{"id":21636,"date":"2025-06-30T20:52:36","date_gmt":"2025-07-01T02:52:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/once-an-energy-community-always-an-energy-community-questa-builds-a-green-hydrogen-plant\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T22:08:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T04:08:11","slug":"once-an-energy-community-always-an-energy-community-questa-builds-a-green-hydrogen-plant","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/once-an-energy-community-always-an-energy-community-questa-builds-a-green-hydrogen-plant\/","title":{"rendered":"Once an energy community, always an energy community: Questa builds a green hydrogen plant"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Questa,
Questa, New Mexico\u2019s green hydrogen project will most likely be built on land currently owned by Chevron. Kit Carson Electric Cooperative received a $231 million grant in January 2025 for green hydrogen. (Ilana Newman\/The Daily Yonder)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

Questa has always been an industrial community. John Ortega, mayor of the Village of 1,797 in northern New Mexico, said his father worked at the Chevron Molybdenum mine for around thirty years until it closed in 2014.<\/p>\n

The mine has been in remediation ever since, resulting in a reduction of about half the jobs it previously provided. But now, thanks to a $231 million dollar grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Questa is at the forefront of energy innovation \u2013 building a green hydrogen power plant on the former mine property and current Superfund site \u2013 that will bring Taos County to 100% renewable energy.<\/p>\n

\u201cQuesta has always been an energy community, a production community. We love the land, and we\u2019re going to continue to be an energy community,\u201d Ortega told the Daily Yonder in an interview.<\/p>\n

Being the mayor is in Ortega\u2019s blood, in a community where history has a lot of weight. His grandpa, uncle, and aunt were all previous mayors of Questa. He started his career as an EMT and at the local fire department, as a way to \u201cmake this place better,\u201d But when that didn\u2019t make the change he wanted to see, \u201cthe next step is to run for public office,\u201d said Ortega.<\/p>\n

Now, Ortega and the Village of Questa are working with Kit Carson Electric Cooperative and other community organizations to build a green hydrogen plant in Questa.<\/p>\n

\"Kit
Kit Carson Electric Cooperative in Taos County, New Mexico has been 100% daytime solar since 2022 and is now working to bring that to 100% solar electricity 24 hours a day through a new green hydrogen project. (Ilana Newman\/The Daily Yonder)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>
An innovative electric cooperative<\/div>\n

Luis Reyes was into solar before it was cool. It was the year 2000, and coal-powered electricity was still king in the Southwest. But the members of Kit Carson Electric Cooperative, where Reyes was the CEO, wanted solar.<\/p>\n

Reyes saw it as a smart economic decision, living in a place where the sun shines 300 days a year. It wasn\u2019t a climate issue, it was an economic one.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you really want to lower people\u2019s energy bills, you should give them the lowest-cost energy resource in that region. If someone wants to pay five and a half cents for fossil fuel, I\u2019m not going to oppose them,\u201d said Reyes in his office in Taos, New Mexico, in April of 2025, just as the temperatures were starting to warm up in the southwestern mountain town.<\/p>\n

\"Kit
Kit Carson Electric Cooperative CEO, Luis Reyes, stands in front of a solar array in the parking lot of the electric co-op in April 2025. (Ilana Newman\/The Daily Yonder)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

In Taos County, the cheapest type of energy was solar.<\/p>\n

it Carson Electric Co-op has been 100% daytime solar powered since 2022, thanks to Reyes\u2019 efforts. But the problem with solar-generated electricity is that if the sun isn\u2019t out, there\u2019s no energy being produced. Another challenge is how to store that energy for later use.<\/p>\n

KCEC started looking into battery options for long-term storage, with at least 100 hours of storage capacity. At the time, the best commercial battery options were only 6 hours of storage, so KCEC started considering other options, like green hydrogen.<\/p>\n

In mid-January 2025, KCEC received $231 million from the USDA\u2019s Empowering Rural America Program (New ERA) to fund green hydrogen power generation and battery storage.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe weren\u2019t the cool kids, and now it\u2019s like we\u2019re the cool kids,\u201d said Reyes, remarking on how much has changed in the energy world since he first started pursuing renewable energy in the early 2000s.<\/p>\n

When asked if the community of Questa could ever have pursued a project like this without federal funding, Ortega replied, \u201cAbsolutely not. These grants have been incredible. I don\u2019t know that of a 231 million project that\u2019s ever come into Taos County. Even northern New Mexico, for that matter.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"A
A graph from the Communities LEAP Intermediate Feasibility Study done by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory about the Questa hydrogen project. Courtesy of NREL.<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>
The future of renewable energy?<\/div>\n

Green hydrogen is hydrogen produced through electrolysis \u2013 using electricity, in this case, solar, to separate the hydrogen from water. Green hydrogen is currently mostly used in transportation \u2013 hydrogen fuel cells power long-haul trucking and other heavy transportation.<\/p>\n

Most hydrogen production currently comes from natural gas, and the process produces carbon dioxide emissions. Green hydrogen production does not emit any carbon dioxide, although there are some \u201cembedded emissions\u201d due to the production of solar panels. The only thing left over once the hydrogen is split from the oxygen is some water.<\/p>\n

Kit Carson Electric Co-op partnered with the Village of Questa, where they planned to build the green hydrogen plant, and other community partners to create the Questa Community Coalition. The coalition applied for and was accepted into the Communities Local Energy Action Program (LEAP), a Biden-era energy transition program.<\/p>\n

Green hydrogen acts as a battery for renewable energy from sources like solar and wind. When energy is being produced, it\u2019s used to power electrolyzers that split the hydrogen from the oxygen and store it in a fuel cell. When needed, the fuel cell is burned to produce electricity.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the wintertime, when there\u2019s less sun and maybe the wind isn\u2019t blowing as much, or if you have some sort of long duration outage, then you can do the second half this process, which is to use that stored hydrogen in a fuel cell,\u201d said Elaine Hale, one of National Renewable Laboratory researchers who helped with a feasibility study to see if green hydrogen was a good fit for Questa.<\/p>\n

The answer was yes. The ideal site for the green hydrogen plant? The Chevron-owned former molybdenum mine.<\/p>\n

When asked for a comment, Chevron replied that it is \u201cconsidering the sale of land and water rights to KCEC for their project.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"A
A view of Chevron\u2019s molybdenum mine, just up the road from Questa, New Mexico. The mine closed in 2014 and is currently a Superfund site with ongoing remediation. (Ilana Newman\/The Daily Yonder)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>
Water in the desert<\/div>\n

Green hydrogen is a water-intensive process. In a place that receives an average of only 12 inches of rain a year, like Taos County, this is a concern.<\/p>\n

But the coalition\u2019s hope is that reclaimed water from both the Chevron mine and Questa\u2019s municipal wastewater can provide needed supply without pulling from revered irrigation systems.<\/p>\n

Earlier in 2025, Chevron settled a water dispute with the state, which claimed that the water rights were not in use and were forfeited under the \u201cuse it or lose it\u201d clause of New Mexico\u2019s water law. The fight began when Chevron tried to sell 7 acre-feet of water to a Questa business, and the state claimed that those rights were not valid because they had not been in use.<\/p>\n

Water is a big deal in the desert, and water rights are a day-to-day issue for residents of Questa and Taos County. Ortega and other residents expressed gratitude for the settlement because those water rights will remain in their community and could be used for local projects like the green hydrogen plant.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe didn\u2019t lose water,\u201d said Ortega, \u201cthey actually kept a lot of the water rights, and they didn\u2019t lose water rights. The fear was that they were going to take water rights that were originally in the Questa-Taos area and sell \u2019em to Santa Fe.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"ohn
ohn Ortega is the mayor of Questa, New Mexico and works as a safety coordinator at Kit Carson Electric Cooperative. (Ilana Newman\/The Daily Yonder)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Chevron planned to donate 120 acre-feet of water to Questa, which will help fill a deficit in water rights that the Village has had since the 70s and support future developments like the green hydrogen. An acre-foot of water is valued at around $16,000 in Taos County.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe settlement ensures Chevron has sufficient water rights for environmental remediation of the mine site,\u201d said Chevron in an email, \u201csurplus water rights are also available for communities in the Questa area and Taos County.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ortega said that Chevron is also putting about a million gallons of treated water into the Red River a day. That, along with treated municipal wastewater, could be used to power the green hydrogen plant.<\/p>\n

\u201cMight as well use it for something,\u201d said Ortega, \u201cIt\u2019s perfect use for it, it\u2019s not going to waste. And we\u2019re not using water from our well or the aquifer.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hale, the NREL researcher, said that \u201cthe water that goes into the electrolyzer does need to be really pure,\u201d so additional purification might be necessary even after initial treatment of something like wastewater.<\/p>\n

\"This
This 82 kilowatt solar array in the Kit Carson Electric Cooperative parking lot was one of the first built by the electric co-op, in 2010. (Ilana Newman\/The Dailey Yonder)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Benefits to Questa<\/p>\n

\u201cThe tax benefit of that build in Questa is going to be tremendous,\u201d said Ortega, \u201cit\u2019s going to allow us to fix roads maybe, or at least get engineering done on roads and some of our projects long term, it\u2019s going to provide jobs at the facility itself.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to an economic impact study done by NREL as part of the Communities LEAP program, Questa would receive about $800,000 in tax revenue during construction of the green hydrogen plant and $210,000 annually once the plant is built. It will also produce around 20 full-time jobs, once it is up and running, with many more jobs initially for the construction phase.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s going to be mostly skilled laborers,\u201d said Ortega. \u201cThere\u2019s going to need to be a training process, but we\u2019ve actually already engaged the school, the university, and UNM Taos.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lynn Skall, executive director of Questa Economic Development Fund, said that they\u2019re always working toward sustainable economic growth for the village. \u201cWe don\u2019t want to lose what makes Questa unique and what makes it have a cultural and strong heritage,\u201d Skall told the Daily Yonder. She sees the green hydrogen plant as the right direction for the Village.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s going to be a tremendous asset for the community, and the growth that will come from it will hopefully stay in line with the direction that the community wants it to go,\u201d said Skall.<\/p>\n

The community, however, is currently concerned about the safety of green hydrogen.<\/p>\n

\u201cHydrogen is a really small molecule, so all the materials that are used to contain the hydrogen need to be at a different level of standards for holding that in. On the plus side, because it\u2019s so small, it dissipates faster, kind of just floats away,\u201d said Hale.<\/p>\n

Kit Carson is currently in the process of conducting a safety study, with a $500,000 grant from the Department of Energy. Hydrogen has been used industrially for over 80 years and is seen as just as safe if not safer, than flammable fuels like propane, gasoline, and natural gas.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverybody in Questa has a propane tank in their yard and everybody drives cars,\u201d said Skall. \u201cSo everything explodes if you don\u2019t handle it correctly. Green hydrogen is safe. It just has to be handled right.\u201d<\/p>\n

The first of its kind<\/div>\n

Questa\u2019s green hydrogen plant would be one of the first of its kind in the United States, paving the way for other similar projects to follow suit. Similar projects are also being pursued in California, Utah, and Illinois, although most of those are producing hydrogen for other markets, not to power their own local electricity.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf a small distribution co-op in North-Central New Mexico can figure it out, the Xcels (major for-profit electric companies) of the world surely can figure it out and fill the gaps that we may miss,\u201d said Reyes.<\/p>\n

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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