Mapping the research landscape of hydrogen supply chains: A bibliometric analysis of citations and co-citations

Abstract

The article aims to identify the most influential authors and publications in the research area of hydrogen supply chains. The analysis of the European Union’s strategic documents and hydrogen strategies announced by individual countries indicate that using hydrogen in the economy is becoming significantly more important. Therefore, scientists exploring the above topics in various research settings and scopes should also expect growing interest. The hydrogen economy, including hydrogen supply chains (HSC) as a tool for its implementation, is still a relatively young and dynamic research area. This applies especially to the so-called green hydrogen supply chains where the hydrogen feedstock is the renewable energy source. This work is intended to facilitate the identification of the most essential items of already published scientific works. The work carried out a bibliometric analysis for the research area “hydrogen supply chains”. As a result of the research, the following were identified: (1) the most frequently cited publications and their authors, (2) the journals and authors that had the most significant impact on research in a given area, (3) the publications to be which are most often referred to by authors writing works in the field of HSC, and (4) changes in the importance of places of publication and authors over time. Due to the complexity of the research issues, it is crucial to determine the most significant scientific achievements to date. This should constitute the basic cognitive base for properly implementing newly undertaken research: the hydrogen supply chain.