When will the Albanese government stop banging on about Australia becoming a renewable energy superpower? Of course, B1 is a big believer, so he will continue to drone on. But surely other ministers realise that the whole idea is ridiculous; that it sounds like a line from a superhero movie. In other words, it’s completely unworkable.

But Jimbo, who controls the money to a degree, remains fully on board, even though he clearly doesn’t have a clue about what it involves. Why would he bother to include ‘getting to net zero and becoming a renewable energy superpower’ as one of themes to be explored by the Productivity Commission? Surely, he must understand that the hard-heads – the few that are left at the PC – will make mincemeat of a sloppy concept such as ‘renewable energy superpower’.

In his May budget speech, he simply asserted that ‘the global energy transformation represents a golden opportunity for Australia. This budget invests in our renewable energy superpower ambition, including $13.7 billion in production tax incentives for green hydrogen and processed critical minerals, so industries are rewarded for scale and success.’

Did he say green hydrogen? Does he really appreciate the impediments facing the development of a green hydrogen industry at scale? And like Albo, he throws in green steel and green alumina – green anything will do – as further examples of the unattainable green dream.

I do doff my cap to our man of the moment in this space, Twiggy Forrest. Yes, he was a true believer in the renewable energy superpower. He possibly still is a true believer in a modified version. But when it comes to producing large quantities of green hydrogen in Australia – or anywhere, actually – it’s a complete bust, although Twiggy won’t quite admit it.

According to the Twigster, ‘We are by no means winding back on our commitment to green hydrogen. In fact, we are doing all we can to back green hydrogen in Australia by investing in renewable energy and hydrogen technology every single day. The price of power remains a challenge in Australia, and this has been caused by fossil fuels and the subsidies provided for fossil fuels.’

There is a real advantage of Fortescue being a listed company. Ultimately, he can’t hide the truth from the shareholders and the news of job cuts of 700 and refocusing the company must be declared publicly. Having massively talked up the prospects of becoming a viable producer of green hydrogen, both here and around the globe, he has had to largely fold’em. Only three small green hydrogen projects are left on the books.

Twiggy’s dream had been to produce 15 million tonnes of green hydrogen by 2030. He may end up producing a tenth of a tonne, may be a little more, as a pilot. Missed by this much, I guess.

It’s important here to understand the four elements in a green hydrogen strategy that need to combine for there to be any hope of future development. They are: cheap, continuous green energy; loads of pure water; massive investment in transport and infrastructure; and customers.

There simply is not cheap continuous green energy available and there is no point taking electrons from the grid because that would be robbing Peter to pay Paul. (Can I still say that? Should it be Peta and Paulina?) The thing is the electrolysers, which split the water into hydrogen and oxygen, are expensive and need to run continuously.

Intermittent renewable energy is a really bad fit – I should repeat that, a really, really bad fit – for producing hydrogen using electrolysis. There are also the issues of the land mass that the turbines and solar panels would take up as well as the cost.

In order for green hydrogen to have any hope of attracting big customers, a figure of $3 per kilogram is seen as the benchmark. In turn, this would require continuous electricity costing between $20 and $30 per megawatt hour; the cheapest on the market for wind and solar for these projects is $70 and this doesn’t cover firming costs. In other words, we are so far out of the game that it’s laughable.

There is a big policy issue being debated by wonks around the world about how green the electricity has to be in order for the production of hydrogen to qualify for the full government subsidies. Twiggy has become very annoyed by the whole discussion because some overseas countries include ‘close-to-green’ but Australia does not.

When it comes to water, we are talking a lot of water. One proposal doing the rounds in Gladstone is the construction of a pipeline from one of the northern rivers to deliver the water. Bear in mind here that we are talking about a lot of water. Normally, greenies would be going crazy about the environmental effects of such a project. They should also be going crazy about vast wind turbines and hectares of solar panels taking over the land.

Then there is the massive investment in specific infrastructure which is required in order for hydrogen to be used as a fuel in a variety of ways, including as a substitute for natural gas. This had been former chief scientist, Alan Finkel’s dream, with green hydrogen being used as one of the principal means of firming electricity grids. He has now backed away from this thought bubble.

Hydrogen easily escapes from standard pipes and renders them brittle. It is also highly flammable and explosive. In other words, the case for conversion has to be very strong and economically attractive for investors to put up the dough.

(Don’t forget that laughable proposition of Albo’s before the election that the newly constructed Kurri Kurri gas plant in the Hunter Valley would initially be fueled by some hydrogen and would in time become 100 per cent hydrogen. The whole thing was simply made up. There is no hydrogen available and the plant will operate completely on gas for years to come.)

Of course, no market is a market without customers. As mentioned above, the critical price point is seen as $3 a kilogram. Even with the federal government chipping in subsidies of $2 per kilogram of green hydrogen produced, the feasibility studies all point to a massive gap between the achievable cost point and the price at which customers will sign up.

The Japanese remain slightly keen on hydrogen but all the original timelines have slipped significantly. With their nuclear reactors being turned on again and possible investment in new nuclear plants, it may turn out that Japan is not the lucrative market for green hydrogen it was once thought to be.

Let’s all take a collective sigh and conclude that both ‘renewable energy superpower’ and ‘green hydrogen’ are just political-speak for a government that doesn’t know what it’s doing but hopes that it might sound good to the voters.

The reality of physics, engineering and economics has a habit of eventually slapping politicians in the face and with much more power than a wet lettuce.