Your article (Hydrogen is unsuitable for home heating, review concludes, 27 September) gives an erroneous view of green hydrogen’s role in reaching net zero carbon emissions. One of the alternatives favoured was heat pumps, which increase the demand for grid electricity. It is also impossible to retrofit the 24m properties heated by gas with heat pumps in a sensible timescale. Currently, 27,000 are installed every year and it will take 600 years to replace gas for heat. So heat pumps are not the solution.
By repurposing the gas grid for green hydrogen, as detailed by Northern Gas Networks in the Leeds H21 study, all 24m properties connected to the gas grid can be decarbonised, and gas heating appliances have been developed for safe hydrogen operation. It would be funded through the gas network cost on gas bills, which would increase bills by 4.5%.
The International Energy Agency in 2021 gave the cost of green hydrogen as 3p/kilowatt hour using solar electricity in 2030 – cheaper than the cost of natural gas today. The IEA and the government are right that hydrogen should be a major part of the road to net zero carbon, as it is the only way to decarbonise heating in the next 20 years.
Prof Gordon E Andrews
University of Leeds
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