Will Hydrogen Hubs Make Hydrogen Fuel Mainstream?
Plus a new episode of Transit Unplugged TV from Tulsa, Oklahoma
To keep you on top of the hottest industry trends, this week we not only have our usual new podcast episode, but also a new episode of Transit Unplugged TV coming to you from Tulsa! Over the past couple weeks, you got to hear all about the city, its people, and the amazing Art Deco architecture it’s famous for, now you get to see it all for yourself.
First, let’s dive into our podcast episode this week: All about hydrogen fuel cells and the Hydrogen Hubs Project.
Can hydrogen hubs make hydrogen a mainstream fuel?
Our transition to zero emissions transit is always a hot topic of discussion. One of the zero emissions options that is getting a lot of attention right now is hydrogen and hydrogen fuel cells.
Paul got up close to a fuel cell-powered bus at the CUTA conference in Edmonton and this week we bring you two of the leading figures on the topic, Kirt Conrad CEO of the Stark Area Regional Transportation Authority (SARTA) and Tim Sasseen, Dir. of Market Development and Public Affairs at Ballard Power Systems (leading developer of hydrogen fuel cells).
Kirt and Tim talk about hydrogen as a fuel and how fuel cells work, but more importantly they dive into one of the most important emissions reducing “Earth Shot” projects–building seven hydrogen hubs around the country.
There are some real barriers to hydrogen becoming a mainstream fuel:
- Cost of hydrogen versus fossil fuels
- Generating hydrogen efficiently and at scale
- Generating “green” hydrogen
- Getting hydrogen where it’s needed, inexpensively
None of these are insurmountable, and some great strides have already been made towards tackling them. But if hydrogen is to become the fuel of the future, they have to be solved. And it’s the hydrogen hub project that aims to do just that.
Listen to Kirt and Tim talk with Paul about this tremendously important topic.
We’re not stopping there! We’ve had a lot of episodes of the podcast dedicated to, or talking about, hydrogen over the years. We’ve put a playlist together of ten episodes for you so you can take a deep dive into the topic:
Transit Unplugged Talks Hydrogen.
We also wrote a post explaining how hydrogen fuel cells work, the challenges generating green hydrogen, and the science behind it all.
Check out our first edition of Transit Unplugged Transit Science.
Let’s Explore Tulsa and Route 66 on Transit Unplugged TV
Tulsa is on track to take the transit world by storm with expanded BRT (Bus Rapid Transit) lines–including on historic Route 66–extremely popular microtransit, and merging microtransit and paratransit to give everyone better access to transportation.
But there’s more than transit to Tulsa.
From the amazing food at The Mother Road Market to the kitsch of Buck Atom Cosmic Curios, Tulsa is a place where Americana is woven into the entire landscape.
Watch the episode now on YouTube and don’t forget to subscribe!
????Coming up on Transit Unplugged: The bright future for autonomous vehicles
Next week on Transit Unplugged we have another podcast episode swap with another great transit podcast: The Future of Mobility. Host Brandon Bartneck has been a guest on the show (and Paul has been a guest there), but today we bring you a special episode on autonomous vehicles (AV) originally broadcast on his podcast.
Brandon sits down with AV visionary and pioneer Larry Burns to talk about what the future holds for AVs and where they might do the most good.
Follow us wherever you listen to podcasts so you don’t miss a single episode.
