Hydrogen-Fueled Air Travel Unlikely to Meet 2050 Goals

Hydrogen has the potential to decarbonize at least a third of the aviation sector, but is decades away from mass adoption, leaving the world dependent on sustainable aviation fuels to reach net-zero greenhouse gas emissions, according to industry experts.
The US has allocated billions of dollars through two recent federal spending packages to scale the production of "clean" hydrogen for a variety of end uses, including as a transportation fuel, S&P Global reported.
But unlike sustainable aviation fuels, hydrogen is incompatible with existing aircraft and will require an entirely new fleet in an industry with a low turnover of inventory.
Airbus SE has set a goal to develop the world's first hydrogen-powered plane by 2035, which even for one plane is "an aggressive timescale," said Jayant Mukhopadhaya, an aviation researcher with the International Council on Clean Transportation.
"Because airplanes live so long — they have 20- to 30-year lifespans — the fleet renewal rates are so slow that any aircraft being bought today is likely going to be in operation in 2050," Mukhopadhaya said during a July 10 panel on decarbonizing the aviation sector, hosted by the Environmental Law Institute.