The UK's first hydrogen highway

UK Hydrogen Highways

The M4 in south Wales and south west of England is to be turned into the UK's flagship "hydrogen highway" populated with alternative energy refuelling stations aimed at making hydrogen and electric-powered vehicles a viable alternative to petrol-driven machines.

Hydrogen has always been considered a good alternative to the dwindling, polluting commodities like crude oil and the announcement expected to be made by Welsh ministers is likely to be greeted with joy and optimism from environmentalists, as there are plans to make South Wales a Low Carbon Economic Area (LCEA) for hydrogen and low carbon fuel technologies such as natural gas and bio-methane.

Responding to the announcement expected later today, Gordon James, Director of Friends of the Earth Cymru (Wales), said: "This is excellent news as it will help to reduce emissions of climate changing gases from transport whilst boosting the green economy and creating jobs in Wales.

Renewable refuelling infrastructure

"We are pleased that the Welsh Assembly Government is promising to produce the electricity and hydrogen by means of renewable energy sources, such as wind and tidal power. It is essential that this is done if carbon emissions are to be reduced."

The long-term aim is to create an extensive renewable refuelling infrastructure in the UK, and the hydrogen highway would remove one of the biggest obstacles to the wider adoption of fuel-cell vehicles by addressing the lack of hydrogen fuelling stations.

The hydrogen highway is simply a linked network of hydrogen filling stations suitable for fuel cell vehicles or H2 combustion engine vehicles. As with electricity charging points, the provision of a suitable infrastructure is seen as vital for the market deployment of existing and future fuel cell vehicles such as the Riversimple Urban open source designed car.

Investing ahead of demand

Other examples of similar hydrogen highways in Europe include Norway, where a highway from Oslo to Stavanger covering 600km as part of the broader HyNor project, with 7 fuelling stations, reportedly the longest in the world.

Sweden and Denmark are also constructing wider segments of the Scandinavian Hydrogen Highway Partnership, to link up with Norway. By 2015 the project aims to have 20 main stations and 15 'satellite' stations in operation supporting about 100 buses, 500 cars and 500 speciality vehicles.

However opinion on the use of hydrogen for fuel is not universally positive, many others are sceptical because it is inefficient to produce, expensive to transport and to convert into electricity.

However governments and local authorities, not just in the UK but across Europe, are starting to realise the economic potential behind the fuel cell vehicle market. People will initially find the idea of spending money on something which people currently know and care very little about frustrating, but in cases such as hydrogen for fuel it is important to understand an emerging pattern and invest ahead of demand.

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Daniel Jones

Daniel is a Politics and Philosophy graduate from Cardiff University where he also worked as a section editor on the award winning student newspaper. After university he joined an IT support company where he was a B2B online writer. He loves anything to do with sport and joined GDS in July 2009.

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