The Colorado School of Mines and the U.S. Geological Survey have jointly established an industry program to assess the potential of geological hydrogen as a low-emissions alternative energy source.
Geologic hydrogen is a naturally occurring gas that may provide energy to hard-to-abate sectors such as heavy-duty transport or industrial heating. Scientists with the Colorado School of Mines and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) have already started preliminary research on geologic hydrogen, discovering large quantities of the fuel source within rock formations in the United States and around the world.
The industry-supported hydrogen exploration consortium will investigate surface and subsurface technologies to locate the gas beneath the ground and will work to overall advance the understanding of geologic hydrogen systems.
“A major focus of the consortium is developing immediately deployable technologies,” said Yaoguo Li, professor of geophysics at Mines. “There’s a need and desire for exploration technologies that can be applied by industry in the near future to contribute directly to the energy transition, as well as for strategies that can be used by society to tackle the challenges in mitigating climate change for better human life.”
The research will be funded by a number of industry partners, including BP, Chevron, Eden Geopower, Petrobras, Fortescue, Koloma, Hydroma USA, and HyTerra.
The consortium’s research will reportedly focus on the development of four major areas for geologic hydrogen.
The first area will explore a geologic hydrogen system model that explores how to accumulate hydrogen in the subsurface. Along with this goal, researchers plan to refine their understanding of where and how hydrogen exists in the subsurface. Tools will also be developed to image the identified hydrogen systems and uncover accumulations that are economically viable for energy production. Finally, the consortium will use 3D reactive transport modeling to simulate the effects of mass transport on contaminant concentrations in groundwater.
The two organizations emphasize that the project will not be "starting from scratch" -- they will be able to build off of existing research developed from currently-used mineral resources, petroleum, and geothermal energy. Collaborative research between Mines and USGS began in September 2023, and the consortium plans to educate researchers and engineers in the field as research progresses.
“This is the first collaborative effort on geologic hydrogen between a federal agency and academia,” said Mengli Zhang, co-director of the Center for Gravity, Electrical and Magnetic Studies and co-lead of the new joint program for Mines. “With the combined expertise in electromagnetics, gravity, and magnetics in mineral exploration and exploration seismology for natural gas at Mines, we are uniquely positioned to tackle the subsurface exploration research in geologic hydrogen.”
