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Our podcast features special guests and leaders discussing the many projects, partnerships, and innovations driving hydrogen adoption — starting in the Edmonton Metro Region, and expanding outward to Alberta, Canada, and the World.
Edmonton Region Hydrogen HUB is a collaborative initiative dedicated to advancing a thriving hydrogen economy in the Edmonton Region and beyond. Bringing together municipalities, industry, and associations, the HUB focuses on building a robust hydrogen value chain through collaboration, system integration, and policy advocacy. Leveraging the region’s world-class hydrogen production facilities and strategic infrastructure, the HUB drives innovation, promotes decarbonization, and stimulates economic growth, positioning the Edmonton region as a global leader in sustainable hydrogen development.
Welcome to the Hydrogen 2.0 podcast where Alberta's energy story evolves. Join us as we explore what's changed, what's working, and what's next from Edmonton to beyond. Here's your host, Kessia Kopecky
Kessia:Welcome back to Hydrogen 2.0 . This is the continued side of our topic with Larry and Dan about pipelines in the Edmonton region's ecosystem, Hydrogen Ecosystem. So, Dan, Larry, thanks so much for coming back. We're just gonna get right back into it. Everything comes with its risk.
Larry:Certainly.
Kessia:Right? And it's about, I guess, from from what I'm gathering from you too, it's the work that you do order to mitigate it, understand it.
Larry:There's no growth without risk.
Kessia:Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. And I think this day and age as well, it's, you know, like, they often say the safety handbooks are written in blood.
Larry:And that's true.
Kessia:And I think with that as well, from my perspective, I'm not a technical person or an engineer, but that goes to show that, you know, from other industries, other energy sectors or subsectors, we've been learning lessons as well with that. Right? Right. So that should mean as well that with hydrogen, you're really ticking every box, crossing every t, dotting every I.
Larry:That's why it's taking so long to get it out there. Mean, we can we can store hydrogen in small, storage vessels to power vehicles or, you know, trucks or or what have you and buses even. But the real and I hate I hate to be the guy that keep coming back to economics on this, but it's what powers our world. Make no mistake. If there's no money in it, no one's gonna do it, period.
Larry:That's just the way we that's just the way it is. There are environmental benefits for sure, but you have to weigh that against what we know and what we're comfortable with and the level of exploration along the hydrogen route. Like, I love the idea of hydrogen powering all the plants in Fort Mac, all the things that we can do it, but I'm still not convinced that my house will ever have hydrogen coming to it. Like, I'm I'm not I'm not there yet until I see that, you know, my family's gonna be safe and there aren't gonna be any issues.
Kessia:Yeah.
Larry:And undergoing the same level of testing that natural gas has. Mhmm. To have that, that's I use natural gas every day in my house. Furnish, especially here in Alberta. You know, we didn't have natural gas.
Larry:We'd be life in Alberta would be much different than what it is right now, and I'd probably be a snowbird because I wouldn't there's very little about Alberta's climate in the wintertime that's attractive, especially to a golfer. But we just you know, and Alberta's it will ring our own tune here, but Alberta is, you know, safety. You know, pipeline issues happen. Things happen in SAGD. All kinds of things happen in our industry that that aren't, you know, glorious and and and, you know, everyone's smiling and happy all the time.
Larry:Things happen all the time. But it's through those experiences and through the and and through through those experiences that, you know, we can we can learn and adapt to make sure that going forward that we've reduced that the risk. Yeah. And that's what this is all about. It's about risk reduction.
Dan:And So Sorry.
Kessia:Oh, go ahead.
Dan:I just wanted to add the the comment about the safety handbook is written in blood. I I think that we have we've come a long way. And like I mentioned earlier, we've we've got this really strong foundation on how we how we run pipelines and and how we ensure public safety. And this jump is going to be more incremental than what we had to learn at the start of operating pipelines. And so the the responsibility that we have now as the engineers working on this is that it is not written in blood, it's going to be written Yeah.
Dan:In failures in the lab Exactly. Are well contained within a bunker and do not affect anyone because our our duty is to members of the public and and making sure that Mhmm. Whenever we, you know, affirm that something would be safe, we've done everything that we can to to convince ourselves that that is in fact true. Mhmm. But the the second part that you kind of touched on is public trust is this whole other aspect to hydrogen adoption that that needs to be addressed too.
Dan:I think Larry and I have focused a bit more on the the technical aspect so far, but public trust is very important. When I tell, you know, my family members that aren't necessarily in the space what I'm what I'm up to, I I've gotten all kinds of responses about, you know, what what hydrogen would mean. Some people have asked, you know, are we heating our homes using the same principles as the hydrogen bomb, which is of course not true. We're just burning it. We're not doing anything nuclear.
Dan:But but it matters.
Larry:That's gonna be in my in people's mind. Yeah. They're they're they're gonna hydrogen. Hydrogen bomb.
Dan:And so Bang. We have to we have to communicate properly, you know, what we intend to do with this, how it's going to be used, and what we've done to look into its safe use. And and that is a whole another challenge than the technical reports that we're cranking out about these, you know, very specific findings that we present at a conference to a very already informed group of people. Public Yeah. Communication is is much more difficult.
Kessia:And that challenge, I think, when it comes to public perception is something that's at least for pipelines, maybe we can talk a little bit more about, you know, where what the current state is and where it relates to pipelines, but that topic on public reception and the importance of it, that might be down the road, right? Like, if we're not deploying it and delivering it to putting it into pipelines, transporting it, delivering it places, and using it yet.
Larry:But in the same sense, it's gonna make it much easier down the road if we're sharing that information along Mhmm. The road. So, you know, we can't in ten years, we can't say, okay. We figured it out. We're going to wire some, you know, we're going to send some pipes to your house.
Larry:It's going be carrying hydrogen. You're going do this, this, this. It's going be just like your natural gas. But it just makes more sense as as a citizen. If I'm part of the process, it makes it much more easier for me to accept knowing what's been done over the last ten, fifteen years to make it safe.
Larry:I'm not I'm not gonna go down the whole politics side of things, but I don't believe 100% what I'm told. So I need to see, I need to feel, and I need to see results. I don't I don't wanna just be told that this is safe. Take your family out in this hydrogen powered car. And I'm sure they're all safe.
Larry:The ones that are on the floor here, I'm sure they're all great. But I'm not taking anyone's word for it. I need to see the research just like you would if you were trying a new anything. Like, we'll use in in in again, it's Ozempic. It's a epidemic in the world right now.
Larry:What makes people think that that's safe for them? And and I'm sure it is or else it wouldn't be approved, but it's a much easier process if you bring people along for the ride as opposed to when you get to the bus stop, say, okay. Get off. You're good to go. So I think that that needs to be a more broad it needs to be more broadly shared with with the people we hope are gonna use this.
Larry:You know, the hydrogen bus, I think there's one or two.
Dan:I think the city's running a bit of fleet.
Larry:Oh, they got some more
Dan:than okay. They're also on this podcast. So Yeah.
Larry:No. I I love the idea of of so on the in the larger scales like the buses and the and the trains perhaps or industry, I'm all for it. There's ways that we can make that safer, but I'm on even on a bus. Someone's gonna step on to that hydrogen powered bus. What inform they're they're just assuming that it's safe.
Larry:They're not doing the research on that thing. They don't they probably wouldn't even recognize it unless it's got it on the side that
Kessia:it's on I think, like, it kinda goes to show the field that you've chosen to to base your profession in. Right? It's it's about that really looking into the data and You you have to. Really understanding it.
Larry:And the onus is on you as a as a citizen. You can't you know, and and I'm certainly I'm digging digging myself a hole here, but you cannot take the word of anyone when it comes to safety. You if if you do, I mean, if the risks everyone we all take risks. I mean, just you don't have to go to engineer become an engineer to understand this. Mhmm.
Larry:But spend the spend the time to to learn where industry is going. If your kids are stepping on that bus, understand, yeah, they have done it.
Kessia:So come to the Canadian High
Larry:in this industry are astounding. Mhmm. They really are.
Kessia:Dan, you look like you have something that you wanna add to this topic.
Dan:Yeah. So on on the public perception front, I I don't disagree with Larry's style of of being a very informed citizen, but that's not always going to be the case. And it's not everything that you need for public acceptance of certain ideas, but I think that pilot programs like the bus fleet in Edmonton and the the work that Enbridge and Gazette Fair are doing out east, where they have a small pilot project, where hydrogen is going to homes to heat them. Those kinds of things are very important in terms of bringing the public along for the ride because they're going to see that the city had this fleet of hydrogen buses, and, you know, that that went well and that there were no major incidents. Same with these homes being heated.
Dan:It's a very small blend. It's not it's not a major amount. They can certainly do more technically, but they just wanna start small to start gaining that trust, getting people used to seeing this in operation, and more importantly, setting this history of safe performance. Because now it's not this change being flipped upon society one day, with a bunch of questions raised about how do we even get here. It's it's incremental changes and small demonstrations where now there's kind of years of data of these buses, these homes, things operating safely.
Kessia:Perfect. Okay. So now I'd like to switch gears a little bit. Kind of, I guess, circling back into maybe this economic current state for pipelines, how it relates to the hydrogen economy. So my understanding is that we're still very much in that testing phase and that innovation phase with pipelines.
Kessia:Is there anything that you can tell me, either of you, about the current state of this, how it might relate to the bigger picture? And if also while you're talking and thinking out loud at me, tell me if you're seeing any stories or associations with what we can learn from around the world.
Larry:I think that's Daniel's purview right there, I think.
Dan:Okay. So kinda being more focused on the the developmental side of of this story, we are seeing still a lot of interest in in exploring, you know, different aspects of of transporting hydrogen pipeline specifically on my end. My my scope doesn't exactly cover vehicles or or kind of end users. We're more on the transportation side, but we're still seeing a lot of people looking into this problem. But but you're right.
Dan:They're not they're not at commercialization yet. They just wanna be sure that they're ready for when that happens. So they're they're currently investing or being supported by grants to do work like this so that, when the time comes, they they would be ready to make more informed decisions. I I think I see the the transportation industry is is probably a little bit further along than than pipelines at the moment. You know, there's there's a real truck that that has been modified to work that's on the showroom floor.
Dan:There are fueling stations that are ready. I believe we've opened one in Edmonton. So, you know, they're they're further along for sure on on that front with hydrogen fuel cells and everything like that. But eventually, once they get to a certain point, they're going to need pipelines in a more stable supply so that they can grow to the next stage. And so it's gonna kinda be incremental.
Dan:I think on on one of your previous episodes, someone mentioned like chicken and egg is discussed as an issue in this in this industry, and then they they went further to say that it's not just the chickens, it's the whole farm, it kinda. So I I like that analogy a lot. It's yeah. We're all at kind of different stages in development. Most of us kind of still developing a a basis to build upon, but we're all going to kind of take steps up together, I think.
Larry:And just on another just to completely agree, let's talk about for a second testing and the limitations. So we we don't have the ability to just, like we do with oil and gas, to create the the circumstances situation. It's it's very difficult to test hydrogen. Large scale tests are very difficult. They're very destructive.
Larry:Even small scale tests, it's very difficult to find and to build the equipment needed to test hydrogen the way you that and and I've experienced this myself, and, you know, we don't have to go too far deep into that. But it's difficult because it's such a new thing. I mean, it and there's lots of people here who've been at it for a long time, and they'll disagree that it's new, but it's new to the public. And it's very you know, testing is those parameters need to be need to be established so that they can be repeated over and over and over again to test results. I mean, you can't you can't take a small sample size and say that, well, this is the way things are.
Larry:Well, no. Because there's other impurities that have to be tested. There's other this. There's other blends. There's there's all kinds of things that have to be tested that we simply don't have the ability to test accurately.
Larry:So the I think to some degree and, you know, I hate to be the guy that's worried about safety all the time. Most people that know me probably wouldn't agree with that's where my my world is, but it it is it is something that, you know, that we have to the facilities like CFIR, and the Hydrogen Centre of Excellence. I mean, those are the types of places where we have to establish those benchmarks. We have to have the ability to test at small scale and then take it, you know, out to the field and blow shit up. Like, that's just that's how things are done.
Larry:But it's we're still limited.
Kessia:So how are you limited? What do you need in order to be able to do these things and do these tests when you're saying we still have to do this? There's things stopping us. Can you be specific?
Larry:The and I'll just talk about my own space because, really, I don't know about anybody else's space. Yeah. So even small scale tests like just testing little coupons, you know, a couple inches by a couple inches in a proper setting where we can blast it at temperature and at pressure to really get down to the minutiae and and at a molecule level to find out what's happening between, say, coatings and carbon steel, say what's happening between corroded areas of the pipe and this and the hydrogen permeation. In some cases, the the corrosion itself acts as a better block than the carb the new carbon steel. So there's a lot of weird things that go on when it comes to hydrogen.
Larry:And I think that there's we're very we're still limited. I mean, people are still looking at hydrogen with the gold you know, with the rose colored glasses on. I mean, it is a root for sure, but we're not we're just not ready for large scale. And small, you know, 5% blends, fantastic. We can do that all day.
Kessia:That's it for today's episode of Hydrogen 2.0 . If you are looking to learn more about the Edmonton region's hydrogen economy, learn more about the Edmonton region hydrogen hub, or get in touch with us, you can visit hydrogen.ca or send us an email at hello@hydrogen.ca. Also, feel free to follow us on LinkedIn, the Edmonton Region hydrogen hub, to stay up to date on all the news and all the activities happening in our hydrogen economy.