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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Energy Res.
Sec. Hydrogen Storage and Production
Volume 12 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fenrg.2024.1473383
This article is part of the Research Topic Climate Implications of Hydrogen Energy Systems View all articles

Environmental Life-Cycle Analysis of Hydrogen Technology Pathways in the United States

Provisionally accepted
Amgad Elgowainy Amgad Elgowainy *Pradeep Vyawahare Pradeep Vyawahare *Clarence Ng Clarence Ng *Ed Frank Ed Frank Adarsh Bafana Adarsh Bafana *Andrew Burnham Andrew Burnham *Pingping Sun Pingping Sun *Uisung Lee Uisung Lee *Hao Cai Hao Cai *Krishna Reddi Krishna Reddi *Michael Wang Michael Wang *
  • Argonne National Laboratory (DOE), Lemont, United States

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Hydrogen is a zero-carbon energy carrier with potential to decarbonize industrial and transportation sectors, but its life-cycle greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions depend on its energy supply chain and carbon management measures (e.g., carbon capture and storage). Global support for clean hydrogen production and use has recently intensified. In the United States, Congress passed several laws that incentivize the production and use of renewable and lowcarbon hydrogen, such as the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL) in 2021 and the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) in 2022, which provides tax credits of up to $3/kg depending on the carbon intensity of the produced hydrogen.A comprehensive life-cycle accounting of GHG emissions associated with hydrogen production is needed to determine the carbon intensity of hydrogen throughout its value chain. In the United States, Argonne's R&D GREET® (Greenhouse Gases, Regulated emissions, and Energy use in Technologies) model has been widely used for hydrogen carbon intensity calculations. This paper describes the major hydrogen technology pathways considered in the United States and provides data sources and carbon intensity results for each of the hydrogen production and delivery pathways using consistent system boundaries and most recent technology performance and supply chain data.

    Keywords: Hydrogen production, life-cycle analysis, GHG emissions, carbon intensity, Inflation Reduction Act, United States

    Received: 30 Jul 2024; Accepted: 26 Sep 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Elgowainy, Vyawahare, Ng, Frank, Bafana, Burnham, Sun, Lee, Cai, Reddi and Wang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence:
    Amgad Elgowainy, Argonne National Laboratory (DOE), Lemont, United States
    Pradeep Vyawahare, Argonne National Laboratory (DOE), Lemont, United States
    Clarence Ng, Argonne National Laboratory (DOE), Lemont, United States
    Adarsh Bafana, Argonne National Laboratory (DOE), Lemont, United States
    Andrew Burnham, Argonne National Laboratory (DOE), Lemont, United States
    Pingping Sun, Argonne National Laboratory (DOE), Lemont, United States
    Uisung Lee, Argonne National Laboratory (DOE), Lemont, United States
    Hao Cai, Argonne National Laboratory (DOE), Lemont, United States
    Krishna Reddi, Argonne National Laboratory (DOE), Lemont, United States
    Michael Wang, Argonne National Laboratory (DOE), Lemont, United States

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