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Geologic Hydrogen's Three-Continent Drilling Rush

Geologic Hydrogen's Three-Continent Drilling Rush

US, Canadian and Australian explorers are chasing naturally occurring 'white' hydrogen with new wells and a lab study, and a USGS model puts the trapped resource at up to 5.6 trillion metric tons. None of it has reached the financing stage the Gulf's own hydrogen strategy already cleared in 2023.

Geologic ('white') hydrogen remains a resource estimate and a handful of test wells, not a financed supply chain. The U.S. Geological Survey models up to 5.6 trillion metric tons trapped underground, but only Mali's Bourakebougou field has ever produced it commercially. NEOM Green Hydrogen Company's financed $8.4 billion Saudi plant has no rival here. This is analysis, not advice.

The Gulf Barrel Desk · 5 min read

Geologic ('white') hydrogen's three-continent drilling push is a resource estimate and a handful of test wells, not a financed supply chain. This is analysis, not advice. The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) models up to 5.6 trillion metric tons of hydrogen trapped in rock worldwide, but only Mali's Bourakebougou field has ever produced it commercially, at village scale since 2012. Set against NEOM Green Hydrogen Company's already-financed $8.4 billion Saudi plant, nothing described below has reached a financing decision.

Three Wells, One Lab Study, No Shared Discovery

The "momentum" is three unrelated projects, not one emerging field. In Western Australia, Edith Cowan University researchers led by Kaveh Moghanirahimi showed magnetite-rich Pilbara iron ore can generate hydrogen through iron-oxidation when heated with water to 200°C for 60 days in a lab, a mechanism distinct from the serpentinization usually invoked (Edith Cowan University; International Journal of Hydrogen Energy). In North America, HyTerra is flow-testing its McCoy-1 well in Kansas's Nemaha project, and Max Power Mining has drilled a third validation well to 2,278 meters at Saskatchewan's Lawson Complex.

The Resource Estimate Isn't a Reserve

A modeled resource is not a proven, recoverable one. USGS geochemists Sarah Gelman and Geoffrey Ellis modeled that up to 5.6 trillion metric tons of hydrogen may be trapped in rock formations worldwide, with 15 to 31 million tons generated annually (U.S. Geological Survey; Science Advances, December 2024). Most of that is modeled as too dilute, too deep, or too dispersed to ever be drilled economically; the study itself flags roughly 100,000 million tons as the plausibly recoverable slice, enough to matter, not enough to declare a new energy category proven.

The Only Well That Has Ever Actually Produced It

Outside a lab, exactly one natural-hydrogen field has supplied continuous power: Bourakebougou, Mali. A well drilled in 1987 and re-tested in 2011 found gas running as high as 98 mol% hydrogen roughly 100 meters down; since 2012 it has fueled a generator serving the village's roughly 1,500 residents (Malian well records; Scientific Reports, 2023). University of Toronto geochemist Barbara Sherwood Lollar, who has studied natural hydrogen seeps since the 1980s, notes the gas forms through ongoing water-rock reactions underground, not a one-time deposit — which is also why nobody has yet proven it flows at industrial rates anywhere else.

Sized Against What the Gulf Has Actually Financed

Set this against the hydrogen project the Gulf has already built, not modeled. NEOM Green Hydrogen Company — the ACWA Power, Air Products and NEOM joint venture — reached financial close on its $8.4 billion Saudi plant in May 2023, backed by $6.1 billion of non-recourse bank debt and a signed 30-year offtake with Air Products for the renewable ammonia (Ammonia Energy Association; NEOM Green Hydrogen Company). That is an FID, an EPC contract and a buyer. Nothing described above — in Kansas, Saskatchewan or the Pilbara — has reached even a construction decision, let alone a financed offtake.

What to Watch

The next real test is dated, not speculative. HyTerra has scheduled a production flow test at its McCoy-1 well in Kansas for the second quarter of 2026, after mud-gas samples there measured hydrogen concentrations up to 96.1% — among the highest recorded anywhere (HyTerra; FuelCellsWorks). HyTerra has also signed Prometheus Hydrogen to purify and store that gas, targeting the first delivery of natural hydrogen to a paying customer by December 2026. If that flow test and delivery both hold, geologic hydrogen gets its first commercial data point. This is analysis, not advice.

Is geologic ('white') hydrogen the same as the green hydrogen the Gulf is building?
No. Green hydrogen, the basis of Gulf projects like NEOM Green Hydrogen, is manufactured by electrolyzing water with renewable power. Geologic hydrogen is naturally occurring gas generated underground by water-rock reactions and extracted by drilling — closer to a conventional gas play than a manufacturing process.
Has any geologic hydrogen project reached a final investment decision?
Not based on public disclosures reviewed for this piece. Mali's Bourakebougou field has run a village generator since 2012 without ever being scaled commercially, and the US, Canadian and Australian projects cited here are still in exploration or pre-production testing, per company statements and USGS research.
How large is the estimated geologic hydrogen resource?
The USGS's December 2024 model put the global in-place resource at up to roughly 5.6 trillion metric tons, though the agency's own study estimates only a small recoverable slice — on the order of 100,000 million tons — would likely be economically accessible.
  1. White Hydrogen Drilling Push Gains Momentum Across Three Continents — OilPrice.com
  2. Model predictions of global geologic hydrogen resources — Science Advances / U.S. Geological Survey
  3. NEOM project reaches financial close, 30 year offtake secured — Ammonia Energy Association
  4. Characterization of the spontaneously recharging natural hydrogen reservoirs of Bourakebougou in Mali — Scientific Reports (Nature)
  5. HyTerra Confirms Elevated Hydrogen and Helium Flows at Kansas Well; Production Test Eyed for 2026 — FuelCellsWorks
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