[biblewonk]

I envision a future with lots of windmills and bio diesel.

[Shermy]

Beware of the hype about hydrogen

Beware the attacks on hydrogen. Especially the anti-hydrogen articles that rountinely avoid mentioning natural gas, coal, and off-hour hydroelectric surplus as sources.

[Tony Niar Brain]

I have a problem with the author of this article about the costs of research into hydrogen energy cells. Expensive or not, R & D costs money, period, without ever having a guarantee of working. This is where the bulk of our defense budget goes.

I also distrust this article because of the experts cited. Not naming the sources outright is not a good sign of a thoroughly researched article.

The potential benefits of hydrogen energy cells justifies research into it. We need to do research before we can decide if it is even possible, not theorize.

[mrsmith]

The Great Hydrogen Myth (FR thread)

It takes some mighty cheap nuclear energy to make hydrogen affordable, heh, heh heh...

[Jack of all Trades]

Here's the original commentary for reference

By Alan Caruba
Feb. 11, 2003

Over the last 25 years, the government has spent $1.2 billion on fuel cell research and development. President Bush proposed spending another billion for further research in his recent State of the Union speech. Automakers have already spent millions to no avail.

The simple fact is that it still costs far more money to extract hydrogen, breaking its molecule away from others in order to create energy. This is a bad idea.

Hydrogen is held out as a clean-burning, virtually inexhaustible source of energy, but as a Washington Times editorial pointed out in November, others "suggest it is a gaseous dream rising on the rhetoric of environmental windbags."

If enough billions are spent, it seems reasonable to expect hydrogen to become an energy source, but like most environmental pipe dreams, this one has the silent agenda of eliminating petroleum as an energy source - nor can we reasonably expect a dramatic breakthrough. Did I mention this is a very bad idea?

Oil is the Green's number one enemy after population. The object is not to make the Earth safer, but to continue the pressure to reduce reliance on it, putting everyone at a disadvantage when it comes to utilizing this primary form of energy.

Given the fact that the Earth shows no signs of running out of oil in the near or even far future, the notion of spending billions to replace it seems odd at best, foolish at worst. The Earth's reserves of oil have been consistently underestimated for decades since oil was first discovered. To the contrary, discoveries of new reserves occur every year and the technology to get at it has improved as well.

The mere fact that Greens have fought attempts to open Alaska's Artic National Wildlife Refuge to oil exploration tells you more about their real agenda than anything else you need to know. The Department of Energy estimates there are at least one trillion barrels currently available worldwide.

If the Saudis were not sitting atop huge reserves, they would still be camel drivers and goat herders. If Saddam Hussein did not control the second largest reserve of oil, we might not be going to war to wrest control from this madman.

While it is true that a hydrogen-based economy is deemed inevitable for reasons of efficiency, environmental benefit and inexhaustibility, I remain wary of this. It is true, too, that hydrogen fuel cells have the potential to be almost twice as efficient as internal combustion engines, emitting only air and water vapor. But there are huge problems involved.

Three experts, Lawrence D. Burns, Byron McCormick and Christopher E. Borroni-Bird, noted in the October issue of Science that, "Viewed from where we are today, fuel cells and a hydrogen fueling infrastructure are a chicken-and-egg problem. We cannot have large numbers of fuel-cell vehicles without adequate fuel available to support them, but we will not be able to create the required infrastructure unless there are significant numbers of fuel-cell vehicles on the roadways."

Breaking a hydrogen molecule into electrons and protons, and then sending it through an electric drive motor, and recombining the particles with oxygen to produce water poses an enormous challenge.

"While hydrogen is universally abundant, it's not cheap to get at," noted the Washington Times editorial. "At the moment, fuel cells are actually energy losers, since it costs more to free the hydrogen than is earned by running hydrogen through fuel cells." In brief, it costs more energy to turn hydrogen into energy than current technology would permit.

Writing recently on the topic, Llewellyn King, publisher of White House Weekly ,
Noted, "In an act of political brilliance, President Bush, in his State of the Union Speech, stole the Holy Grail of environmentalism, the hydrogen-powered fuel-cell car. For two decades, environmentalists have held out the 'hydrogen economy' as the pollution-free future for transportation. Unfortunately, it also has had about it the whiff of a free lunch."

Five Presidents have put the federal government to work trying to achieve this goal. It remains a very bad idea.

The process involved is called hydrolysis, popularly called "cracking water." As King pointed out, "The former defeats the purpose because you still have to have oil, coal or natural gas to manufacture hydrogen."

This is what the Greens like to gloss over. Why not, asks King, just run a vehicle on natural gas to begin with? Why burden a vehicle with a duel system of reforming the gas and then making electricity? This seems so obvious that one is also compelled to ask, why not just keep using gasoline? The entire, worldwide structure of extracting oil to transporting it to refining it would have to be changed. Why not just keep finding new sources of oil since there is no evidence we are in imminent danger of running out of it?

Hydrogen has a very low energy density. It would cost more to fuel your car with it than our current system. As King notes, "The energy density of hydrogen is about one-tenth that of natural gas." Hybrid engines, available only in "demonstration" vehicles, would reduce our dependency on imported gas and this well may be the President's interest in this power source. That does not, however, make it any less of a bad idea.

Hydrogen is the new darling of the Greens as was nuclear energy a few decades ago until they abandoned their support and now actively fight the creation of new nuclear energy plants.

Forget about some spectacular breakthrough on hydrogen as an energy source. Do not be fooled by the Green's claims because, like everything else they propose, their primary goal is to reduce the population of the Earth and anything that can serve their agenda will be pursued amidst a flood of lies.

[Maceman]

So you're telling me I should dump my Ballard Power Systems stock, which I bought at 70 and is now around 10?

[yankeedame]

Part of the problem of energy costs, energy dependency, and the cost of oil can be found in the fact that the US has experienced a drop in its refining capability over the past twenty years. We went from being able to refine 18.5 million barrels to 16.5 million barrels. There has been an even sharper drop in the number of refineries, from 315 to 155! Thus, the US is highly vulnerable if even a small number of refineries stopped producing, even temporarily. A major factor for the dramatic increase in oil prices is this lack of refining capacity.

I found the article interesting until I hit the above paragraph. What the heck is that? The requise nod to the handwring-"Ashes, all is ashes!" crowd?

[green team 1999]

BMW is on 5th generation of hydrogen cars, still don`t work

[Poohbah]

Of course, if we use nuclear plants to crack the hydrogen, that will simply send the ecofreaks into a bigger tizzy.

Let's get moving on this...

[Waco]

While considering the use of energy to create energy, couldn't some sort of reverse process be used to alter natural gas reserves (huge) to make a liquid fuel (gasoline?) What would the efficiency be, of this? Wondering....

[kidd]

I worked at International Fuel Cells for 5 years where I worked with phosphoric acid fuel cells (PAFCs) and molten carbonate fuel cells (MCFCs). I also had a short exposure to polymeric membrane fuel cells (or PEM fuel cells) at the Treadwell Corporation.

I mostly agree with the author of the article. Fuel cells are a wonderful specialty power source. They are perfect for situations where emmisions are a problem (Los Angeles busses, indoor applications, space applications, etc), where quiet operation is imperative (military applications), or where a source of hydrogen is readily available (industry).

However, as a primary engine for general use, such as automobiles, fuel cells are expensive, finicky, delicate, respond poorly to a need for acceleration power, are damaged by exposure to sub-freezing temperatures and have a limited life of less than five years.

You simply cannot beat the energy density and relatively cheap availability of gasoline, as well as the durability and responsiveness of an internal combustion engine.

Hopefully, only economics will force us to switch to another fuel for cars. If we do have to switch, it'll either be LNG, gasified coal or ethanol.

[Pylot]

I used to work for a globally recognized energy company. This year that companies R&D estimated 5 to 7 years for certain specialty applications in hydrogen based fuel cells to become viable. They doubt wide spread use will ever be feasable.

I worked with a highly respected engineer here in the US who doubts the viability of hydrogen based cells on any basis because of two of the reasons cited in the article. One is the cost of production of hydrogen itself and the other is the unique danger posed by a ruptured cell.

[RightWhale]

hydrogen as an endless, virtually free, source of energy

This point should not be addressed at all. Probably there is no one left who believes hydrogen is an endless, virtually free, source of energy. Instead, the emphasis should be on hydrogen as a clean-burning fuel for cars or for the fuel cells.

[djf]

Methyl Hydrate. Anybody got a guesstimate about how the reserves of methyl hydrate on the ocean floors compare to the oil/gas reserves?

[Tailgunner Joe]

bttt

[Tribune7]

More nukes.