Isabelle Moretti heads a team dedicated to natural hydrogen at the Université de Pau et des Pays de l’Adour (UPPA). She is a member of the Board of Directors of EartH2 which federates the European hydrogen industry.
What encouraging signs do you see in the development of natural hydrogen ?
Firstly, a growing number of countries are including hydrogen in their subsoil laws. In Europe alone, France, Poland, Kosovo, Serbia and Finland have done so. We are also seeing a significant acceleration in exploration, particularly in the United States. The dynamism of the Koloma company, which has recently raised several successive rounds of funding totalling $350 million, even though it has been very discreet until now, is, in my opinion, quite emblematic. Another highlight: at the end of August, five companies responded to the call for tenders issued by the Philippine Department of Energy for the exploration of natural hydrogen. But the real game-changer is that the big state-owned oil companies, such as Ecopetrol (Colombia) and Petrobras (Brazil), are taking an interest in the field. With their financial resources and drilling expertise, this involvement could be a turning point for natural hydrogen.
What’s the outlook for the HNAT congress, to be held in Paris on December 25 and 26?
Very well, we sold out, since we sold more tickets than there were seats! Secondly, compared with previous editions, we found that many more different countries were represented. In the past, participants came mainly from Europe, the United States and Australia. This year, we have players from Morocco, Egypt, the Philippines, Kazakhstan, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia and the Middle East. This is a strong sign.
What do you think of Look Up Geoscience’s initiative to develop software dedicated to natural hydrogen exploration?
Natural hydrogen players need specific tools and software. But we’ve been using the same software for 40 years! These have certainly been improved over time, but they are still very expensive (around 500,000 euros with all options). So there’s plenty of room to develop software using more modern languages, which are both high-performance – enabling, for example, the aggregation of different types of data – and not too expensive. Startups don’t have the same resources as oil companies!