well, I don't think government should have any interest in how US citizens go about attaining their fuel or what fuel it is they attain. It certainly shouldn't be stealing money from the populace to prop up a strategy that is more expensive than the current one. Including, incidentally, one that pollutes more.
Let me repeat that, environmentalists pushing for hydrogen are pushing for a fuel that pollutes more, not less.
The goal of 'energy independence' is as shallow and as ridiculous as that of 'automobile independence', and has become little more than political jargon of the meddling elites.
Then Bush is out there talking about price gouging, of which, by definition, there is no such thing.
It is so topsy turvey, it is, frankly, somewhat mindboggling.
The Dept of Energy has sucked down $5 billion a year for 30 years, and if there isn't a gov't solution in hand by now there won't be. The latest example of gov't coming to the rescue was Katrina, and that is probably the best that can be expected. Being $9 trillion in debt can't be of any help, and the private sector is likewise $9 trillion in debt. There isn't much more where that came from. Answer? Horses? Bicycles?
We're better off getting away from the oil dependence (a lessen we should've learned 30 yrs ago during the oil embargo) than worrying about short term costs of adopting new technologies. Gas-electric hybrids and hydrogen fuel cells are two parts of a strategy. Don't be a luddite.
It's not necessarily more polluting to produce the hydrogen than to use oil. The libertarian Reason Institute's think tank's assumption was based on using natural gas plants. That's definitely not the only answer.