A Picture of Dorian Grey Hydrogen After Oscar Wilde and the Copywriter Contributor to the American Fuel Cell & Hydrogen Energy Association Summer 2023 Lobbying Campaign For America's climate goals, investing in clean energy adds up Days in summer, Basil, are apt to linger But what doesn't add up is additionality requirements And the mind of the thoroughly well-informed man is a dreadful thing. Additionality would be unnecessary and put an unequitable “Yes, there is a gas-fire with asbestos.” burden on America’s domestic clean hydrogen producers About half-past eight I passed by an absurd little theatre, with great flaring gas-jets and gaudy play-bills. America needs clean hydrogen. Shrill flaring gas-jets, dulled and distorted in the fly-blown mirrors that faced them, were ranged round the walls. But additionality doesn't add up. The gas-lamps flickered and became blue, and the leafless trees shook their black iron branches to and fro. Get the facts at ... PAID FOR BY THE AMERICAN FUEL CELL & HYDROGEN ENERGY ASSOCIATION
the pillars are additionality, deliverability, and hourly matching.
So why do we even need those pillars? As you've alluded to, the credits entirely hinges on how the lifecycle of hydrogen or lifecycle emissions of hydrogen are determined, which means that the Biden administration treasury, in collaboration with the OE, EPA, and the White House, will essentially determine how this credit will impact our energy system. But calculating life cycle greenhouse gas emissions can be quite tricky, and the complexity really varies from project configuration to another. So, for example, if you have an AES-Air Products-like project where you have a big electrolyzer not connected to the grids, only powered by renewable energy on-site, easy, that's a zero emissions rate.
However, when you move to a different configuration of electrolyzers that are grid-connected, drawing grid power and buying credits or offsets to net out those emissions, it becomes really complicated. And this is the classic kind of complexity of offset systems.
—Rachel Fakhry, NRDC, in conversation with David Roberts, “We're about to give billions of dollars to clean hydrogen. How should we define it?”