron oxide and iron hydride, storing hydrogen in the earth’s core.
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Let’s wait for earth scientists to give us the answer to this question. Moreover, understanding the form in which these elements exist in the earth’s core and mantle can also solve many unknown mysteries, such as the detailed composition of the earth’s core, the reason for the existence of abnormally low resistance areas in the earth’s mantle, improving the earth’s mantle dynamic model, and finding out Where is Godzilla?
Can radiation also produce hydrogen?
During the long process of decay, radioactive elements such as thorium and uranium in the earth’s crust will slowly break the bonds of water molecules in the formation, forming oxygen and hydrogen. For example, a 1 MeV alpha particle is enough to dissociate 10 water molecules on average. When the rock has higher porosity, alpha particles will have a greater chance of interacting with water molecules, resulting in a higher hydrogen production.
But in fact, considering the speed of decay and the ultra-low content of radioactive elements in the ground, this method is not very efficient. In fact, only 1% of the energy used by alpha particles to dissociate water molecules is consumed, and the remaining energy is It is still absorbed by nearby rock formations and consumed in the form of heat.
In addition to the low yield, theoretically speaking, hydrogen and oxygen should be seen coexisting where radiation occurs, but current field investigations have only found hydrogen. Whether the oxygen is further involved in other reactions, or has escaped, or even if the theory needs to be adjusted, more research is needed.
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Okay, we know how hydrogen is produced, but the point is, how much hydrogen can we use?
How much hydrogen is there underground?
Natural hydrogen gas is found all over the world. By the way, although this map looks like the discovery locations of hydrogen are concentrated in North Asia and Eastern Europe, this is just because the current exploration is concentrated here and does not represent the true distribution of hydrogen.
This hydrogen from the ground is called geological hydrogen. If classified by color, it is called white hydrogen or golden hydrogen. If hydrogen can be mined on the same scale as natural gas, the price of white hydrogen is expected to fall to US$1 per kilogram.
In comparison, other hydrogen production methods, such as the gray hydrogen produced by steam reforming as we mentioned last time, sell for about US$0.9 to US$3.2. Green hydrogen generated from green energy costs US$3 to US$7.5. Therefore, if white hydrogen is officially used in large quantities, it will significantly reduce the current price of hydrogen, and even drive the development of industrial chains such as hydrogen transportation, storage, and power generation units, and jointly reduce the hidden costs of other colors of hydrogen.
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Bill Gates and the Hydrogen Energy Industry
Unlike Musk who is pessimistic about hydrogen energy, Bill Gates not only invests in the development of white hydrogen, but also invests in many hydrogen energy industries.
For example, he invested in Spanish company H2SITE, a company dedicated to hydrogen energy transportation and hydrogen production. Because the cost of transporting hydrogen is three times that of manufacturing hydrogen, if the transportation cost can be reduced, it will help the development of the entire hydrogen industry. In terms of mining, various countries have also begun to invest in the research and development of geological hydrogen research and mining technology.
The US Geological Survey preliminarily estimates that there may be tens of billions of tons of hydrogen hidden underground around the world waiting to be developed, which can meet the energy needs of all mankind for thousands of years. Of course, this number does not take into account the difficulty of development and is simply based on the global stock.
But some people are thinking about changing their mind. Why not inject hot water into iron-rich rock formations to promote the production of more hydrogen? It is similar to the enhanced geothermal system used in geothermal power generation, except that instead of direct heat energy, we obtain hydrogen.
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What? Is hydrogen also a greenhouse gas?
Having said that, will hydrogen really be the savior? Wait a minute, things may not be that simple.
As the lightest gas, hydrogen has a lifespan of only about two years in the atmosphere. However, during the period of time when hydrogen exists, it will interact with hydroxyl radicals and other gases in the atmosphere to produce a series of reactions. The consequences include an increase in the amount of time methane remains in the atmosphere, an increase in ozone, and an increase in water vapor in the stratosphere.
Therefore, hydrogen is an “indirect” greenhouse gas. The 100-year global warming potential of hydrogen, GWP 100, is evaluated as 11.6, that is, based on the interval of 100, the greenhouse effect of hydrogen is 11.6 times that of carbon dioxide.
In addition, we have studied too little about hydrogen, which is why we have only now discovered that it is all around us. And as we mentioned last time, using large amounts of natural gas means there will be many natural gas leaks. As hydrogen is exploited in large quantities, more hydrogen will surely be released into the atmosphere. Whether this will have a negative effect on our atmosphere, or even do more harm than good, requires more research.
Finally, I would like to ask everyone, Musk and Bill Gates have very opposite views on hydrogen energy. And you? Do you think hydrogen will change the future of energy?
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