Centrica PLC (LSE:CNA) boss Chris O’Shea has accused net-zero minister Grant Shapps of jumping the gun with claims that hydrogen may not be used instead of gas to heat homes en masse.
Responding to Shapps’ comments in Parliament last week that hydrogen was better suited for replacing natural gas in industry than in homes, O’Shea argued we need to wait for results from trials.
“Suggestions that hydrogen is unlikely to be part of the solution for home heating [..] risks undermining the energy transition and increasing the costs for everyone,” O’Shea said.
“We have expertise here,” he continued, adding the UK risked falling into the “trap” of believing heat pumps were the only viable replacement for heating households.
Calls have repeatedly been made for hydrogen to be used to wean households off natural gas, which currently heats 74% of UK homes, as per census data.
Previous hints have also been made that new-build homes could have hydrogen-ready boilers fitted as standard from 2026, ahead of the fuel being blended into gas mains.
Hydrogen is cleaner to burn than natural gas, in terms of carbon emissions, though concerns have been raised over production given lifetime emissions are only low if it is produced with renewable energy, what's known as green hydrogen.
Questions have also been asked about the likely high costs of replacing existing pipelines to carry hydrogen, as well as the need for higher volumes of the fuel, given it is less energy dense than natural gas.
These were among the points Shapps made last week.
“There was a time when people thought you will just have something that looks like a gas boiler and we’ll feed hydrogen into it,” he said.
“The problem with that is that you’d have to replace a lot of piping and of course we’ve got to produce the green hydrogen to make the whole thing stack up.”
O’Shea urged that the UK should be “proactive” on hydrogen though, warning that by “dragging our heels” the economic price of transitioning would be higher.