Hydrogen

[00:00:18] Speaker A: Welcome to Uptown Chats, a podcast where we share stories about environmental justice by and for everyday people. I'm your co host, Lonnie. [00:00:24] Speaker B: And I'm your other co host, Jarren. [00:00:26] Speaker A: And today, we're continuing our wrong direction mini series by talking about hydrogen with our very own Manny Salgado and Talley Natter, who work in our federal policy team. But before we get into that, Jaron, can you read our mission? [00:00:38] Speaker B: I sure can. WEAC's mission is to build healthy communities by ensuring that people of color and or low income residents participate meaningfully in the creation of sound and fair environmental health and protection policies and practices. [00:00:51] Speaker A: All right, so we're talking about hydrogen. [00:00:53] Speaker B: Yes. [00:00:53] Speaker A: What is hydrogen? [00:00:54] Speaker B: That's a great question. I mean, for me, this is something that I was always trying to wrap my head around when I started to learn about hydrogen as an energy source, when it started to come into the space. First of all, hydrogen, as many of us know, is an element on the periodic table. When some of us learn that in chemistry or taking it back. Yep, yep. But hydrogen is also a fuel that can be produced from a variety of resources, like natural gas, nuclear power, biomass, and renewable power, like solar and wind. [00:01:24] Speaker A: Yeah, and there are different ways to kind of produce this hydrogen, as you called it, as a form of fuel. And it's usually classified differently depending on how it's produced. And there are different colors that have. [00:01:35] Speaker B: Been assigned the rainbow of hydrogen. [00:01:37] Speaker A: The rainbow of hydrogen. Not a complete rainbow. No, but a partial rainbow. So there's green hydrogen, blue, gray, and brown. [00:01:46] Speaker B: Very earth tones. [00:01:48] Speaker A: They are very earth tones. I don't even think about that now. [00:01:50] Speaker B: Yeah, we got all the earth tones. We're missing a couple colors in that rainbow. This is the earth tone rainbow. [00:01:55] Speaker A: And our personal opinion is that we think some of these colors aren't appropriately matched. However, we will go with what? [00:02:01] Speaker B: Neither here nor there. [00:02:03] Speaker A: So we'll start with the first one talking about green hydrogen, which is produced through electrolysis using renewable energy. Electrolysis is just a process that splits the hydrogen from water using electric current. [00:02:16] Speaker B: Yeah. Blue, on the other hand, blue hydrogen production uses carbon capture and sequestration to remove carbon dioxide that's created during hydrogen production. See, that's the confusing part. I feel like when I see the green hydrogen. You're talking about splitting hydrogen from water. That should be called blue hydrogen. Right. I know what they're getting at with the green. It's the green. Whatever. But come on, it's got water in it. I know water's not technically blue, but that's neither. [00:02:43] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, I remember that whole water is not technically. [00:02:45] Speaker B: We're getting in the weeds here a little bit. Yeah. So what is gray hydrogen, Lonnie? [00:02:49] Speaker A: So, gray hydrogen is produced almost solely with fossil fuels through steam, methane reforming, or SMR, where the methane gas is broken down into hydrogen and carbon dioxide. That just sounds horrible. If you learn anything from this podcast so far, all of those words sound bad. [00:03:05] Speaker B: You know, as soon as fossil fuels get rolled in there, that's not a good sign. And also, smr, it's not like the fun msmr, you know, like this. We wish it was, but it's not. And then the last one is brown hydrogen, which is produced through coal gasification. So, you know, they knew what they were doing. They picked brown hydrogen. It's just a bad one. Don't do it. [00:03:22] Speaker A: So, basically, once hydrogen's actually produced, it's usually stored in the form of compressed gas, kind of like helium, in those big metal tanks. From there, it could either be used in a fuel cell or a combustion turbine. [00:03:38] Speaker B: Yeah. So for many of you, like me, who did no idea what a fuel cell is, I had to do some research on this. But a fuel cell is basically like a magic box that actually magic, but it feels like magic, this magic box that makes electricity, and it uses hydrogen gas and mixes it with oxygen from the air to create power, essentially. It's a really simplified explanation for how it works. It's not real magic, I promise. I wish real magic exists. I'm a huge nerd. The only thing it leaves behind in the process is water. So it's a clean way to make energy for things like cars and gases without any pollution. So theoretically, a fuel cell is a good system for using hydrogen to create energy in a clean way. [00:04:23] Speaker A: Yeah, I like the magic touch because there's a lot of details in there that neither one of us can really explain. Yeah, hydrogen. And then so there's combustion turbines, and they're the same. They're very similar to, like, a car engine where hydrogen gas is burned, and the byproducts in this process are water vapor and nitrogen oxide, which is a harmful gas that is regulated by the. [00:04:45] Speaker B: Clean Air act, which we definitely talked about in one of our previous episodes about air pollution. So good excuse to go back and. [00:04:51] Speaker A: Listen to that talk about knocks and socks. [00:04:53] Speaker B: Knocks and socks, not the socks on your feet. So we've got some of the basic parts. This is what hydrogen is, the different colors and how it's used. But how does it actually work as an energy source. How is it used to run things? Essentially? We gave a couple examples, but some of the things that we mentioned about the way it's produced and used make it an attractive fuel option for things like transportation and electricity generation. It can be used in cars and houses for portable power and lots of other things. Right? [00:05:23] Speaker A: Yeah. And I think one of the things that is talked about a lot is kind of like the industrial process. Right. So places and sectors that are very difficult to electrify using renewable energy. Right. So you have, hydrogen can basically replace natural gas and other fossil fuels in an industrial process, such as steel and cement production, reducing carbon emissions, but depending on the color. Right. Because we see that you have to use fossil fuel in some colors in order to actually produce hydrogen. [00:05:50] Speaker B: Yeah. We don't want that brown hydrogen to make our steel and cement. And also, you can think about things like aviation airplanes as a really big emitter of pollution and emissions in the transportation sector, as a potential space for those cleaner alternatives of hydrogen potentially to fit in. But there's also this term floating around that people have probably heard, and that's a hydrogen hub. Right. What is a hydrogen hub? [00:06:17] Speaker A: So, yeah, basically, a hydrogen hub is like a centralized area where hydrogen is being produced, distributed, consumed, and stored. Like one all in one package space for hydrogen. The point of these hubs is to support the development and expansion of hydrogen energy infrastructure by bringing together various stakeholders, including producers, consumers, and infrastructure developers. [00:06:41] Speaker B: Yeah. And there's currently no green hydrogen plants in New York City. We're obviously always thinking about local implications of this. So there's no green hydrogen plants in New York City. However, there's a push for increased reliance on clean energy in New York City, which means that some will likely begin to receive energy from green hydrogen produced outside of New York City. So there are likely going to be proliferation of these green hydrogen infrastructure. You know, some of these hydrogen hubs in and around New York City, even if they don't exist there right now. Right. For this, based on this demand for clean energy, we won't say too much. Right now, I feel like we covered some of the good stuff. For those of you who are less familiar with what's going on in the hydrogen space, to really get the most out of this episode. So I say let's go ahead and jump into our interview with Manny and Tally. [00:07:33] Speaker A: Let's get into it. [00:07:34] Speaker B: All right. All right. Well, today we have a very special interview. We have not just one, but two guests with us. So before we get too far in, do you both want to quickly introduce yourself. Maybe we can go age before beauty. I don't know. Seniority? What do you want to do? [00:07:58] Speaker C: Tali can go first. [00:08:01] Speaker D: Whoa. I guess not. Age before I use she her pronouns. I am currently the Cecil Corbin mark, environmental justice research fellow at the federal policy Office of React for Environmental justice, and I'm super excited to be here. It's a dream come true. I'm, like, number one fan of this podcast. It was in my Spotify rap. So super happy to be here. Thank you for having me. [00:08:26] Speaker A: We made your Spotify wrap. [00:08:27] Speaker B: That's impressive. Yeah, that's a highlight for me. [00:08:30] Speaker A: Same. [00:08:31] Speaker B: All right, Manny, take it away. Let's hear from you. [00:08:32] Speaker C: Okay, so, I'm Manny Salgado, federal research manager at the DC office for Wex. He, him, pronouns, and. Yeah, geoscientist by training, but been with react for almost two years now. Doing a lot of different data analysis and some policy work. And a lot of work on hydrogen. [00:08:52] Speaker B: Yes. And as tally knows, as apparently our number one fan, Manny's actually been on the show before. He is a return customer from last year. So. Thanks for coming back, Manny. Clearly, we didn't scare you away with being on last time. I thought we had a great time. [00:09:07] Speaker A: And we can just say that, you know, it's probably by popular demand that you came back. Maybe we had, like, a flood, an influx. [00:09:12] Speaker B: People demanded it. [00:09:13] Speaker A: Bring back Manny. [00:09:14] Speaker B: Manny. Manny. Yes. But as you alluded to, Manny, we're talking about hydrogen today, and the two of you have spent a lot of time thinking about hydrogen and how it fits into the environmental justice landscape, you know, at the federal level here in the United States. So, just for folks who are not as familiar with how hydrogen is being deployed in the United States right now, can you give us a little bit of a brief on what that looks like? [00:09:38] Speaker C: Sure. So, right now, we're really at a very nascent stage in hydrogen being developed. Currently, most of hydrogen is produced through natural gas, but we've seen a big push federally, with money coming from the IRA in the form of tax credits and the Department of Energy, in the form of the hydrogen hubs program, to have a push for clean hydrogen. The DOE has a clean hydrogen roadmap in which they plan to increase the amount of hydrogen produced within the country over the next ten years quite substantially. Yeah. And so what we're seeing is quite a bit of money that's flowing into the hydrogen landscape to, you know, build new hydrogen production facilities. But we're really just at the beginning stages of that process right now, and. [00:10:30] Speaker B: Can you say a little bit more about the funding piece? Because I think that's something that for folks working in the EJ space, we spend a little bit more time thinking about the Inflation and Reduction act and infrastructure, bipartisan infrastructure bill and things like that. And some folks who are not in the EJ space have probably heard those things thrown around. How do both of those fit into this conversation around the hydrogen and hydrogen hubs and that? [00:10:55] Speaker C: Yeah, and so there's two main pieces of funding that. There's little bits here and there, but the two big sources that EJ communities tend to be quite concerned with are, first of all, the hydrogen hubs program, which is, you know, Doe funding that's sending billions of dollars to eight hubs which have been selected nationwide to produce, quote unquote, clean hydrogen. Most of the production methods that have been selected for those hubs are clean, but they're being touted as such. It's a big source of money. The selection process has happened, but the selection process isn't final. So we're kind of in a gray area right now with those hubs where they're finalizing each project for selection. We don't have much information on that. Doe has not maintained transparency with these projects at all. And so we're still waiting to find out where they're going to be located specifically. We know generally where these hubs are, as far as, like, the states, and, you know, where they're going to go in. But for most of these hubs, we have no information about the locations, which areas and communities are impacted by the new infrastructure. You know, how big they are, what exactly they're going to be doing, how they plan to implement the construction and building out of infrastructure. And so right now, we have mostly questions with that. But that's a big source of concern for EJ communities, potentially. What has almost been a little bit more under the radar, but has a much more significant impact in the long term, are the tax credits included in the IRA. We just refer to them usually as 45 volts. And these are tax credits that govern the production of, once again, quote unquote, clean hydrogen. And the guidance for that was, came out in proposed form recently. We act submitted comments, we testified at the Department of Treasury's hearing for that, and we're awaiting the finalized guidance on those tax credits. I think hydrogen hubs have tended to get a little bit more attention from EJ groups because those are actual facilities that they know are going into their communities. But the amount of money that could be potentially given out by the government in the form of tax credits is much, much greater than the amount of money that's going to go into the hydrogen hub. So it's probably an order of magnitude or more greater an impact than the hubs, and it's something that we really need to be attuned to and ready to engage further on. [00:13:38] Speaker B: Got it? [00:13:38] Speaker A: Yeah. Tali, I didn't know if you wanted to add anything about the energy hubs, but I do kind of have a quite bit of follow up question, if you wanted to touch on this. How much of this is investment that's from the government directly building these hubs versus from this being to, like, a private venture? So are the tax credits more so for kind of the private sector to take advantage of things that they've already built or trying to plan, build up this infrastructure? And then there's like, I'm assuming there's money in grants going into states also putting this money out to do this work as well. [00:14:09] Speaker C: Yeah. So it's a mix. The hubs are a private public partnership. In most cases, you have states that have partnered with various private entities. There are companies that are pushing it heavily in each state, but almost each state also has a partnership with some form of a public entity. It's really hard to untangle how much of this would be happening without the government money. I tend to think very little, or maybe not at all. During the testimony for the tax credits, there was quite a bit of private testimony stating that they couldn't make the hydrogen industry grow the way the Biden administration has set forth without very loose regulations on the tax credits that they're able to qualify for as much of that federal money as possible. There was also a lot of private testimony that said that they could do it with stricter requirements. And so there's obviously still private money that's going to come in regardless of how strict those requirements are. But I do think the tax credits are a big impetus on. On the build out in general, and I don't know how much that would be happening without the tax credits. It's really impossible to untangle at this point, the hubs themselves. I don't think. I do think that some of those projects would still happen regardless of that pot of money seems large, and it is a substantial amount of money, these billions of dollars. But I think that the tax credits are a bigger push because it's so much more money in the long run. And I do think that there just is a desire to find a use for natural gas and converting it to hydrogen kind of gives them a way to greenwash the natural gas. And so I still think that there would be some motivation there to monetize that resource that they have in a way that seems more green or clean. But it's really difficult to untangle because the amount of public money that's flowing into this is so substantial. [00:16:23] Speaker B: That's interesting. And I appreciate you bringing up the fact that intent of trying to use something that they're already channeling money into, which is the natural gas, and let's just find another purpose for. It's like when you have a hammer, everything is a nail. If you have this thing, you want to use it for everything. And that's not always. That's really the answer. It's really is that the case is the best move forward. But one thing I want to mention, just for clarity, again, not everyone is as familiar with the energy space. So doe Department of Energy, and I appreciate you bringing up the siding piece of it, thinking about the locations. You mentioned that a little bit before. And so much of what we talk about when we talk about environmental justice is where does a thing go? Even if something is a good idea to build, where does it go and how is it benefiting that community or harming that community, or a mix of both? And so I know you said that some of that is already, it's still being figured out, but from the locations that you have, that they have kind of announced, or the things that you have seen about discussing locations, how does that piece of it fit in? Does it seem like they're really considering and taking into account the cumulative impacts, like the existing burden of polluting facilities in a given area? Or is that like, not even in the conversation? Like, they're not even taking that into account when they're thinking about where these hydrogen hubs are going to be? [00:17:42] Speaker D: Yeah, I think that's definitely a key part of the hydrogen hubs. As Manny mentioned, there are several hubs, but very little information. So just, you know, the communities that will be impacted by the hubs don't have the transparent locations in order to understand how the hubs will impact their communities. So while there have been public webinars and maps, they're very broad, and they just kind of put a little star on a part of the state. And that makes it really hard, you know, as a resident, to understand how this will impact your community. And as Manny mentioned, a lot of the framing of the hydrogen hubs is about being like a national, clean hydrogen network. And while that is the messaging, a lot of them are relying on existing polluting infrastructure and building out more polluting infrastructure to continue to produce hydrogen. They're going to need to create a lot of more toxic facilities. And we have done an internal analysis of, you know, from the very little information that we have and from kind of like zooming in on satellite maps, trying to figure out where things are and where they might be. And the proposed locations are disproportionately located in communities that are disadvantaged using the CGIS tool or using justice, 40 disadvantaged community metrics. But what is kind of interesting here and what I think falls into what I'm sure you talk about a lot regarding environmental justice and energy is the Doe, the Department of Energy, is framing this as a positive opportunity, as like job creation and, you know, involving the community and the electrification and clean energy transition. And that is the framing. Instead of, you know, we are going to be adding polluting facilities to disadvantaged communities, they're saying, oh, we're going to make jobs and we're going to support local businesses because we're going to be bringing all this new infrastructure. But that isn't the reality. The reality is that this will make overburdened communities, you know, even more susceptible to the harms that come with toxic facilities and energy production. And even though we don't have the exact location for all the hubs, we know that just based on the limited information available, this is going to disproportionately harm overburdened and over polluted communities. And there's just not enough information and opportunity to give these community members the tools to voice their concerns and have a seat at the table and understand what might happen in their community. [00:20:11] Speaker B: Well said. [00:20:13] Speaker C: I think tally nailed it. I think that it's really concerning that, you know, when we think about benefits, all they really want to highlight is jobs. And the jobs in these cases are really theoretical. The job estimates that we've seen from these hubs, it frankly seem outlandish in certain cases. The California hub says that it's going to add hundreds of thousands of jobs, which is much higher than any of the other hubs. And so just kind of want to wonder where the map is on that and how they're coming up with these figures and whether or not they're being checked. [00:20:51] Speaker A: Yeah, I find it fascinating the number of ways that people can greenwash things. And so I think as we have this conversation and we've talked about before at the beginning of the series, the wrong direction series that we've talked a little bit about, greenwashing and what that looks like and how that plays a role here. You've already kind of alluded to a couple things. One of them is jobs, right? That's a really big seller. It's like green jobs. And I think the one of the question is for you guys is we've kind of talked about things that are like, in this very opposing space, right? We're saying that these things, are calling these things green or clean, and then at the same time, we're saying that they're going to negatively impact environmental justice communities. So can you talk a little bit about how hydrogen is an actual environmental justice issue, kind of from like, that physical standpoint of, like, the hubs itself and, like, what they do and how they impact the communities and then also taking into account the idea that this might not be as green as we and clean as we being told to us. [00:21:47] Speaker C: Yeah, for sure. So, I mean, hydrogen, like, its impact really depends on so many factors, right? It depends on whether or not you're talking about production, whether you're talking about creating it and what production method. And then there's also impacts dependent on how you're using it. And then there's just impacts that come along with being close to any type of industrial facility, right? There's increased truck traffic. There is all kinds of pollution that comes associated with that. There's dangers from explosions and chemical release that go into production. So there's a lot of different dangers associated with hydrogen. And so I think from environmental justice perspective, when we think about the hubs, it really depends on the type of hydrogen, what we're worried about. So you may have already covered this in the 101 section, but there's all these different color codes for hydrogen, and one of those is blue hydrogen, which is hydrogen produced from natural gas that then captures the carbon dioxide in the process. So you don't get greenhouse gas emissions. In theory, this is appealing to a lot of people because, you know, then it says, well, we're not polluting because we're not releasing greenhouse gases, were not releasing the CO2, so we're limiting the impact of this on climate change, and it makes it green. That is really fraught because anything associated with natural gas extraction pollutes all along the supply chain. You have lots of leaky infrastructure that is constantly emitting methane. So you still have a huge greenhouse gas component, even if you were able to theoretically capture all the CO2 in the hydrogen production process. That in itself, I said, is theoretical because it's not really something that has been demonstrated to be very effective. We act as not supportive of any carbon capture efforts. We don't think it works. We don't think it's the appropriate solution. And so you still have a lot of leaky methane in the supply chain. You probably aren't going to capture all the CO2. So they're like, already you've called this clean, and you've labeled it that you don't have greenhouse gas emissions, but you do. And then there's the end use. If the hydrogen is being burned somewhere, you. When hydrogen combusts, it doesn't produce CO2, as in burning natural gas, but it does produce nox. And so if we're producing, taking blue hydrogen and then, you know, using it to run power plants or using it in homes and replace some natural gas and stoves or anything where it actually combusts, then you're still having nox emissions. Anytime you have combustion in the atmosphere, you release Nox. So that's still an issue. Right. And then with. With other forms of hydrogen, let's. We've. We've heard a lot about green hydrogen, which uses energy to split water into hydrogen and oxygen. If you're producing hydrogen in this manner, you're. You're producing a fuel that once again, allegedly doesn't produce greenhouse gases, but you need energy to split that water into the two constituents. And where that energy comes from is incredibly important. If you're producing that energy by burning fossil fuels, then it doesn't matter what you use, how you use the hydrogen, whether or not it emits greenhouse gases, because you've already emitted so many greenhouse gases through the production of said hydrogen, more greenhouse gases than you would have emitted if you would have just burned natural gas in the place of hydrogen to begin with. So you've actually made things worse through greenwashing this process. Right. This is the same case if you produce green hydrogen with clean energy, but it's clean energy that you're pulling away from another source. Right? So if you have a windmill on the grid that's powering a city block, and then you say, oh, well, we're going to use that windmill to produce this hydrogen. So the hydrogen's clean, or does that city block get its energy from now? Right, it's going to come from another source, which is likely to be fossil fuels. So, once again, you're just kind of playing a shell game here, and you're shifting the emissions somewhere else, but those emissions are still occurring. So you haven't really solved anything, right? You've just labeled this other energy source, this green when in actuality, you're just shifting around the emissions and, and they're still occurring. So there's a lot of danger there with greenwashing potential. And how companies can say that this is a clean method of energy when you've just shifted the emissions somewhere else, or you've even caused more emissions because you produced it in a really dirty manner. [00:26:36] Speaker D: I guess another form of sort of talking about greenwashing. Again, just going back to the lack of public engagement, I think a lot of terms are thrown out. Not just green jobs, but also community benefit plans and meaningful community engagement. But then these community benefit plans are not public. Only the California hub has a public community benefits plan because of the state laws. But for the other hubs, you can't really access what they mean by community benefit plans. And then they talk about having listening sessions and involving the community. But then, for example, in the mid atlantic hub, 32 environmental justice organizations signed a letter saying the listening sessions you had were actually really inaccessible. It was like during the workday, there was no virtual option. And that is a way to keep out meaningful community engagement. So despite kind of throwing out terms about engaging the community and listening to the community, it seems like they're intentionally keeping community members out. Or even if it's not intentional, like not listening to the concerns that the community members raise. And so if this is kind of the system they're setting up to listen to the community, and then community members aren't able to come to these meetings and have a seat at the table, then this is how we kind of further environmental injustices, is when the people most impacted aren't able to contribute to the decisions being made. [00:27:58] Speaker B: I appreciate that. I feel like you both are kind of covering the two different pieces of the environmental justice definition. When we talk about environmental justice, at least I think of the two major pieces of it, the impacts, the equitable outcomes piece of it, making sure that everyone has a fair share of the pollution. When we're producing pollution, ideally less of it, but inevitably we do that. We're not overburdening communities of color in the process and low income communities. The other piece is the participation piece, making sure there's meaningful engagement in the process. It seems like there's a bit of a gap for both of those things when we're talking about the way that hydrogen is being kind of rolled out or being supported at the federal level. And it seems like what I'm gathering is that there's this theoretical, hypothetical way that if we were going to move forward with hydrogen, there's ways that it could be used effectively. But it seems like the way that is being implemented now, it's not taking into account the existing burdens in communities and the potential additional impact that adding the hydrogen production might cause. And it's also not really going about the community engagement part of it properly either. So does that seem like that squares with how you're seeing it from your lens, or are there pieces of this in terms of why we consider hydrogen, you know, part of the wrong direction? You know, is that kind of in a nutshell how you're seeing it? Or are there other kind of other nuances to the piece that we're not saying? [00:29:31] Speaker C: Yeah, so, I mean, I'll just say that what's for me personally, what's incredibly frustrating about the way hydrogen is being handled is that there are productive uses for hydrogen that could help decarbonize our economy. Maritime shipping is somewhere where, you know, using hydrogen would be preferable to using the fuels that we're currently using. If we could use hydrogen for flights, that would be much better than the gas that we currently use. These, these are areas where, you know, and limited, and in other industrial sources like steel production, cement production, where you have to have really high heat involved. Hydrogen would be really preferable because there's no way around using a really dense energy source for these items. You know, you can't just stick a bunch of batteries and have an electric plane. Batteries are heavy, and so it's counterintuitive, right, that you can put a bunch of batteries in a plane and have a fly. So you have to find other ways to decarbonize these sectors. And hydrogen would be, really has a lot of potential in these sectors. But what we see in actuality isn't hydrogen being pushed in these limited areas where it might be effective and actually be useful. We see it being pushed in such a wide manner because there are so many industrial interests that have money tied up that can pivot to creating hydrogen and use that as a greenwashing way to keep selling natural gas, for instance, or pivot and use it to power cars. These are places where we know that direct electrification is a much better alternative. These are places where we shouldn't be pursuing because we know that there are better choices. If your goal is to keep environmental justice, community safe and to decarbonize our communities and to avert the impacts of climate change, we know there are better solutions in these situations. And yet, because the financial opportunity is there for people with a lot of power, we see that co ops hydrogen and use it instead as a green washing tool or as another method of making money at the expense of environmental justice communities and people of color. And so a lot of times what environmental justice organizations just end up doing is just flat out opposed to all hydrogen production because it's safer and we lose opportunities in that. I mean, the opportunity for harm is much greater if we don't advocate for just stopped with these programs. So it's tough. It's a really difficult space to find that safe nuance in. [00:32:22] Speaker B: Makes sense. It's a bit of a slippery slope in that case, once the cat's out of the bag. [00:32:27] Speaker A: Yeah. And I also think about, when I think about these kind of technologies, I also think about the opportunity cost when it comes to funding. Right. There's how much money that could be spent on improving the things that we know are proven to be actually renewable and clean. Like wind and solar are still not perfect, but they are definitely preferable. So why are we not putting more money into making those as perfect as possible? Whether it's better ways of storing that energy where we have a less extractive battery, for example, for solar storage and wind storage. And so it's just. It is. I echo Manny's frustration here. It's just because from this kind of policy standpoint, it's, why are we putting this money towards these things that are not necessarily truly proven? We don't really know if they're really working effectively as we think they should be. Are they really doing the job that they're supposed to do? And are they going to the right places like you already talked about? And since they don't, it kind of like there's billions of dollars being left on the table to actually improve real, actual climate solutions. [00:33:23] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, I feel like between the two of you, really, I feel like I learned quite a bit and I feel like we covered an important framing for why this sits as a false solution for us here at Wex. So thank you. Any last thoughts or comments? Anyone want the final word before we wrap up? [00:33:40] Speaker C: No. Thanks for having us. [00:33:42] Speaker D: Yeah, yeah. Thank you so much. [00:33:43] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:33:44] Speaker A: Much appreciated. It adds a lot of context. This is a very nuanced thing, all of this, a lot of the energy. Like you all said, the energy space is very complicated, can get very technical, very scientific, very quick. And what are communities supposed to do if they know none of this information at all? So that's why they look to places like organizations like we act to really get an understanding and sense of, of how they should start to think about these things without us saying, like necessarily saying, this is the solution your community has to choose or not. But here is the information. Here are the kind of facts that we can give out. [00:34:18] Speaker B: Perfect. Thank you. Thanks for listening again. This was the second episode in our wrong direction mini series. Tune in on July 8 for the next episode where we'll be talking about one of the most prominent false solutions being explored now, carbon capture and storage. If you liked this episode, make sure to rate and review the show on whatever platform you listen on. If you have thoughts about the show, we encourage you to reach out to us with your thoughts and [email protected]. [00:34:43] Speaker A: Dot check out we act on Facebook at weact four EJ. That's w e a C t f o r e J, Instagram X and YouTube. Act four eJ that's w e a c t number four eJ. And check out our website, weact.org, for more information about environmental justice. [00:35:02] Speaker B: Until next time.