A framework for considering decarbonisation risks emerging from low-carbon hydrogen supply chains

Abstract

Since 2017, more than sixty countries have developed national hydrogen strategies aimed at facilitating the establishment of low-carbon hydrogen supply chains to help national and global decarbonisation goals. However, <1 % of global hydrogen production is low-carbon. Moreover, efforts to scale up hydrogen production and use will confront multiple barriers that could delay decarbonisation outcomes. Government proposals to build a vast infrastructure for producing and consuming low-carbon hydrogen thus carry significant risks to decarbonisation. The extant literature has examined financial and physical risks of proposed hydrogen supply chains. But broader interdisciplinary perspectives on the challenges to achieving decarbonisation via hydrogen lack. In this study, we employ an integrative review (considering literature from diverse fields and many methodologies) to comprehensively identify the risks for national decarbonisation goals posed by emerging low-carbon hydrogen supply chains. Following categories proposed by the IPCC, our review reveals thirty-two risks across seven categories (geophysical, environmental-ecological, technological, economic, socio-cultural, institutional, geopolitical). To increase the framework's value as a decision-making tool, we also suggest illustrative indicators and potential data sources for them, to evaluate the severity of these risks. The framework prompts a shift for hydrogen development discussions away from asking “how” hydrogen contributes to decarbonisation, instead prompting questions of “where” hydrogen can be used with the least risk to reducing emissions around the world.