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"The problem with wind and solar power is that they cannot meet power requirements on demand. Even if they produced power cheaper than fossil fuel plants electric power would cost more because, in addition to the solar and wind plants necessary to produce maximum peak load you would STILL have to have fossil fuel plants in sufficient quantity to provide power ON DEMAND for those times when solar and wind are not generating."

Which is exactly why the "hydrogen economy" is an important feature of the total energy package--STORAGE and transmission of energy with hydrogen solves your "demand" problem. "Load-balancing" then becomes an inherent part of the transmission system. It also is more efficient for transmission over long distances, and works for nuclear as well (no more need for load-balancing gas turbines--just design the nuke plant with a larger capacity factor).

Suggest you closely read Mr. cod's post #9 above. Do you have knowledge or experience with which to convince the skeptical that your statements are anything more than a pipe dream? Most of these alternate energy sources belong in that category.

"Which is exactly why the "hydrogen economy" is an important feature of the total energy package--STORAGE and transmission of energy with hydrogen solves your "demand" problem. "Load-balancing" then becomes an inherent part of the transmission system. It also is more efficient for transmission over long distances, and works for nuclear as well (no more need for load-balancing gas turbines--just design the nuke plant with a larger capacity factor)."

Hydrogen is just a big storage battery--which must be charged by electrolyzing water using fossil fuels or nuclear plants.

Forget the middleman and go directly to all-electric vehicles as a thought experiment. No longer can you load-balance with, e.g., hydrogen production. The extra generating capacity you would need to supply all of the vehicles in the U.S. is 500,000 megawatts, roughly 500 brand-new 1,000 megawatt nuclear plants. With hydrogen, the situation is WORSE, since electrolyzers run at ~70% efficiency (tops) meaning you would need ~714,000 megawatts.

--Boris