Atlantic Council GLOBAL ENERGY CENTER
I S SU E B R I E F MARCH 2023
Can Hydrogen Fuel Reduce Aviation’s Climate Impact? BY JOSEPH WEBSTER INTRODUCTION
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s the United States looks to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions, lowering its carbon footprint will require an all-of-the-above strategy across multiple sectors. Decreasing aviation-sector emissions will be critical to ensuring the United States reaches its emissions goals. Indeed, the aviation sector accounts for about 720 million tons of energy-related carbon emissions, and world demand for jet travel has increased nearly continuously for decades, with the important exception of during the COVID-19 pandemic.1 With the worst of the pandemic seemingly in the rearview mirror, however, passenger throughput is rebounding. Reducing the aviation sector’s greenhouse gas emissions will require a transition to new energy resources. Liquid hydrogen fuel (H2) has emerged as a promising alternative to conventional jet fuel. Alternative clean energy options for aviation, such as batteries and sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), exist but have limitations. Several analysts have identified clean ammonia, which is produced from hydrogen and nitrogen via clean electricity, as a potential alternative to liquid hydrogen. However, this study assumes that the latter will prevail in the fuel competition, as the overwhelming majority of technical aviation experts interviewed by the author believe that liquid H2 will ultimately be adopted by the industry. With few alternative technologies available for systematic decarbonization of the aviation sector, it is imperative that policymakers closely examine hydrogen’s role in aviation decarbonization.
The Global Energy Center promotes energy security by working alongside government, industry, civil society, and public stakeholders to devise pragmatic solutions to the geopolitical, sustainability, and economic challenges of the changing global energy landscape.
Several challenges will need addressing over the next ten years or more before the industry can begin to convert to, or partially switch to, hydrogen. Engineers must design planes to accommodate hydrogen; hydrogen-fuel infrastructure, although growing in the United States, must expand further to support hydrogen jet fuel needs at scale; and additional hydrogen uses, such as long-haul trucking, would improve the economic case. This issue brief will examine these challenges, and the policy solutions needed for including aviation in the nascent hydrogen economy and energy transition.
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ATLANTIC COUNCIL
“Aviation,” International Energy Agency, September 2022, https://www.iea.org/reports/aviation.
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