Scientists at Diamond Light Source, the UK’s synchrotron at Harwell Campus, the British Geological Survey and the Philippine Nuclear Research Institute, are studying the inside of ancient rocks from the Philippines to see if it could be the net source of clean fuel for the world. 

The rocks at the centre of this study came from the Zambales ophiolite system in the Philippines. An ophiolite is a section of ancient ocean floor thrust onto land through tectonic movement, geologically significant because the minerals it contains, particularly iron- and magnesium-rich rocks, are known to react with water in ways that generate hydrogen gas.

Zambales is not just any ophiolite. Surface hydrogen flux measurements taken at bubbling springs and seeps in that region rank among the highest natural fluxes ever recorded anywhere in the world, making it an exceptional site for studying the conditions that drive hydrogen generation.

PNRI scientists collected rock samples from several areas within the Zambales system as part of a broader project documented by Aquino et al. in 2025. Those samples were then shipped to the Diamond Light Source in Harwell for synchrotron analysis.

Natural hydrogen does not appear from nowhere. It forms through a combination of geochemical and biochemical reactions involving rocks, minerals, fluids, and microbes. Which minerals are present, how they interact with water, and what role microbial activity plays, these conditions together determine whether hydrogen is generated in quantities that matter.

Understanding those conditions at the atomic scale is the central challenge. Identifying which elements are driving the process, and in what configuration, could eventually allow scientists to pinpoint the precise geological signatures of a commercially viable hydrogen accumulation. That is the deeper purpose behind the synchrotron analysis.

Dr. Ruth Delina-Agillon, BGS experimental geochemist and principal investigator of the research, described the significance of the approach. Using the Diamond Light Source, she said, provided “a great opportunity to investigate the behavior of key elements in hydrogen seep systems at an unprecedented level of detail.” She called it “an important step towards understanding the drivers of natural hydrogen generation in ophiolitic environments, not only in the Philippines but worldwide.”

Hydrogen is already a working industrial material, playing an active role in metal treatment, fertilizer production, and chemical manufacturing. What is new is the growing recognition of hydrogen as a potential clean fuel and the question of where it might be found naturally, without the need to manufacture it.

When hydrogen burns, it produces no carbon emissions. That separates it from fossil fuels and makes it relevant to the global energy transition. Most hydrogen today is made using fossil fuels, which largely cancels the emissions benefit. Natural hydrogen sidesteps that problem entirely, generated by the Earth through geological processes that require no industrial input.

Original news article can be found here.