[Varmint Al]

Paul J. Georgia really nails it! I heard him on KSFO Radio 560 AM on the dial this morning. Very quiet spoken, but grounded in science and facts. It was so refreshing. The CEI web site looks like an excellent site to bookmark for accurate science.

[PhiKapMom]

Thanks for posting this. I think the hydrogen car should be pushed to the way back burner and have "zero" funds allocated for it. Just my two cents!

[HuntsvilleTxVeteran]

Check out the new engine design
www.starrotor.com

130 hp engine in two cubic feet.
this would give a full sized car 90 mpg.
engine would last 1,500,000 miles.
will run on most fuels.

[VRWC_minion]

Busbh ought to come out for every idea the wackos have. That would end them for good.

[CasearianDaoist]

The only way to mke a hydrogen economy" work would be cheap and abundant nuclear fusion. Here hydrogen it a plentiful by-product of the process. BTW, we just rejoined ITER, the large internaltional next generation fussion project. It may turnout that long term funding of fusion and hydrogen engines will turn out to be look quite visionary 20 years or so down the line.

[templar]

Very quiet spoken, but grounded in science and facts. It was so refreshing

Well, arguments also grounded in science and fact:

Bumblebees can't fly
A man cannot stand speeds in excess of 35 miles per hour without dying
The world is flat
The universe revolves around the earth
Travel past the Van Allen belt is impossible since it impossible for rockets to carry the nescessary weight of lead shielding to protect the people on the ship.
The speed of light is fixed and cannot change
etc.

What is scientific and factual today is not what will be scientific and factual in the future. The purpose of research is to develop new science and new facts. Consider what an early electrical engineer in 1903, only a hundred years ago, would say to the idea of the semi conductors and computers that we all take for granted today.

[AdamSelene235]

Transition to a Nuclear/Hydrogen Energy System
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/797219/posts

[Wonder Warthog]

"The process of extracting hydrogen uses energy, which means that using hydrogen is less efficient than burning fossil fuels."

Sorry, Al, but this kind of blanket statement is bull****. Sure, extracting hydrogen uses PART of the energy, but what matters is the efficiency of the TOTAL CYCLE including hydrogen extraction.

For instance, if one is talking about a mobile application, burning gasoline in an IC engine is likely to be much LESS efficient than extracting the hydrogen from the same gasoline and using it to power a fuel cell/electric drive, simply due to the far higher conversion efficiency of the fuel cell/electric system.

I'm sorry you think the CEI site has "accurate science", because it doesn't. Like all "policy" sites--it only tells the part of the story that fits its agenda. If you want accurate SCIENCE, try:

here:

[ancient_geezer]

This article completely overlooks the research being done on catalyic & photosynthetic production of hydrogen from organic molecules.

Strong advances are being made in this area. Catalysts currently under study are lowering the temperature (i.e. energy) requirements for extraction of hydrogen every year.

Combining the catalytic production of hydrogen with fuel cell technology is a promising avenue that is being explored and the president's program would be focusing attention to the R&D of these projects.

Not useful today, but it is definitely on its way. There is more than one way to aquire hyrogen than the energy intensive processes used now.

[Core_Conservative]

I agree that Buch should not be spending my hard earned money on Fuel Cell Research. I have been to several websites that promote a household generator - which works completely off of self seperated hydrogen. In order to seperate the hydrogen from the water to produce the chemical reaction which produces electricity - you need to have a catalyst. One such catalyst is borax - yup that's right - the old standby laundry soap. Look it up - there are plenty of on-going project which already work - the auto companies already have fuel cells - it's just that I think that they are on the wrong tract - they are still using gas for the catalystic product - YA DON't NEED IT!

[tallhappy]

Actually his comments are specious and border on intellectually dishonest.

This passage for example:

But hydrogen is not a source of energy, something which hydrogen advocates either don't understand or refuse to acknowledge. Since hydrogen does not exist in geological reservoirs it must be extracted from fossil-fuel feedstocks or water. The process of extracting hydrogen uses energy, which means that using hydrogen is less efficient that burning fossil fuels.

His comments do not address his statement that "hydrogen is not a source of energy".

His comments addres the lack of hydrogen available, not whether or not if it were available would it be a viable energy source.

His comments are written to falsely that imply hydrogen is not efficent as a fuel. That sort of distortion is not appropriate.

[ex-Texan]

He is all wet. BMW will introduce a Hydrogen fuel cell automobile in about 3 years. GM just announced a major fuel fuel cell break through ... I found over a hundred articles on H2 power in 5 minutes.

BMW: http://www.auto.com/industry/iwirg28_20020828.htm

Ford: http://www.automotive-technology.com/projects/p2000/

Many cars: http://www.h2cars.de/

[FLCowboy,]

When I see this article, and it's been often, since people keep posting it, I am reminded of my 7th grade science teacher teaching us about jet engines and their promise (1954). Since we all understood how propeller powered airplanes flew, by pushing air via the propellers, jet engines were something new. The same idea existed though, spoke the teacher, for jets. Cold air was taken in via the intake, super heated by a flame, and pushed out the exhaust, thus producing thrust which pushed the airplane. The teacher then went on to teach that this would never work in outer space, since there was no atmosphere for the thrust to push against.

I often wondered what happened to him.

While today's understanding of power from hydrogen doesn't appear practical, perhaps there is an unknown principle out there someplace that will change the results. I'd rather invest in finding the future, because dwelling in the past or present doesn't appear to have much future.

Many years ago the pursuit of storing electricity led to batteries. Perhaps a renewable energy cell the size of a battery composed of some sort of nuclear compound is the answer. I say keep investing in the future.

[The Shootist]

Orbital Solar Power Satellites. Turns the Sun's energy into microwaves which are then beamed to rectennas placed in deserts. The microwaves and turned into electricity and water is turned into hydrogen.

The problem is not as the author describes rather the storage and distribution infrastructure needs to be built first. But we cannot afford to build the dist. network because nobody uses hydrogen and nobody uses hydrogen because we don't have a distribution network.

None of this is new. We have been planning and talking about hydrogen power since the late 60's.

http://www.jerrypournelle.com

[RonF]

Ah, last time I checked there were power lines going into oil refineries, too. It certainly takes energy to drill wells, extract the crude, transport it to refineries, catalytically crack it, refine the product, transport that product to distribution centers, and then distribute it. TANSTAAFL, folks.

[dark_lord]

Three newly proposed wind farms in West Virginia would occupy 30 to 40 square miles but would produce slightly less electricity than a new 265 MW gas-fired combined-cycle generating plant, which would occupy a few acres.

On the other hand, there are farmers that earn extra money by permitting wind farms on their crop lands. The big towers have no apparent negative effects on the crops, there are no nearby neighbors to complain about the sound (wind farms can be noisy), and they make some steady bucks.

[narby]

But hydrogen is not a source of energy, something which hydrogen advocates either don't understand or refuse to acknowledge.

Every time I see this, I've just got to ask, "what's their point"? Nobody said Hydrogen was "source of energy". It's an energy transmission medium that can be used for mobile use.

I prefer fission to generate the original energy. It's the safest, cleanest, largest source of energy we've got.

And as far as the nuclear waste "problem". It isn't. If there are any humans around to harm in a few tens of thousands of years when any storage method might fail, then they can rebury it perfectly easily. If no humans are around, then who cares

[The Great RJ]

The two most abundant things in the universe are hydrogen and stupidity.

[Servant of the Nine]

As long as it will produce a silent vibrationless source of electricity for my boat, spend on.
After all these years I would like to see some govt. money spent on a boondogle I can get something out of.

It's my turn.

So9

[Willie Green]

Good post, Al.

The junk science alchemists will still insist that they can discover a secret formula to transform lead into gold (or in this case, hydrogen into "fuel"). But when it comes right down to it, their magic elixirs are nothing but snake oil. At best, hydrogen may be used someday as a temporary storage medium for energy originally produced from some other source. But it is NOT an energy source itself, and never will be.

[NonValueAdded]

I'm waiting to hear the Ralph Nader / Corvair objection. In addition to exploding cars, there is the pesky little problem of invisible hydrogen fires.

Why don't we just wait until Dr. Brown invents the Mr. Fusion?