Thanks for the interesting read. I suspect it's the effect of nascent technologies, like transistors being more expensive than vacuum tubes at first, and printing presses being more expensive than quills and inkwells.

Further reading from the EPA about the methods of production and the emissions data for motor-vehicle use. EPA says about 95% is produced by reclamation from natural gas, so if it was 99.9% before it's growing exponentially, which is what we can hope for as non-grid production technologies are developed. Last point is that the ArsTechnica article only discusses one type of hydrogen fuel augmentation being used in one (massive) sector. The uplifting news is that in the foreseeable future, only antiques will use vacuum tubes fossil fuels.