On Earth Day, I’m motivated by the great responsibility we bear in the power industry to decarbonize and electrify the world for future generations.
I reflect on my younger days growing up in upstate New York—summers when I used to hike the Catskill mountains and fish along the Hudson River. I want my kids, and my grandkids, to continue to have those experiences as they get older.
My personal decarbonization journey began about four years ago when I began to work with some of the great minds in GE Vernova to identify the most effective and efficient pathways towards a planet with less CO2 emissions. And while the role of renewables is a big part of that solution, it creates other challenges. Something needs to kick in when the wind isn’t blowing, and the sun isn’t shining—and battery storage doesn’t have the longevity we need.
The world requires dependable, rapidly dispatchable power that can complement the intermittency of renewables. This is why we rely on gas turbines. With tremendous power density and the ability to rapidly respond to grid fluctuations, gas turbines are ideal to complement renewable power.
If we’re truly serious about massively reducing our planet’s CO2 emissions in a more affordable and reliable way, we must invest in the technologies we have today. Hydrogen-capable gas turbines and carbon capture technologies are crucial to rapidly reduce CO2 emissions for our planet, and these technologies are available right now.
Today, GE Vernova has 120+ gas turbines burning various blends of hydrogen to lower their carbon footprint, with a pathway to have our entire gas turbine portfolio 100% hydrogen capable in the next decade. Although hydrogen is a part of the solution, it’s resource intensive. For context, it takes a hydrogen blend of ~80% to reduce the carbon emissions by ~50%.
Carbon capture and sequestration (CCS): CCS is a viable and essential piece of the solution going forward. It’s been around for over 30 years but has never been applied to a gas turbine... yet. I’m proud to highlight that GE Vernova has been selected as a technology partner for one of the first-of-a-kind gas turbine combined-cycle power plant with carbon capture proposed to be built and commissioned for the UK Teesside Power Project. This aims to capture 95% of the plant’s CO2 emissions, and is one of several projects we’re currently developing in this space.
The world’s energy demands are forecasted to double in the next two decades, and we are going to need a portfolio of solutions reducing CO2 emissions like these that can be implemented today. So, what is holding us back?
We’re going to need new legislative policy and marketplace constructs that can help drive these technologies and projects forward. Two great examples of policy enabling these goals are:
- The United States’ Inflation Reduction Act (IRA): it’s the largest investment in reducing carbon pollution in U.S. history as it aims to reduce carbon emissions by 40% by 2030.
- UK Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) announced a £20 billion investment to support carbon capture, usage, and storage (CCUS) deployments in March 2023.
With the right policies and investments, we can make significant progress to reach our energy transition goals. I am truly humbled to be part of something so important and impactful for the future of our planet. We have the technology, we have the solutions, the time for action is now—let’s go!
