Idaho National Laboratory

Advancing the Nuclear

Hydrogen Initiative

Producing Hydrogen with

Nuclear Energy

Why Hydrogen? oxide or other harmful gasses

into the atmosphere. A shift toward hydrogen and away from

petroleum as a transportation

fuel will also reduce U.S. dependence on foreign energy supplies.

Changing the fuel cars and trucks

use has huge potential: the transportation sector now accounts

for 28 percent of U.S. energy

consumption, and transportation

energy use is growing faster than

electricity or heating.

Why Nuclear Hydrogen?

Producing hydrogen requires enormous amounts of electricity and/or

heat. Relying on fossil fuels for the

energy to produce hydrogen would

mean substantial new emissions of

carbon dioxide. Using nuclear energy to produce hydrogen, however,

would involve no CO2

 emissions.

The energy from a single pound of

nuclear fuel could provide the hydrogen equivalent of 250,000 gallons of gasoline without any carbon

emissions.

Creating the Technology

Research is underway on several

methods for hydrogen production

using nuclear energy:

• Electrolysisto split hydrogen from

water using nuclear-generated

electricity.

Continued on back

The energy from a single pound of nuclear

fuel could provide the hydrogen equivalent

of 250,000 gallons of gasoline without any

carbon emissions.

A

jor transportation fuel. The longterm goal of the Department of

Energy’s Hydrogen Fuel Initiative

is to encourage the production of

hydrogen-powered vehicles and

the hydrogen supplies necessary to

fuel them. The Idaho National

Laboratory is taking a leading role

in making this goal a reality.

A shift to a hydrogen economy

would have dramatic environmental and economic benefits.

Hydrogen-powered cars and

trucks would emit no carbon dimajor initiative is underway

in the United States to develop hydrogen into a ma-
Idaho National Laboratory

Continued from front

• Thermochemical cycles that combine heat and chemical processes

to split water into hydrogen and

oxygen.

• Hybrid cycles that combine thermochemical and electrolytic steps.

• High-temperature electrolysis

adding high temperatures to the

electrolysis hydrogen separation

process to increase efficiency.

• Steam methane reforming using

nuclear energy to generate the

heat for the reaction (steam reforming of methane accounts

for almost all hydrogen production today).

INL Is Making it Happen

INL is a leader in moving the hydrogen economy toward reality.

INL’s hydrogen initiative uses INL’s

portfolio of research and applied

engineering capabilities and projects

and its operations infrastructure to

move forward on all aspects of the

hydrogen economy: production,

storage and use.

• Production – INL has research

projects underway on high-temperature electrolysis and thermochemical cycles for water splitting,

The INL is one of the U.S. Department of Energy’s

multiprogram national laboratories, and is

managed by Battelle Energy Alliance, LLC.

For More Information

Technical Contact:

Steve Herring

208-526-9497

J.Herring@inl.gov

Management Contact:

Kathy McCarthy

208-526-9392

Kathryn.Mccarthy@inl.gov

two of the most promising technologies for nuclear hydrogen

production. A new Very High

Termperature Reactor could be

operating at INL around 2015,

producing both electricity and

hydrogen.

• Storage – INL is working on several aspects of hydrogen storage,

including creating storage tanks

that hydrogen cannot permeate,

developing an aqueous solution

allowing a safe and convenient

source of hydrogen on board a

vehicle, and creating new materials to increase the amount of hydrogen that can be stored on a

vehicle.

• Use – INL is involved in research

on fabrication of hydrogen fuel

cells, developing a hydrogen fueling station and hydrogen-powered vehicle testing.

In implementing its hydrogen initiatiive, the INL

uses its research and applied engineering

capabilities and its own and its partners’

operations infrastructure to move forward on

all of the technological underpinnings of the

hydrogen economy.

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