 Welcome to Stand the Energy Man, I'm Stan Osterman from the Hawaii Center for Advanced Transportation Technologies, at least for a couple more weeks anyway, and we have a great show today. One of the big benefits I have of doing the job that I do here in Hawaii is I get to travel from time to time and I've said in the past couple of shows I was in DC for annual merit review with Department of Energy and did a presentation there along with my partner Dave, and we've been to several great events and one really really good event that I have etched in my mind forever was in New York City in 2017 in September where I was there representing the state of Hawaii for two big events. The Department of Energy was rolling out a thing they called Hydrogen at Scale and it was also one of the first meetings of the Hydrogen Council which was a brand new international council that was stood up in early 2017 to promote Hydrogen on an international level and help scale it up, so the Department of Energy and the Hydrogen Council efforts were in parallel and then they were coming together there, and I got to meet a bunch of great folks including my guest today, Rafael Shodanin, who I just can't even get into his background, it's so broad, but he's done everything from the Corporate Technology Officer or NG, one of the largest energy companies in the world. He's been involved with government agencies, he's just a wealth of knowledge when it comes specifically to Hydrogen, and so Rafael welcome to the show today, I really appreciate it and the audience really needs to understand that this is a long shot for us, we actually have Rafael in Nice, France on the French Riviera down there on his vacation at midnight streaming live into the show, so I just really, I thank you so much for taking that kind of time and effort to be on the show here, it really humbles me greatly. Thanks Stan for welcoming me and I mean we are both looking at the ocean, makes I think about winds, sun and producing hydrogen from water. There you go, well when your family gets a little bit older and you can travel out this way bring them on out and we'll get them on horseback riding and we'll go up and do some fishing and maybe even teach them how to surf and things like that, and we'll make it a memorable trip for them, but anyway could you tell the audience a little bit about yourself and your background and some of the things you've done in your life to get you to the level you're at right now? Yeah, thanks Stan, you already mentioned a few things, so I have been 10 years a civil servant and by then I did different things like I headed the economic development of the northern region of France, I worked for the European Commission and I also was the diplomatic advisor at a certain time of the French energy communication industry minister, so a bit like the equivalence of your DOE and then I went to the corporate sector, did also a number of things for 15 years and as you mentioned, so I worked for this large utility, NG being first the head of China and then in my last position CTO of the company and so my role, you can compare in the United States this company as a large utility like your reliance, energy or other ones, but active worldwide in 70 countries and so my job was to really travel the world and talk to amazing people like you that are at the frontier of new technologies really all over and step by step I realized that together with the teams, even though we had worked in new labs like setting up batteries lab, storage lab, drones lab, 3D printing labs, artificial intelligence, cyber security labs, so the new stuff, addressing the new topics that you need to work upon, I realized then that hydrogen and fuel cell was actually a topic still a little bit in the shadow but with a very, very interesting future and I got interested to the point that step by step I worked on it and I got engaged with more and more people in Europe and I make it short, I became elected chairman of hydrogen Europe, which is the European association of all the players active in this field and when you are in that position you also chair the European funds that is backing this industry a bit like the DOE budget in the United States and this I did for three years and it is by then that at the initiative of my predecessor was the current secretary general of the hydrogen council, we created it was initiative of hydrogen Europe and now it's a private initiative from a certain number of industrials, this hydrogen council that you referred to Stan, which was launched in Davos in 2017, which was quite an amazing initiative because for the first time you had an array of large and 100 companies by then was only 14, now you have more than 50 companies, about 30 that are 14100 and another 25 that are not that are engaged in saying hydrogen will be key in the future of energy and then to continue on that adventure having been 10 years of civil servants, 15 years in the corporate world, I considered that I needed to be an entrepreneur, to have the opportunity to help any company, any institution either public or financial or any startup that wanted to get more interested in that field, to help them I needed to be independent and so that's what I did, I left my position in the corporate world and became an entrepreneur and as a first company I have created hydrogen advisors which does what it says and next to them also working on an array of projects, so that's where I am. That's really great and it's an inspiration to me because I've done a lot of time in civil service and also in the military and so I have two retirements already behind me and I'm getting ready to leave state civil service right now and actually be more really retired, I'll be moving to the Big Island and working on hydrogen projects with a lot of people on the Big Island where we expect to see hydrogen really taking off so I'm sure you and I will be talking a lot in the future about the things that we're going to do here in Hawaii revolving around hydrogen but you know the hydrogen council for me was a really impressive group and as you said they've grown dramatically from 2017 to well over 50 members almost approaching 60 I think now and these are not just little companies there they're like Shell Oil, Total Oil, Kawasaki, Honda, Toyota, just big big big name companies Air Lequid, Plug Power, companies that do hydrogen for their business and companies that do vehicles and transportation and heavy equipment, electrolyzers, fuel cells, it's really grown but you know from your perspective how important has this hydrogen council been in reaching that goal of getting hydrogen to be ubiquitous to really take its role and be a leader in energy storage and energy in the world? I think what is absolutely what was a tilting point in 2017 with this creation is that for the first time you have major energy companies so you mentioned Shell but there's also Total, NG also industrial gas companies like you mentioned Air Lequid but there's also Linda sitting together with major car manufacturer Toyota, Honda, Nissan and others and also companies that are developing other types of you know transport application like Alstom for train and saying you know hydrogen is common to us all, it is a new energy vector, it is a new fuel, it is the gaseous equivalent of green electrons when you produce it via electrolyzers and so we have here a new approach which is extremely strong because you come with CEOs from companies that from different sector and say this is something major a new. The 2017 was only a starting point, I think that's 2018 is an even more interesting year if I can compare is you know the creation of the hydrogen council was a bit before the coming wave of more political engagement so what happened in 2018 you have had an array of very important ministerial meetings you have to have in mind that these CEOs when they created the hydrogen council their main target was to engage with top politicians energy ministers transport minister finance ministers potentially head of states telling them you know this is like moving from steam to power we are now here with hydrogen this new energy vector and in 2018 you have had a certain number of major moves coming from energy ministers one of the key ones was in 2018 in June 2018 you had mission innovation that decided to work on hydrogen fuel cells so what is mission innovation it is the meeting of 23 ministers of 23 countries that have declared themselves as engaged in tackling climate change after the COP 21 and they're also joined by the European Commission who is number 24 and these people had in the early days of mission innovation thought about hydrogen and fuel cell but no cold tree really wanted to take the lead on having a group working on that and it's we had to wait until last year for it to happen and so in June 2018 in Sweden they announced that they would start working on this topic and then a little bit later in September you had all the energy ministers of Europe were gathered for an informal meeting in Linz Austria who signed a declaration the Linz declaration saying that hydrogen will be part of the future of Europe but that was not all you had then a third meeting taking place in November in Tokyo which was the first energy ministers at worldwide level meeting focused on hydrogen so it's absolutely amazing you know in within six months you had one year after the creation of the hydrogen can still a can of response from energy ministers and now there is more coming in 2019 it's been an amazing thing to watch and you know we're out here in the middle of the Pacific Ocean surrounded by our own political issues locally and looking at our national level political issues with our president and our Congress all fighting about things and we're not hearing and not seeing the a lot of the issues that that you're just talked about that that are going to be game changing world-changing events that will suddenly pop on the America's horizon and my fear is that United States is going to be playing catch up because it's not just Europe that's that's really leading the charge on hydrogen but China is very much focused on hydrogen to combat their pollution issues Japan is focused on hydrogen because they want to they want to divest themselves of nuclear power and South Korea is looking into hydrogen because they see it as an emerging market for their industry to step into with their Hyundai vehicles and other equipment so the work of the hydrogen Council and the organizations you just highlighted it's kind of going unseen in the United States and that was one of my main reasons for reaching out to you for today's program was to try and help bring that awareness to the American public that we can either start to recognize what's going on worldwide and understand it and and be part of it or we can play catch up to the rest of the world and you know I looked at your website as you started your your hydrogen advisors and I was really the first the very first image that came up you were talking about why hydrogen specifically is the answer and and I'd like to give you an opportunity to talk a little bit about that because of course I agree with you that I think hydrogen is the answer and I've been criticized by by people that I'm too focused on hydrogen I need to look at other things too and it's like I understand batteries I understand flywheels I understand other technology but for me hydrogen is the answer and it looks like you feel that way as well so can you spend just a few seconds talking about that of course but first I would like to comment what you said which is United States watching I do not believe that United States is watching I mean you have spent a lot of efforts and money over the past 10 20 years on this technology and that will surface in Utah okay what is happening right now as we talk and we you know it as I know it is that there's a meeting taking place in Tokyo which is the G20 and during that meeting energy ministers will mainly talk about hydrogen because the International Energy Agency has prepared a report to that extent and so the facts the mere fact that the International Energy Agency has worked for now more than half a year on preparing their reports and becoming vocal was an article in the Financial Times and also in other major newspapers last week announcing it will be a game changer and it will have rollover effect everywhere at utilities level I was invited by the Edison Institute about a month ago to give a lecture you know in a conference and I could see how many you know large companies from North America were interested by hydrogen so it's coming now coming back to what you asked me why do I believe that hydrogen is key very simple if we look at greenhouse gas emissions and climate change and we know that 20% of the emissions are coming from agriculture and forestry and 80% are coming from energy so there is something that we need to do for the planet is to focus on the energy part then when we look at the energy part most of the politicians will tell you you know if we want to green our energy we need to go for green electrons green power more wind more sun but they tend not to mention that electrons and electricity is only 20 to 25 a cent of our daily energy world we consume many energy in other forms in the form of solid like wooden coal form of gas like natural gas when the form of liquids like gasoline so in combustion processes where we shoot co2 in the air particles noxious and so it's great that we talk about electrical mobility it's great that we talk about more solar and wind farm I love it it's great that we talk about batteries but we should not forget that 80% of the world of energy is combustion based so in that word of solid liquid and gaseous fuels if we want to stop shooting co2 in the air and particles we need to go for the only one of that family that hasn't got any carbon atom in it and physics and chemistry tell us there's only one which is hydrogen now you can be a believer in climate change or not so I'm going to take it on the other from another perspective let's forget about climate change and just explain why hydrogen is going to be like you know cocaine once you're gonna have sniffed it you're gonna wish to stay with it everybody wants to have clean air in cities and we know that pollution in city comes from transport if you want to have clean transport and silent transport you have no way to go for electrical based transmission power and then if you want to go short distance you can go with batteries if want to go long distance you don't want to carry batteries in trains you don't want to carry batteries in trucks around you just want to have space for goods and people and that's where hydrogen plus a fuel cells comes in and gives you a proper solution to have an electrical powertrain plus range usually over a thousand miles and so it's a no-brainer knowing that hydrogen now will be produced at a price which is competitive with gasoline because prices of electrolyzer are going down following exponential curves like winds farms prices have gone down and solar panels prices have also gone down so it's not even a question of climate change it's just going for something that is silent without emissions great with a great experience and hydrogen is not only about mobility is also about heating in homes right it's also about developing energy independence so there are many many angles from which you can look at it but I would say those are the two main angles I would suggest to follow if you want to have a proper look at what hydrogen is I'd say that when I looked at your website and I saw that that position you're taking which you just articulated well it just brought everything together and you know I actually sat down at my desk several weeks ago and just started drawing you know kind of a mind map of why hydrogen and making all the connections producing oxygen for medical uses you know everything transportation grid stability storage and all the places connected and you're right when you paint that picture if I could if I could get a canvas and paint the picture everybody would be wondering why the heck we're using fossil fuels but I tell you we have to take a quick break here and come back with you Rafael and we'll have about 10 more minutes to wrap this up and talk about further what you just explained hi I'm Rusty Komori host of Beyond the Lines on Think Tech Hawaii my show is based on my book also titled Beyond the Lines and it's about creating a superior culture of excellence leadership and finding greatness I interview guests who are successful in business sports and life which is sure to inspire you in finding your greatness join me every Monday as we go Beyond the Lines at 11 a.m. Aloha hey Aloha my name is Andrew Lening I'm the host of Security Matters Hawaii airing every Wednesday here on Think Tech Hawaii live from the studios I'll bring you guests I'll bring you information about the things in security that matter to keeping you safe your co-workers safe your family safe to keep our community safe we want to teach you about those things in our industry that you know may be a little outside of your experience so please join me because security matters Aloha hey welcome back to stand the energy man on my lunch hour as usual and we're talking to he looks pretty awake but I'm surprised he's not a little bit sleepier Rafael Schochen from from Nice France on his vacation at midnight actually probably quarter after midnight 20 after and he's he's just a wealth of knowledge and I looked at his website and and it pulled so much together for me in terms of I'm always having to explain to people the advantages of hydrogen and and I've gotten a kind of a reputation as being pretty much just bullish on hydrogen but there's so so many reasons it makes sense and the more I learn the more these reasons just hopped into into my logic and say this is the way to go and obviously Rafael is in the same mindset so let's talk a little bit about the economics you started telling us that that the cost of producing hydrogen and the cost of producing clean energy with solar and wind is coming down to the point where it makes economic sense my fear though is that we'll kind of just take a nice steady pace at it and in the meantime if we have some kind of fossil fuel crisis of any kind whether it's a hurricane in Houston that shuts down refineries in the US or a Middle East crisis or whatever that we're going to be in the crisis mode and at that point we currently use those same fixed fuels that you talked about to build infrastructure for hydrogen or build components or do the industrial piece of hydrogen and it will make adopting hydrogen go even slower if we wait for the crisis can you talk a little bit about that the economic balance of of how fast we move into hydrogen and how we do it well if you look at the prices of you look at prices of electrolyzers and the size of electrolyzers they are following the same kind of curves that we have seen 15 years ago in the solar arena and 10 years ago in the winds energy arena so we are now in a situation where the price of hydrogen coming of electrolyzer is not anymore driven by the price of electrolyzer itself but by the price of power and we can foresee to be in the next five years five ten years in a range of I'm mentioning Europe at Euro USD is somehow similar to four euros per kilo and today as we talk together Stan I want to tell you about a project that landed which is before some players in Europe over the past few years wanted to develop hydrogen buses in cities in northern Europe and do it at scale the problem is that a diesel base or gasoline based bus costs roughly around let's say 300 K USD and today you can buy hydrogen buses around 500 K USD on the European market and then we have seven suppliers there's not yet a lot of them so they need to hand build them somehow and costs quite a bit of money and additional 200 K is a lot for a city today so those people an array of companies they decided to talk to the bus suppliers and ask them would you be able to lower your prices if you would build more of them they said yeah we need a hoarders of 100 or plus then the price could go down to 400 K this is not not enough it should be 350 K for a city to buy and they would be okay to pay the additional 50 K because this is a clean bus compared to a gasoline base and what those companies did is they went to the European Commission to ask for a subsidy for the remaining 50 K bring the prices down to 350 K then you will be surprised why I am not telling you anything about the price of fuel and the reason is that that's not where the problem is because with the Curain Electrolyzer technology compression technology and filling station technology different arenas in which we have quite a lot of players in Europe they can on the northern market in Europe where renewable power is abundant and cheap produce hydrogen at a price point which is the same as gasoline prices so it's not a problem of fuel costs it's just a problem of the equipment and if we go now with increased production sizes with hydrogen trucks and you have some leaders worldwide in the United States you have also other players in the other areas Asia and Europe if we have now you know more production of hydrogen based trucks hydrogen buses hydrogen cars we will be you know in a situation where the fuel is at price and the vehicles also at price so I'm very confident that all this is going to work well that's that's really an interesting thing here in the US I think we're not quite there with the fuel piece and I think it's because a lot of our economy is subsidizing continually subsidizing fuel like for example what is the price of gasoline in France now how many how many euros per liter or you know give us an idea well it's around one point six but you know we have had a lot of issues because it's difficult to compare things you know because we have a lot of taxes on so it depends from one country to the other one let's put it this way hydrogen is in the range there's a very interesting study by Shell on the internet on hydrogen showing that hydrogen is in the price range in terms of fuel of other alternative fuel being LNG or you know diesel for for trucks so and I can give you another example in Switzerland starting in September you will have a deployment of a fleet of 1600 hydrogen trucks in Switzerland and this is done without any subsidy why because trucks that are emitting CO2 in Switzerland have to pay a tax when they cross the country and so as this truck will not have to do it it's economical and it would just happen without subsidy so I think when we need to keep in mind is that this economy of hydrogen is happening we and it's happening much faster than one thing and yes it's going to be a competition between Asian European and American players but I also believe that there will be a lot of cooperation and what is also starting now that we didn't touch upon it we start to see the first structure in deals like you know acquisition or M&A in a magnitude of tens and millions of dollars once you have reached that thresholds and only grow so 2018 was already an interesting you may have a look on the media part of my website hydrogenvisors.com I did a review of everything that happened 2018 to another one in 2019 and I'm absolutely convinced that what 2019 is going to give us going to be even more astonishing than everything else that happened before and we are really now at a tilting time with that hydrogen economy. I'm going to encourage our viewers to do that to look at hydrogen advisors that's all basically one word.com to check out to your website because I found it fascinating and you know we're at 30 minutes already Rafael and and I really it does fly so fast but I'm so glad we had a chance to talk today and you can now go to sleep and get some rest and enjoy the rest of your beach time with your family but don't forget when the girls are a little older you'll have my phone number you can call me up and tell me when you're getting here and we'll make sure that we get you out to the beach and and let the girls have a great experience so thank you so much for your insight on hydrogen and we hope to see you soon and I'll have you on the show again we have lots more to talk about. Thanks Stan and I also look forward to see what's going to happen in Hawaii in the field of hydrogen because you have fantastic playground there and you do already amazing things and there's more to come. Okay if you can do me one favor is talk to those guys at Hyundai and tell them it's time to send their their cars out we have Toyota already has some Marais out here we need to get Hyundai out here so if you can do that for me I'd love it and then you can charge me a small premium for that as your advisor. Alright thanks Rafael and Aloha from Hawaii and Aloha to my viewers until next Friday it's Stan the energy man.