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It will soon replace old diesel trains in four French regions: Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, Bourgogne-Franche-Comté, Grand Est and Occitanie. Alstom’s hydrogen train is tested on Monday 6 September in Valenciennes. The Minister of Transport, Jean-Baptiste Djebbari, will be present at the demonstration. It is a “clean” train that only rejects water, already on the rails in Germany since 2018. On paper, the means of transport of dreams. Mainly because SNCF has promised to get rid of the 1,000 diesel trains still in circulation by 2035. To replace diesel, hydrogen appears at first glance to be miraculous.
Because it is necessary to imagine that, thanks to a fuel cell, installed on the roof of the train, hydrogen chemically combines with oxygen in the air, which makes it possible to produce electricity, rejecting only water vapor. In this way, we achieved zero carbon trains, capable of traveling 600 km with full autonomy, without the need to carry out works to electrify the lines. It’s a kind of Holy Grail. Mainly because hydrogen has already proven its worth for driving trucks, buses or even taxi fleets. Airbus is even talking about a hydrogen plane for 2035.
Hydrogen, therefore, seems ideal for the development of pollution-free modes of transport. The problem is that the production of this molecule can be more or less polluting. On Earth, pure hydrogen is very scarce. It only exists in traces in the atmosphere. Therefore, it is necessary to recover hydrogen atoms. For this, it is necessary to break other molecules that contain it, whether water molecules or gas, oil or coal molecules. Depending on the method used, one kilo of hydrogen is produced, whose carbon balance varies from 1 to 10.
Today, the hydrogen used by industry in France is produced 95% from fossil fuels, resulting in the emission of 8.7 million tons of CO2 per year, according to data from Ademe, the ecological transition agency. The ideal, to get really clean hydrogen trains or cars, would therefore be to use more “green” hydrogen, that is, made of water molecules that break down by electrolysis with renewable electricity, of solar or wind origin, for example. It’s quite possible, but at the moment it’s a more expensive process. To lower prices, we will have to invest more in this mode of production. But, according to some economists, the cost of producing green hydrogen is expected to drop 85% by 2050.