Just curious, what alternative fuels produce far more energy? Hydrogen fuel still relies on coal and petroleum due to their high concentration of hydrogen. Water is not a viable source. The hydrogen isn't dense enough. Solar and wind take up vast amounts of land space and cause other environment problems. Ethanol uses more fuel to produce than it generates. Nuclear is the only option I can think of and I've been thinking about non-petroleum related energy since the 1970's.
If a person could figure out a cheap, efficient, small footprint, powerful fuel resource they would make trillions of dollars. I want to be that guy. Unfortunately the best I could come up with it rigging exercise equipment up to the power grid. I had an idea for perpetual motion once. That is until I worked the math. Personal nuke stations have tickled my fancy from time to time. Too much sci-fi I guess.
Rapeseed sourced BioDiesel for one. It has a net energy balance of 3 to 1. And that's for the energy in the BioDiesel alone (no wacky energy accounting tricks like including byproduct energy offsets). BioDiesel from other source oil crops have even higher net energy balances, but not all of them grow well in the U.S. (and I only remember the number for Rapeseed). Even ethanol has a slightly positive net energy balance.
Of course no fuel is perfect. The two main problems with BioDiesel are the corporate farm subsidies that keep the price of the source oil artificially high and the plain fact that we probably don't have enough available farm land capacity to meet our current (not to mention future) fuel demands. The second problem might be resolved if someone invests a bit of cash into developing oil algae farming techniques. The first will probably never be solved so long as there are Democrats in congress.
Hydrogen fuel still relies on coal and petroleum due to their high concentration of hydrogen.
The so called "hydrogen economy" is at best a pipe dream, and at worst a joke. Because it has such a high mass energy density, hydrogen makes an excellent rocket fuel. But because it has such a low volumetric energy density, it makes a lousy vehicle fuel.
Like you said, commercial hydrogen comes from fossil fuels (natural gas mostly). As such, it makes more sense to just burn the natural gas. For hydrogen to be a renewable fuel, it needs to be produced through electrolysis. That consumes a lot of electricity and that electricity has to come from somewhere. And it's none too efficient either. Again, it makes more sense just to use the electricity. The actual hydrogen combustion itself may be "zero emissions", but that just about the only thing hydrogen has going for it as a fuel.
Personal nuke stations have tickled my fancy from time to time.
Probably a Very Bad IdeaTM. Consider the absolutely pathetic maintenance the average person (liberals especially) does on their car. Now think about what would happen to a nuke in their care.