Six years ago it seemed that almost all wealthy nations were committing to net-zero policies, spending on Hydrogen, Solar, Wind, however many public programs to achieve this have either been scrapped or have had their funding significantly reduced. When President Trump was re-elected, he signed an executive order to withdraw the United States from the Paris Climate Agreement, prioritising economic growth, lower cost of living and U.S. economic dominance.
It must be said, that infrastructure for Green energy production is not cheap, costing 1320% to 400% more than a combined cycle gas turbine, although the cost of renewably sourced energy itself is 70% cheaper in the UK.
Understandably, the low initial return on investing in renewables paired with high construction costs is enough to discourage many private companies from using it to generate electricity, especially when the high cost of energy in the UK is due to government taxation and outdated energy pricing policy.
Whilst other sectors of the economy were able to adapt to net-zero policy with relative ease and speed, aviation was stuck with using traditional fossil fuels, due to the lack of alternatives. Overall, aviation accounts for 22.5% of all CO₂ emissions.
The world’s largest plane manufacturer, Airbus, announced the ZEROe Hydrogen-powered aircraft project in 2020, with them originally aiming for it to enter passenger service by 2035. Although Airbus is still invested in the project, they have pushed their deadline to 2045 and reduced funding by 25%, indicating that the design process will be more arduous than originally expected.
How can electricity be generated from Hydrogen?
Simply put, a hydrogen fuel cell converts the chemical energy store of Hydrogen to electricity, via an electrochemical reaction with oxygen, but to be more specific:
1. Hydrogen Gas (H₂) is supplied to the anode, the electrode where the loss of electrons occurs (oxidisation)
2. At the anode, Hydrogen is split into protons (H⁺) and electrons (e⁻), with the help of platinum as a catalyst, which lowers the activation energy of the reaction, without being used up in it.
2H₂ -> 4H⁺ + 4e⁻
Now that electrons have been released, they flow through an electrical circuit creating a current, which is then used to power the planes fans.
3. The protons (H⁺ Ions), flow through an electrolyte membrane of Nafion, from the anode to the cathode. Nafion contains Sufonic acid groups (A functional group where 1 Sulphur atom is bonded to 3 Oxygen atoms and one of the Oxygens is bonded to Hydrogen) which means any member of the group can dissociate (where compounds break down into their respective ions and/or molecules) in water, to release protons (H⁺ ions) increasing the number of protons, which increases the membranes proton conductivity. Water is needed to facilitate the movement of protons from the anode to the cathode.
-SO₃H→-SO₃⁻+H⁺
The Sufonic Acid dissociates to negatively charged Sulfate ions and positively charge Hydrogen ion.
4. Oxygen from the environment combine with the protons and electrons to form water vapour as a waste product.
4H⁺+4e⁻+O₂→2H₂O
What’s stopping it?
Hydrogen-powered fuel cells produce no pollution in their generation of electricity, only water. Despite these advantages, the infrastructure to generate hydrogen from a renewable source of energy does not exist, is simply too inefficient and too expensive.
Almost all commercial sources of Hydrogen come from the reaction of steam and methane to produce Hydrogen and Carbon Dioxide, which is a greenhouse gas and defeats the process entirely. Some consider using Carbon Capture to store Carbon Dioxide, such as injecting it into empty oil and gas fields, however, we need to empty them first.
Overall, the technology itself is impressive and revolutionary, however counterintuitive infrastructure that relies on fossil fuels to power these Hydrogen fuel cells undermines the point of it.
There were designs and ideas for aircraft with large lithium batteries to supply electricity for flight, however it was quickly discovered that batteries are too heavy and store too little energy for flight.
It appears that there is no real alternative to kerosene, as the laws of physics put dreams of net zero into jeopardy.
If you want to read more technology articles, visit:
- Department for Energy Security and Net Zero & House of Lords ↩︎
- Hannah Ritchie (2024) – “What share of global CO₂ emissions come from aviation?” Published online at OurWorldinData.org. Retrieved from: ‘https://ourworldindata.org/global-aviation-emissions’ [Online Resource] ↩︎
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Cover Image – Airbus SAS 2025 – Image belongs to Copyright Holder.
