The Great Hydrogen Myth

Over the last twenty-five years, the government has spent $1.2 billion on fuel cell research and development. During his recent State of the Union speech, President Bush proposed spending another billion for further research. 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 use it 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 a 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 it 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 gaining access to the estimated 16 billion barrels of oil in Alaska´s ANWR area 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 being 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, 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 that "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.

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

Nothing new under the sun! - My high school chemistry teacher predicted this foolishness 43 years ago. He said that the stability of the water molecule is such that any attempt to split it is a poor use of energy. He's still right today. (big surprise)

costs more to free the hydrogen than is earned by running hydrogen through fuel cells

Hydrogen is merely a method of energy storage. Fusion could make energy cheap enough to use the storage method but until then, Hydrogen would require us to use some other form of energy source to feed the system.

Hydrocarbons are a dead end on the other hand.

"Unless they figure out that oil is still being created by the earth..."

That was figured out a long time ago, and it is producing it far faster than we will ever be able to burn it. - We're going to have to find ways to increase our use of petroleum to keep it from seeping up out of the ocean floor as it is doing off the central coast of California (and has done for hundreds of years).

What's your point?
Hydrogen is merely an energy storage medium, like compressed air to run your air drill.

That's precisely my point.

The notion of a "hydrogen-based economy" is just as absurd as a "compressed air based economy".

It's just another junk-science political buzzword foisted on a dumbed-down populace.

In my opinion, I think as technology improves we'll see the following happen first:

1. Automobiles will switch en masse to hybrid power, where 75 to 85 percent of the motive power is generated by a new generation of very clean-burning gasoline engines using direct-injection fuel delivery systems and low-sulfur gasoline (with selective cylinder shutdown to reduce fuel consumption in partial load conditions) and the rest generated by a electric motor that is recharged by the gasoline engine. Think of the hybrid drivetrains pioneered by the Toyota Prius and Honda Insight/Civic Hybrid and apply it on a larger scale. The result is automobiles with 35-45% better fuel mileage than now regardless of size.

2. Larger vehicles such as minivans, SUV's and pickup trucks will switch to the next generation of clean-burning diesel engines using low-sulfur diesel fuel; the excellent low-end torque of diesel engines are well-suited for these types of vehicles, and of course they'll get 35-40% better fuel mileage than today's gasoline-powered minivans, SUV's and pickup trucks. GM's amazing Duramax engine the sign of things to come for these types of vehicles.

In short, it is within easy technological reach to have automobile CAFE be 38 miles per US gallon and minivan/SUV/pickup CAFE be 27 miles per US gallon without going to exotic hydrogen power. And we'll get lower emissions since less exhaust is emitted per mile of driving due to the need to use less fuel in the combustion process.

The argument that "hydrogen takes more energy to create than you get from it" is specious at best. Everything takes more energy to create (in some form) than we get from it. Otherwise we would have a perpetual motion machine. There is an efficiency involved. Cars are not 100% efficient. They give off energy in the form of heat and sound.

Hydrogen is a great alternative. No I am not a liberal. I'm about as conservative as you get. I am also an Electrical Engineer and would love to have a fuel cell car. My dream would be hydrogen produced by an in-home electrolysis machine. This is probably not going to happen until we can get nucular (sic. for the Prez) plants online to provide cheap electrons. I would love to see big $$$ spent for the generation of electricity with no/little fossil fuels. Mostly to rob the Mid-east of its strangle hold on our economy.

There is a sub-rosa, environmental agenda behind some of the enthusiasm for Hydrogen cars but that is not the whole explanation. The same arguments being put forward against hydrogen as a primary fuel source were also put forward against coal and oil. When production is scaled up the cost numbers look much better.

The article completely omitted the most favorable scenario for hydrogen. That scenario envisions Hydrogen being produced in great quantities at little marginal cost as a byproduct of fission-based nuclear power generation.

For the first time in 25 years a new nuclear reactor is scheduled to be approved for construction by the Department of Energy. Adding hydrogen production as adjunct process to power gwneration is relatively easy to do with the new generation of "pebble-bed" reactors.

Mr. Bush's proposal makes a great deal more sense given the idea that DOE is seeking to set up "hydrogen wells" at the site of new nuclear reactors.

The high cost of fission energy comes primarily from overcoming the fanatical resistance to its use from the enviro whackos. However, natural Uranium (and Plutonium, which is derived from Uranium in a nuclear reaction) is similar to fossil fuels in that it is energy stored by nature at a different time and place, that we collect, process, and use. We have a lot of it, particularly since we have many tons of bomb-grade stuff that would need to be diluted twentyfold for power reactor use. But we are using up what exists on this planet, and it is not being replenished.

Fusion, on the other hand, is a NEW energy source if we can figure out how to do it. And of course, the fuel for fusion energy is ... Hydrogen! Well, actually Deuterium, an uncommon form of Hydrogen, but the amount of it found in the oceans would last for thousands of years.

But in the meantime, fossil fuels as an energy source will not go on forever. Renewable source fuels are not up to the task, and solar, wind, and tidal will never be more than marginal - they are intermittent and unreliable.

Hydrogen is an energy VECTOR, not an energy source. You only get out of it a portion of the energy that you expend manufacturing it. But someday, that may be the best that you can do. We use a lot of energy from incredibly expensive sources because of its convenience and portability. Think of a flashlight, or a portable radio.

Hydrogen can be dangerous stuff, and I don't think your insurance agent would take too kindly to filing a report about how you blew up your garage...
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Gasoline burns pretty well too. But then, we've become accustomed to the safety issues involved, and we're used to the risk. I'm certian that there are ways to make hydrogen "safer". Probably safer than gasoline, which tends to spread all over and flow in wrecks.

Hydrogen is extremely slippery--it's the smallest molecule, and it can leak out through the walls of a steel tank.

At atmospheric pressure, its energy density is very low, so it has to be compressed, liquified, or absorbed into metal hydrides. Compressed or liquid hydrogen would be EXTREMELY dangerous in a crash, much more dangerous than gasoline. Hydride storage is very heavy.

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.

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That statement is unbelievable and hence does a disservice to the arguments against this ludricrous use of hydrogen movement. Eventually we are going to run out of oil, regardless of whether past estimate of oil availability have been wrong. The idea of arguing from a hypothetical momentum of past error belongs to students in a grade school classroom. There is no such momentum.

Well, we can't convert until we get it to make sound sense monetarily, but when that day comes we want to hold all the patents for this stuff so that our country makes the money selling it to the world.

I was trying to tell someone this the other day - we cant "go green" before everyone else unless we stand to make money at it, otherwise countries still using oil for energy will make goods cheaper than we can.

Granted, I'm taking the word of someone who is a hydrogen promoter.

Enough said.

But... since one of the methods is to use electricity at night which right now is thrown away. It would seem to me that hydrogen produced by that method is basically "free".

Did your "hydrogen promoter" also tell you this falsehood?

The nice thing about hybrid cars is that they are here now. Of course, if they would also "plug in" to the grid, that would be all the more better.

The best idea I have seen is to store Hydrogen chemically as Sodium Borohydride, NaBH4. It forms a stable solution in water (with a little Sodium Hydroxide) that is about as hazardous (and as flammable) as the water in the wash cycle of your dishwasher. But when exposed to the proper catalyst, the reaction NaBH4 + 2 H2O => NaBO2 + 4 H2 releases large quantities of clean Hydrogen, leaving a residue of Sodium Borate (a laundry soap component) in water.

A full fuel cycle would have to recycle the Borate, with inputs of Hydrogen and energy, of course.

If you are interested, here is a link:

http://www.millenniumcell.com/solutions/white_hydrogen.html

And here is an alternative, that I don't like as well:

http://www.powerball.net/concept/index.shtml

Hydrogen generally will not leak out of compressed gas cylinders. It is however very flammable and it takes very little for it to go boom. It just is not practical... even via electrolysis, which results in a net energy loss. Energy is required to split very strong H-O bonds, which steals efficiency from the engine. Gasoline is much more efficient, and fuel standards help improve combustion efficiency to very high levels. Besides, oil is not just used for fuel. It is the source of many chemicals, some of which are used to produce polymers which find their way into everyday use. As of yet, they are difficult to synthesize from more "enviro-friendly" alternatives.

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