RC104 JanFeb2023 - Magazine - Page 34
ENERGY
AN EMERGING RESOURCE
Hydrogen’s important role in Canada’s energy transition
by Satvinder Flore
ANADA IS FACING PRESSURE to reduce its reliance on fossil
fuels, and quickly. Like the rest of the world, we are
facing a climate reality that will have devastating
future consequences if we do not take serious steps
towards drastically reducing our overall carbon
footprint.
The success of this transition depends on us making a
difference by using the technologies we have available to
us today, while continuing to develop future energy solutions that can further lower our emissions in the years and
decades ahead. It is a balance, but a very important one, as
we can’t rely on a ‘silver bullet’-low-emissions technology
that will eliminate the need for fossil fuels.
This is why the burgeoning hydrogen economy is such
a valuable part of the energy transition. It is not a solution
that will eliminate our reliance on carbon-emitting fuels,
but it is one of the solutions that can help us with significant emissions reductions.
But before we go too far into the weeds on how we
embrace and ramp up hydrogen, let’s take a moment to
appreciate the challenge we’re up against.
C
Satvinder Flore
is the executive vice
president, Energy,
Resources, and Industry,
at WSP in Canada.
34 RENEW CANADA — JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2023
The challenge
In advance of 2021’s COP26 in Glasgow, Scotland, which
I had the good fortune of attending, the International
Energy Association stated that 25 per cent of our global
energy production needs to come from hydrogen for us to
meet our Paris and post-Glasgow targets. That is a huge
undertaking. Here’s why.
According to statistics released by the U.S. Energy
Information Administration in August 2022, global oil
production currently sits at just over 100 million barrels
of oil per day. That translates to roughly 1200 barrels
per second. Based on the COP26 target, if oil production
doesn’t increase in the next 13 years, that means we
would need to produce the equivalent of 300 barrels of
oil, per second, worth of hydrogen just to replace oil. To
put this in perspective, the equivalent displaced barrels
currently being produced by commercial hydrogen are
precisely zero.
Consider the development of green hydrogen. Green
hydrogen is, for the most part, derived from solar and
wind production. Those two technologies, which represent
RENEWCANADA.NET
GOVERNMENT OF CANADA
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz (left) recently signed onto a major energy project that will see a green energy hydrogen
project, powered by wind turbines, built in Western Newfoundland.
