Hydrogen 'no silver bullet', warn Scottish Greens

Scottish Government plans for a ‘hydrogen economy’ shows an over reliance on the fossil fuel sector and technologies that haven’t been developed yet to provide an emergency response to the climate crisis, the Scottish Greens have warned.

In a statement to MSPs, Energy minister Paul Wheelhouse pledged to press on with a move to hydrogen energy, even though he conceded it was not yet known how it could integrate with the gas grid.

Commenting, Scottish Greens energy spokesperson Mark Ruskell said: “It is right for the Scottish Government to explore all options to lower carbon emissions, but hydrogen is far from a silver bullet.

“Clean, green, hydrogen energy is better than from the fantasy of ‘blue hydrogen’, proposed by the oil and gas sector, but it is a technology that is still some way off. With only nine years left until climate science tells us is a point of no return, we simply don’t have time to wait to become early adopters of a new technology.

“Instead of expecting the oil and gas sector to manage their own transition, we need to maximise the technology we have and realise Scotland’s huge potential in wind and tidal energy and create thousands of jobs there.”