OKLAHOMA STATE UNIVERSITY (OSU) researchers have secured shale-backed funding to investigate the state’s natural hydrogen reserves.
The project was one of eight to receive US$25,000 in a recent round of funding from the Hamm Institute for American Energy – the research grant provider funded by Harold Hamm, founder and CEO of major US shale producer Continental Resources.
The research team at the university’s School of Chemical Engineering plans to survey parts of Oklahoma and surrounding states for deposits of geologically formed hydrogen gas, also known as “white hydrogen”. The project will run until July 2026.
White hydrogen is formed through oxidation of ferrous iron minerals. According to the 2025 US Geological Survey, the Southern Oklahoma Aulacogen (SOA) likely contains deposits of white hydrogen owing to its iron-rich rock. The researchers say that the tight shales that overlay porous reservoirs near the SOA could act as natural seals for the hydrogen.
Prem Bikkina, a professor of petroleum engineering who is leading the research, described white hydrogen as “an emerging frontier in clean energy”. He told TCE that Oklahoma is “exceptionally well positioned to emerge as a leader in natural hydrogen development” owing to the state’s “subsurface potential and above-ground readiness”. As the fifth-largest crude oil-producing state in the US, Oklahoma has existing infrastructure that could be adapted for white hydrogen production, he argues. Its deep knowledge of stratigraphy, fault systems, reservoir behaviour and subsurface fluid flow is also well suited to supporting white hydrogen development.
The team will use legacy oil and gas well records and new geological data to produce and analyse a dataset of white hydrogen deposits in the region and assess the viability of its extraction.
Bikkina also said the SOA could act as a “natural hydrogen reactor”, using iron-rich mafic and ultramafic minerals in the rock as feedstock. By injecting water enriched with catalysts and oxidants, they could accelerate hydrogen formation in the rock and then extract the gas using techniques similar to conventional shale fracking.
Ann Bluntzer Pullin, executive director of the Hamm Institute, said the funding is “about backing the people and ideas that have the potential to change the way we power our communities, our state and our country”.
Growing commercial interest
White hydrogen is gaining attention as a potential naturally occurring green fuel. It has been used to power homes and shops in the village of Bourakébougou in western Mali for at least a decade, having been discovered by accident during hydrocarbon exploration. Last year, a reservoir containing up to 250m t of the gas was discovered around 1 km below the surface of Lorraine in France, while in Australia, over 40 licences have been issued for white hydrogen exploration since 2021.
Commercial interest in white hydrogen has grown in recent years, with previously sceptical fossil fuel and mining giants – including bp, Shell, Chevron and Rio Tinto – now making small investments. Philip Ball, a geothermal energy expert and honorary senior research fellow at Keele University, told TCE that as recently as 2023, companies often doubted the existence of white hydrogen. “Now we seem to have less resistance in that argument.”