That may be, but this was your first post :
The measure is what you put in versus the value of what you get out, and H2 as a transport fuel could have great "value" in the future. Gasoline has been a "great value" for transport fuel, but it would be way too expensive for use in generating electricity for the grid. It's the application of the fuel that determines it's value.
My point was, and still is, that the value (energy) we put into cracking the water (or other feed stock) into H2 is not offset by an equal or larger benefit. If you want to use nuclear energy to do it, then maybe I'll agree.
The point of the original article was that hydrogen will not replace oil, coal or natural gas. Nothing you've said shows that it will. Either nuclear or solar or wind will be needed.
Too many greens say "We need battery powered cars because they don't pollute" not realizing the batteries need to be recharged, most likely with coal generated electricity.
As soon as we have enough extra power from all the new nuke plants we'd need (I'm not holding my breath) then H2 becomes feasible (assuming we can keep the cars from exploding), until then, an H2 economy is a pipe dream.
You still don't know that. I have pointed out to you that the measure is not the energy input but the market value of the energy output. You also don't know what the future price of the alternatives will be. That is why the article is wrong. It assumes that simply because it would require more energy to crack H2 than it can deliver, it is not a viable transport fuel. That is a wrong-headed assumption. There are other measures that must be considered before you can make an judgment. We don't even know if it will be an energy intensive effort to generate H2. There is a possibility it could be a relatively simple biological process.
I have no problem with using nuclear, solar, wind, hamsters on a wheel or micro-organisms to generate the H2 as long as the delivered product is economical when compared to the alternatives. Without knowing the costs of all the other components of a future H2 infrastructure and comparing them to the future cost of hydrocarbon infrastructure, I am not prepared to rule H2 out as you and this writer have so boldly done. In fact, no one knows what those costs will be and no one can even predict them right now. Only the market can ever sort that out and looking at the history of how our markets have done amazing things in the past (the electrical and hydrocarbon infrastructures that grew from uneconomical nothings to fully developed in just a few decades) I'll be content sit back and see what happens.
BTW. This would normally be the point where I would trot out some old quotes by very learned people in the past confidently and authoritatively declaring that the airplane had no future, that man would never get meaningful energy from the atom, that electricity would only be valuable to large industry and municipal lighting, that the automobile was a passing fad or that AC could not possible run a motor. But I feel this conversation has gone on long enough. You have your mind made up and I'm not going to change it for you.