10:46 AM
Maturing as a documentary photographer and filmmaker requires attuning to the stories seeking you, not the other way around. The story of the burgeoning natural hydrogen industry sought me.
In September 2023, I traveled to Muscat, Oman, to produce and direct a short documentary for Eden Geopower. The project began in a room filled with US and Omani government officials, scientists, and industry leaders discussing iron-rich rocks as the possible energy source of the future, and Oman’s potential role as a global exporter. The next day we traveled in a convoy touring potential well sites. It dawned on me I might be witnessing the early days of something that could one day rival the discovery of oil itself, and that I was one of the first filmmakers in the world to document it. I remember saying to my crew, “It’s like we are 19th century filmmakers documenting oil prospectors!”
With this project we may have captured the beginnings of an entirely new energy era, one that could reshape how we produce and consume energy, with profound effects on global politics, climate, culture, and daily life. Or maybe we did not. Either way, I am fascinated by natural hydrogen and its potential.
What Natural Hydrogen Is
Natural hydrogen is hydrogen gas that occurs naturally in the Earth’s crust, produced through geological processes such as the reaction of water with iron-rich rocks, radiolysis, or volcanic activity. Unlike the hydrogen currently used in industry, which must be manufactured through energy-intensive processes, natural hydrogen can potentially be extracted directly from underground reservoirs, like oil and gas.
The road ahead will be difficult and beset by failures and false starts. Whether natural hydrogen can scale remains uncertain. Critics dismiss it as overhyped. Evangelists see it as revolutionary. I personally am more on the hopeful side, but I am not here to adjudicate that debate. I am here to document something with unfathomable potential unfolding in real time, while what it ultimately becomes remains unknown.
Why This Matters
This story about the beginning of an entirely new energy era, one that could reshape how we produce and use energy, is unrepeatable. If I do not capture this now, the founding moment will pass, and the story that is seeking me will vanish into time.
What compels me is not natural hydrogen alone but the human energy driving a new energy source forward. The partnerships being forged, the technical challenges being solved, the failures, the willingness to imagine a different energy future is documentary gold. This also offers something increasingly rare in our broader American cultural moment. At a time when envisioning a better future feels difficult, people in the natural hydrogen community are doing the work of building a new energy future regardless. After all, forebears who built earlier industries with oil and gas did not work with guarantees either. The impulse to build, to explore, to push toward something not yet proven is a deeply human one. This is the resonance I am engaging with in this project.
Who I Am
I am a documentary filmmaker and photographer based in Boston. I make films about energy and infrastructure around the world. I hold a PhD in international politics and documentary filmmaking. Documentary practice is my research method—my way of exploring the world and sharing what I learn.
I work as a creative director in the energy transition, primarily with scientists and engineers who have developed remarkable inventions but need help with storytelling and partnership development. Companies hire me to make their work resonate, attract funding, and build the relational and business development infrastructure that allows their ideas to be implemented in the real world.
What You Will Find Here
Photography and video about the emergence of a potentially transformative global industry. Conversations with the people building it. Field notes from site visits across the natural hydrogen landscape. And my own attempts to make sense of what I am witnessing as it happens.
My intention is to create a visual and narrative map of the early leaders and formative developments. Like natural hydrogen itself, I am also uncertain where this project will go!
Free subscribers receive everything. Paid subscribers get extended interviews and deeper dives into the technical and geopolitical dimensions.
Support This Work
Documentary projects like this one take time, travel, and sustained attention. If you are a brand, institution, or organization interested in partnering, I would welcome that conversation.
This could be the energy source of the future, or it could come to nothing. Either way, the story of people working toward that future matters right now. I invite you to join me as I document this unrepeatable moment in global history.