physics

Hydrogen Council

Hydrogen Council is a physics topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Hydrogen Council rather than just read about it. In short: The Hydrogen Council is a group of 140 leading energy, transport, industry, and investment companies that seeks to develop the hydrogen economy. It aims to accelerate investment in the development and commercialization of the hydrogen and fuel cell sectors and encourage stakeholders to increase their backing of hydrogen as part of the future energy mix.

Key takeaways

Hydrogen Council belongs to physics; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Hydrogen Council to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Hydrogen Council from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The Hydrogen Council is a group of 140 leading energy, transport, industry, and investment companies that seeks to develop the hydrogen economy. It aims to accelerate investment in the development and commercialization of the hydrogen and fuel cell sectors and encourage stakeholders to increase their backing of hydrogen as part of the future energy mix.

Formation The Hydrogen Council was launched at the World Economic Forum in Davos on January 7, 2017. In one of two formal statements made at the Forum, Air Liquide Chairman and CEO Benoît Potier stated that the aim of the initiative was “to explain why hydrogen emerges among the key solutions for the energy transition, in mobility as well as in the power, industrial and residential sectors.” The 13 inaugural members included Air Liquide, Alstom, Anglo American, BMW, Daimler, Engie, Honda, Hyundai, Kawasaki, Linde, Shell, TotalEnergies and Toyota.

Members In 2024, the Hydrogen Council consists of 140 members separated into three groups: the Steering Group, the Supporting Group, and the Investor Group.

Steering Group (52 members)

Supporting Group (68 members)

Investor Group (12 members)

Governance The Hydrogen Council is steered by a core group of executives who meet annually at a CEO-level event. Ongoing governance is led by two co-chairs from different geographies and sectors, elected every two years by the council's Steering Members. Each year, one of the two co-chair mandates is renewed for continuity. The organization is steered by two co-secretaries (representatives of the two Co-Chairs).

Co-Chairs and Co-Secretaries To date, the co-chair and Co-Secretary positions have been held by Air Liquide and Toyota (2017), Air Liquide, Hyundai (2018), and Air Liquide and Hyundai (2019).

Partners As of November 2019, The Hydrogen Council lists its partners as the Center for Hydrogen Safety, the Clean Energy Ministerial, Energy Observer, H2 View, IEA Hydrogen, Mission Innovation and the World Economic Forum.

Reports The Hydrogen Council has published three reports, in collaboration with McKinsey & Company, that are available on their website.

How Hydrogen Empowers the Energy Transition Published in January 2017, "How Hydrogen Empowers the Energy Transition" explores the seven roles of hydrogen in decarbonizing significant sectors of the economy and considers the policy environment needed to facilitate the deployment of hydrogen technology.

Hydrogen Scaling Up: A Sustainable Pathway for the Global Energy Transition Published in November 2017, "Hydrogen, scaling up" suggests wide-scale deployment of hydrogen for the decarbonization of transport, industry, and buildings and enabling a renewable energy production and distribution system. The scenarios outlined in the report suggest that hydrogen technologies could contribute to meeting 18% of the world's final energy demands, avoiding 6 Gt of CO2 emissions, and creating a market with revenues of $2.5 trillion each year while providing 30 million jobs by mid-century. An investment of $280 billion – or annual investments of $20–25 billion until 2030 – would be required to build the hydrogen economy with these benefits. Following the publication of this report, the EU, France, and South Korea published similar analyses, focusing on their specific regions.

Hydrogen Meets Digital Published in September 2018, "Hydrogen Meets Digital" investigates the impact of digitization on energy demand to establish a dialogue with the ICT sector on how digitization and hydrogen could complement each other during the energy transition. The report concludes that hydrogen has substantial benefits that could enable major digital trends and thus serve as an efficient, zero-emission energy vector.

Path to Hydrogen Competitiveness: A Cost Perspective Published in January 2020, "Path to Hydrogen Competitiveness: A Cost Perspective" provides evidence based on the path to cost competitiveness for 40 hydrogen technologies used in 35 applications. The report suggests that scale-up will be the biggest driver of cost reduction, with costs projected to decrease by up to 50% by 2030 for a wide range of applications.

Events

CEO Events The Hydrogen Council holds an annual CEO Event, where CEOs and C-suite representatives of member organizations meet to reflect on the work of the previous year and to brainstorm strategies to accelerate the council's mission going forward. To date, five CEO Events have taken place. The first was held at the World Economic Forum in Davos (2017), the second at the COP 23 in Bonn, Germany (2017), the third in San Francisco, USA (2018)., the fourth in Versailles in January 2020 and the last in a digital format in January 2021.

Side Events The Hydrogen Council also hosted a number of side events that gathered CEOs and executives from member organizations alongside key stakeholders and influencers in the energy sector. Examples of such events include: 'New York: Investor Day, Celebrating Hydrogen in the Clean Energy Economy', 'China: Hydrogen Industry Development Innovation Forum', and 'Korea: International Hydrogen Energy Forum.'

Notes

References

External links Official website

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Hydrogen Council

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Hydrogen Council claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In physics, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Hydrogen Council before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Hydrogen Council ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Hydrogen Council

In research: Hydrogen Council appears in physics research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Hydrogen Council in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Hydrogen Council is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 2017 establishments in Belgium, Energy in Belgium, Hydrogen, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Hydrogen Council outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Hydrogen Council in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Hydrogen Council means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Hydrogen Council out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Hydrogen Council in simple terms?

Why does Hydrogen Council matter?

Because it connects several physics ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Hydrogen Council?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Hydrogen Council.