Why the next energy race is for underground hydrogen - MIT Technology Review [View all]

Olivine minerals like forsterite can interact with groundwater, resulting in hydrogen building up underground. Smithsonian

Why the next energy race is for underground hydrogen

Hydrogen can be used in chemicals and as a green fuel. Vast underground stores could help make it an economical option.

TechnologyReview.com | Casey Crownhart | January 23, 2025

It might sound like something straight out of the 19th century, but one of the most cutting-edge areas in energy today involves drilling deep underground to hunt for materials that can be burned for energy. The difference is that this time, instead of looking for fossil fuels, the race is on to find natural deposits of hydrogen.

Hydrogen is already a key ingredient in the chemical industry and could be used as a greener fuel in industries from aviation and transoceanic shipping to steelmaking. Today, the gas needs to be manufactured, but there’s some evidence that there are vast deposits underground.

I’ve been thinking about underground resources a lot this week, since I’ve been reporting a story about a new startup, Addis Energy. The company is looking to use subsurface rocks, and the conditions down there, to produce another useful chemical: ammonia. In an age of lab-produced breakthroughs, it feels like something of a regression to go digging for resources, but looking underground could help meet energy demand while also addressing climate change.

It’s rare that hydrogen turns up in oil and gas operations, and for decades, the conventional wisdom has been that there aren’t large deposits of the gas underground. Hydrogen molecules are tiny, after all, so even if the gas was forming there, the assumption was that it would just leak out...more
https://www.technologyreview.com/2025/01/23/1110435/geologic-hydrogen/

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