It's a chicken an egg problem.

We are using methane to produce h2 because synthesizing fuel (any fuel) is incredibly energetically inefficient. Otherwise we would be using electrolysis for h2.

Either you decide it's a problem, and you don't synthesize any fuel, or you will, and you'll oversize the energy grid and improve the synthesis process efficiency.

This thread assumes we decided we should synthesize fuel (I'm not sold, but I'm debating in that context).

If we do, then synthesis will never beat sourcing in efficiency for methane, since it's a direct process. But if there is a huge market for h2, there will be a incentive for over-sizing the grid and improving on electrolysis to the point that it can be competitive against sourcing methane + synthesize from that, which are 2 steps instead of one.

However, there is no way we can find a way to compete against sourcing methane (and no more step) alone. No good incentive to create.