Evolving sustainable energy technologies and assessments through global research networks: advancing the role of blue hydrogen for a cleaner future

Abstract

Considering the interest in innovations in the energy sector and government policies that seek an energy system free of polluting agents, blue hydrogen, whose production takes place through fossil fuels with the capture of CO₂, is seen as a way to offer economic opportunities for production with a reduced amount of unwanted by-products. Thus, in blue hydrogen research, the United States leads in the number of publications (16) and the number of citations and H-index, closely followed by England, Norway, and China. However, when considering the number of institutions involved in research in this field, the United Kingdom has a prominent place, the main one being Research Libraries UK (RLUK), with 10 articles published. Also notable is the participation of South Korea in the ranking of active development agencies (8%). Thus, advanced bibliometric analysis techniques were implemented in this study, using the Web of Science website, to understand the cooperative relationships between authors, countries, institutions, and agencies in developing research on blue hydrogen, establishing parameters to understand future trends and the main derived subfields. Thus, it is possible to verify the role of the United States as the primary research center today and to identify which topics involve hydrogen production. Future research will address storage routes due to their relevance in integrating blue hydrogen into the energy matrix.