even though vehicles that use hydrogen to spin  their wheels have been on the market for years  

the technology is still struggling to gain  traction that could change in the near  

future as the european union and other countries  have committed to expanding their use of green  

hydrogen yes i specifically said green hydrogen  because there are a couple ways of producing it  

and not all of them move us toward the goal of  cutting down on greenhouse gas emissions today the  

most common hydrogen is known as gray hydrogen and  it's created from fossil fuels like in a process  

called steam methane reforming by combining ultra  hot steam with the methane in natural gas and a  

catalyst the water vapor and methane react and  produce hydrogen gas carbon monoxide and some  

carbon dioxide a second step called the water gas  shift reaction uses the carbon monoxide steam and  

another catalyst to extract more hydrogen gas  giving off co2 as a waste product worldwide  

about 95 percent of our hydrogen is gray i think  the problem here is pretty obvious sure you can  

use hydrogen in a fuel cell powered car and only  give off water as a local waste product but if the  

hydrogen was made through steam methane reforming  you're just shifting your carbon emissions from  

your tailpipe to a plant somewhere there is a way  to make the process more eco-friendly by capturing  

the co2 and storing it or using it for other  industrial applications and hydrogen made this  

way is called blue hydrogen still what we're after  is the good stuff the gilt free stuff the green  

stuff hydrogen is the most abundant element in  the universe it's found in this thing called water  

which you may have heard of hydrogen can be pulled  out of said water using electricity in a process  

called electrolysis using electricity from wind  or solar power could vastly cut down on how much  

carbon dioxide the whole process creates hydrogen  made this way is you guessed it green hydrogen of  

course there's a catch green hydrogen is much more  expensive to produce than gray or blue hydrogen  

while a kilogram of green gas goes for about  six dollars today the gray stuff is priced at  

just a buck 60 per kilogram still the european  union imagines natural gas as an important tool  

for getting to net zero carbon emissions by 2050.  by improving electrolyzing machines and reducing  

the cost of renewable energy green hydrogen could  compete with its gray counterpart as soon as 2030  

then it could be applied in transportation  particularly for large vehicles like buses  

trucks and ships where the drawbacks of current  batteries make them less than ideal but hydrogen  

has potential far beyond trucks or boats and  the eu has drawn up a road map of the ways green  

hydrogen could help them hit emissions targets  it could be used to decarbonize the gas grid and  

deliver heat and power around europe adding it to  the grid doesn't require huge upgrades and energy  

producers could convert to use pure hydrogen  essentially hydrogen could be a way to produce  

energy in one place and then transport it for use  or storage somewhere else solving a big problem  

of renewables finally hydrogen could be used in  industrial processes to generate heat or replace  

coal based blast furnaces in steel production  right now steel production is responsible for as  

much as nine percent of global carbon emissions it  all sounds very tempting tempting enough that the  

eu proposed investing billions of dollars in green  hydrogen separately the uk is ramping up their own  

use of hydrogen with buses and trains powered  by the technology just entering service in a few  

trial cities with reimagined transportation and a  converted grid using hydrogen from clean sources  

europe could be a model for the world to follow if  we're hoping to make fossil fuels a thing of the  

past if you want to know more about the promise  of hydrogen fuel check out josh's video here so do  

you think green hydrogen is the answer or is there  another green tech you think will revolutionize  

the world let us know in the comments be sure to  subscribe and i'll see you next time on seeker