减少碳排放，就用这把瑞士军刀 | 盖茨笔记

When most people picture greenhouse gas emissions, they think about cars and electricity. That’s because they turn keys, press buttons, and flip switches every day. The good news is, we already have ways to decarbonize these types of emissions (solar, wind, and nuclear power and lithium ion batteries). The bad news is, they add up to only about one third of the total.

大多数人在想象温室气体排放时，脑海中浮现的往往是汽车和电力。这是因为他们每天都在转动钥匙，按下按钮，拨弄开关。好消息是，我们已经找到了使这些排放物脱碳的方法（太阳能、风能、核能和锂离子电池）。坏消息是，它们加起来的碳排量只占总量的三分之一。

The other two thirds—almost 35 billion tons—are much harder for most people to see. For example, we all use products made of cement, plastic, and steel, but most of us don’t manufacture them or load them onto cargo ships. To zero out emissions on these products, we need new technologies. Enter clean hydrogen. It has so many potential uses that some people refer to it as the Swiss Army Knife of decarbonization.

余下的三分之二（将近350亿吨）碳排放量，更难被大多数人看到。例如，我们都在使用由水泥、塑料和钢铁制成的产品，而我们中的大多数人并没有参与产品制造过程或将其装入货船。为了消除这些产品产生的碳排放，我们需要新技术——引入清洁氢。氢的潜在用途如此之多，以至于有些人将其称为脱碳领域的瑞士军刀。

1

  What hydrogen can do

氢可以用来做什么

The world already uses 70 million tons of hydrogen each year as a chemical in some manufacturing processes like making fertilizer. Today, nearly all that hydrogen is produced from fossil fuels. If we make that hydrogen clean, we eliminate the 1.6 percent of global emissions that it is responsible for now.

世界每年的氢用量已经多达7000万吨，其被广泛用作化学品，参与化肥制造等生产过程。如今，几乎所有生产中使用的氢都来自化石燃料。如果我们能让它变成清洁能源，我们就能消除目前由其产生的占全球总量1.6%的碳排放。

But that’s just the beginning. Hydrogen is pure, reactive chemical energy. If we can bring the cost down far enough and make enough of it, we can also start using clean hydrogen to replace fossil fuels in all sorts of other industrial processes, including important ones like making plastic and steel, liquid fuels, and even food. (It’s called the Swiss Army Knife for a reason.)

但这只是个开始。氢能是纯粹、活泼的化学能源。如果我们能够把成本降得足够低，并生产出足够多的氢，我们可以开始在其他各种工业制造过程中使用清洁氢来替代化石燃料，包括制造塑料和钢铁、液体燃料、甚至食品等重要的工业过程。（氢能被称为瑞士军刀是有道理的。）

In addition, clean hydrogen opens the door to all sorts of possibilities beyond industry. For example, as more and more electricity comes from variable sources, the world will have to get better at balancing energy supply and demand so we don’t go dark when the sun isn’t shining or the wind isn’t blowing. Electricity can be converted into hydrogen through a process called electrolysis, then stored for months at a time, and finally converted back into electricity when it’s needed.

此外，清洁氢能还提供了除工业之外的各种可能性。例如，随着越来越多的电力来自可变来源，世界将不得不更好地平衡能源供应和需求，这样我们才不会在没有阳光或者没有风时陷入黑暗。电能可以通过一个叫做电解的过程转化为氢能，一次性储存数月，最后在需要时再转化为电能。

Another potential use for hydrogen lies in heavy-duty transport. Battery-electric vehicles work great for passenger transportation and trucking over shorter distances, but aviation, shipping, and long-distance trucking remain a challenge. And together they account for 8 percent of global emissions. Clean hydrogen has the potential to provide a net-zero solution for moving cargo around the world.

氢能的另一个潜在用途是重型运输。纯电动汽车在短途客运和货运方面表现出色，但在空运、水运和长途货运领域仍然面临着挑战。这些运输过程加起来产生的碳排量可占全球排放总量的8%。清洁氢可以为全球货运提供一个净零碳排放的解决方案。

So in theory, clean hydrogen can do a lot of things we need to do urgently. And governments in many European countries, Australia, Japan, and the United States have ambitious plans for using it to decarbonize their economies. But how do we make hydrogen clean in practice?

从理论上讲，清洁氢可以在很多亟待解决的领域发挥作用。许多欧洲国家，以及澳大利亚、日本和美国的政府都制定了雄伟计划，利用其实现经济脱碳。但如何制造出清洁氢能呢？

2

  How to make hydrogen clean

如何使氢变为清洁能源

Innovators are working on several different technologies, some of which are more mature than others.

创新者正在研究几种不同的技术，其中一些相对更为成熟。

One option is to use solar, wind, or nuclear power to turn water into hydrogen and oxygen. This process, known as electrolysis, was invented in 1800 using the first-ever battery that had just been invented by Alessandro Volta. More than two centuries later, the same basic principle may be the key to massive clean hydrogen production. There are four different electrolyzer technologies being developed, and the price of each one needs to go down to make electrolyzed hydrogen cost-competitive.

一种选择是利用太阳能、风能或核能将水分解为氢气和氧气。这个过程被称为电解，该技术诞生于1800年，使用的是亚历山德罗·伏特刚刚发明的电池。两个多世纪后，同样的基本原理可能成为大规模生产清洁氢能的关键。目前有四种不同的电解技术正处于开发过程中，但每种技术的价格都需要降低，以保证电解氢的成本价格具有竞争力。

Another option is to produce hydrogen using the current methods that burn fossil fuels and then capture the CO2 produced in the process before it’s released in the atmosphere. It may never be economical to capture 100 percent of the carbon released using incumbent technologies, but while we’re waiting for thousands of industrial facilities to retrofit their infrastructure, carbon capture can help drive emissions way down.

另一种选择是沿用目前燃烧化石燃料的方法，在制造过程中产生的二氧化碳被排放到大气中之前捕获它们。使用现有技术百分之百捕获排放的碳可能永远都做不到经济廉价，但在等待成千上万的工业设施进行基础设施改造的过程中，碳捕获有助于我们降低碳排量。

Other clean hydrogen technologies are further away.

其他清洁氢能技术更为遥远。

Methane (CH4) is the primary fossil fuel used to produce hydrogen now. When it reacts with water (H2O) at a high temperature, both H2 and CO2 are produced. However, through a different heating process that happens in the absence of oxygen, called pyrolysis, it’s possible to separate the hydrogen atoms and leave just solid carbon—think of the lead in a pencil.

甲烷（CH4）是目前用于制氢的主要化石燃料。当它与水（H2O）在高温下发生反应时，会同时产生氢气（H2）和二氧化碳（CO2）。然而，通过采取一种没有氧气参与的加热方法，该过程被称为热解，则有可能分离出氢原子，并留下固体碳——想象一下，它们就像铅笔中的铅一样。

Finally, there are reserves of hydrogen in geologic formations around the world, and in theory geologic hydrogen has the potential to provide a vast supply of affordable, zero-emissions hydrogen. Scientists are still in the early stages of researching ways to find and extract geologic hydrogen from natural reserves.

最后，全球的地质构造中都有氢储量。理论上，地下氢有可能提供大量可负担且零碳排放的氢。科学家们仍处于研究如何从自然储备中发现和提取地下氢的早期探索阶段。

3

  Making clean hydrogen cheap

使清洁氢能更便宜

So the potential of clean hydrogen is tantalizing, and its necessity is becoming clearer every day. Take Russia’s war in Ukraine, which has made hydrogen not just a climate change issue but also an energy security issue. The EU has already announced its intention to produce and import 20 million tons of green hydrogen by 2030, enough to reduce its dependence on Russian natural gas imports by at least a third.

可见，清洁氢能的潜力是诱人的，其必要性也日益凸显。以俄乌冲突为例，这场冲突使得氢能不仅关乎气候变化问题，也关乎能源安全问题。欧盟已经宣布，计划到2030年，生产和进口2000万吨绿色氢能，这足以使其对俄罗斯天然气进口的依赖程度降低至少三分之一。

But hydrogen faces the same challenge as just about every other clean technology: Can we get the price down far enough, fast enough? If people have to pay too much to be green, change will happen too slowly. But if we get the Green Premiums down near zero, there is a chance to build a prosperous net-zero economy. It’s going to take a big push for collaboration between business and governments, which, together, can make innovation happen much faster than usual by being aggressive with investments and policies.

然而，氢能面临着与其他几乎所有清洁技术一样的挑战：我们能否把价格降得足够低，足够快？如果人们必须为环保付出过多代价，改变将进行得极其缓慢。但如果我们能将绿色溢价降至接近零的水平，我们就有机会建立起繁荣的净零经济。这将需要大力推动企业和政府之间的合作，通过积极的投资和政策，使创新相较以往更快地发生。

Breakthrough Energy, the climate initiative I helped start, is supporting the commercialization of clean hydrogen in many ways. The Breakthrough Energy Fellows program funds innovators working on early stage ideas. Breakthrough Energy Ventures invests in companies working on clean hydrogen. And the Breakthrough Energy Catalyst program speeds up the time to market for clean hydrogen, among other climate technologies.

我帮助发起的气候倡议“突破能源”，正在以多种方式支持清洁氢技术的商业化。突破能源研究员计划资助那些致力于早期想法转化的创新者们。突破能源风险投资公司投资制造清洁氢的公司。在众多气候技术中，突破能源催化剂项目缩短了清洁氢产品的上市时间。

The more everyone gets excited about the many benefits of clean hydrogen, the faster businesses and governments will put in the work to make it a real alternative to fossil fuels. That’s how we avoid a climate disaster.

人们对清洁氢的诸多好处越感到兴奋，企业和政府就会越快促使其成为化石燃料的真正替代品。这就是我们避免气候灾难的方法。