The groundbreaking hydrogen discovery in northeastern France last year is reigniting interest in a long-overlooked source of clean energy—natural hydrogen. At a moment when the bets on hydrogen for transportation are severely off the table, scientists have started mapping vast amounts of mineable hydrogen and laid out the challenges for exploitation methods.
Tucked beneath the former coal town of Folschviller, scientists uncovered an estimated 46 million tons of hydrogen gas. Such numbers might seem vague, but put into perspective, this volume is big enough to meet over half the world’s current annual industrial hydrogen demand, the largest user. The find, with an estimated worth of $184 billion, is igniting both optimism and caution in the race for cleaner, scalable energy solutions.
Passive formation
Natural hydrogen, sometimes dubbed “white” or “gold” hydrogen, is generated through geological processes like water-rock reactions and radioactive decay. Unlike green hydrogen, which requires energy-intensive electrolysis powered by renewables, or gray hydrogen, which is derived from fossil fuels with carbon emissions, natural hydrogen is formed passively underground and emerges with a near-zero emissions footprint.
So far, this is good news, as it eliminates the inefficiency problem of hydrogen production. But there’s still a challenge to be overcome, and it lies in safely extracting it. “Nature has done the heavy lifting,” said Dr. Jacques Pironon, lead scientist behind the Folschviller project. The hydrogen reservoir was discovered exactly one year ago, by accident during a methane drilling campaign.
It shows how misunderstood subterranean systems remain, and how nations formerly not dominant in the energy game could see the tables turning in the near or far future. Early estimates suggest it could eliminate up to 130 million tons of CO₂ annually if used to replace gray hydrogen in heavy industries.
For 170,000 years
The implications of France’s jackpot stretch beyond the borders of Macron’s country. A subsequent research wave, led by universities in Oxford, Durham, and Toronto, estimates that the Earth’s crust may now hold enough natural hydrogen to meet global energy needs for up to 170,000 years. While not all of it is accessible or economically viable, even a small fraction could completely transform energy markets.
However, the technology to leverage this potential is still in its infancy. Also, slipstreaming the French find is a recent safety review published in the magazine Nature Communications. It warns that hydrogen’s physical properties, its ability to embrittle metals, degrade rubber seals, and alter cement chemistry, pose severe risks to conventional drilling infrastructure. Hydrogen’s small molecular size also makes leaks more likely and harder to detect.
No simple retrofit
This outlook could pose a headache for the conventional drilling industry. It has already set its hopes on a substitution scenario where common methods for oil-related products could be exploited and easily converted to white hydrogen. Bear in mind that also the back-end infrastructure of oil and hydrogen (pistol filling, forecourts…) is comparable. But: “We can’t just retrofit oil and gas wells and call it a day,” said Baojiang Sun, lead author of the safety study. “This requires new materials, new designs, and new safety protocols.”
Nevertheless, the game is on. Recognizing the technical and regulatory gap, the research team behind the Oxford-Durham study has launched a startup aimed at locating economically viable natural hydrogen reservoirs. The company is using an “exploration recipe” to assess where hydrogen has accumulated, what formations trap it, and what biological or geological processes might deplete it.
Beating strong headwinds
With pilot wells planned and global interest rising, from U.S. gas companies to mapping efforts in Australia, the next few years could determine whether natural hydrogen becomes a cornerstone of the global energy transition or just another buried promise. Either way, the ground beneath our feet may be more valuable than anyone imagined.
The question is whether car makers can be patient and wait until enough momentum has built up. Toyota, Honda, Hyundai, and BMW haven’t yet abandoned their hydrogen passenger car projects, but they face strong headwinds as global demand keeps sliding, last year by roughly 20%. Efforts are increasingly concentrating on the commercial vehicle branches.
Finally, the most promising prospect is that white hydrogen, due to production benefits, could raise the efficiency threshold from 20% to 40% compared to blue hydrogen.
