Our New Hydrogen Bomb

The New York Times ^ | February 21, 2003 | NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

[merak]

H2 is not a fuel and will always require more energy from another source to produce than can be obtained by its use. Windfarm generation of electricity to produce hydrogen would be an even greater folly.

Have you factored the cost of rebuilding one of our major cities every two or three years into the cost of continuing to send money to OPEC countries as an alternative?

[2nd_Amendment_Defender]

I think hydrogen powered cars are the future. The engines that run on hydrogen I hear will last longer. Hydrogen won't leave carbon deposits inside your engine and best of all there are no toxic emmissions. Just find an efficient way to separate hydrogen from the oxygen molecules in water and you have a very large power supply.

[SauronOfMordor]

There are people working on fuel cells using methanol to power laptops. Methanol can be created from hydrogen.

[Willie Green]

Just find an efficient way to separate hydrogen from the oxygen molecules in water and you have a very large power supply.

The energy supply used to separate the water into H₂ and O₂ would have to be even larger.

[woofer]

Synthetic oil from coal is more feasible (and already being done)

Hope you're not talking about that money pit in Beulah ND.

[2nd_Amendment_Defender]

I have also heard that gasoline is more unstable than hydrogen. Is it true that gasoline tanks are more likely to explode than a hydrogen tank?

[-YYZ-]

Not only that, but how much energy is required to compress the hydrogen to those kind of pressures? Another energy input required for this scheme.

At the risk of sounding like a raving greenie, energy conservation and improvements in fuel efficiency (diesel/biodiesel and smaller, lighter cars come to mind) could give big reductions in the needs for petroleum, which would also reduce greenhouse emissions and other pollutants, much sooner and at much less cost than changing to a hydrogen economy. But no, we want our 3 ton tanks with peppy performance, and independence from imported oil. Well, maybe we can have it, but the R&D investments and costs in converting infrastructure will be huge.

[hford02]

I believe coal-gasification supported Germany the last two years of WWII. ...

[El Gato]

H2 is not a fuel and will always require more energy from another source to produce than can be obtained by its use.

That's true of everything that isn't used "raw" as it comes from the source. You spend energy to dig out coal. You spend energy converting crude oil into something you can burn in your vehicle. You spend energy growing and harvesting ethanol, and more converting the grain into ethanol.

I tend to agree about the use of wind power, which just isn't that "dense" an energy source, and is available in a usuable form, in only a few places. Nuclear power however would do the trick. Fusion power, if we can ever get it, would be better yet. Crude oil is really too valuable as chemical feedstock, in the long term, to be burning it all up now.

[El Gato]

H2 is not a fuel and will always require more energy from another source to produce than can be obtained by its use.

Think about as an energy storage mechanism then. The "other source" may not be suitable for mobile use for example. (Hard to haul a nuclear reactor or a hydroelectric dam around with you) Gasoline is like this too in a way. Crude oil is not suitable for vehicular use, nor even for heating purposes. It must be refined, which takes energy.

[jordan8]

Jeff Wolak, the engineer who travels with Hy-wire and mothers it, explained that it is drive-by-wire
Man, there's a BSOD you don't want to see. Gives new meaning to the phrase.

but in the near term it's more likely that the hydrogen will come from natural gas.
Or you could just burn the gas.

[AEMILIUS PAULUS]

Plus it is subject to burning. Remember the Hindenberg?

[El Gato]

Try stuffing that 48-gallon tank in something smaller, like my Saturn (I like handling ). Drop that to the 12 gallons that it carries now and you're talking 75 miles

Well no. Tour Saturn is a lot lighter and more aerodynamic than a van. Just as a gasoline powered van has a larger tank than you gasoline powered Saturn, and yet the they have about the same "range", so would comparable hydrogen powered vehicles.

[Willie Green]

That's true of everything that isn't used "raw" as it comes from the source. You spend energy to dig out coal. You spend energy converting crude oil into something you can burn in your vehicle.

No. In those instances, the refined fuel still contains more energy than what was needed to process it.
Hydrogen, OTOH, will always require more energy for processing than what's obtainable when using it.

[El Gato]

What do you suppose would happen first at a refueling station when that happens; the hydrogen finds a source of ignition, or the hydrogen disperses?

About the same as happens when the pump shutoff doesn't work and the spilled gasoline finds an ignition source. (The first, but not the second thankfully, happened to me a week ago, I think I pumped out about 3 gallons of mid grade unleaded)

[Axenolith]

The hydrogen fairy is sprinkling its dust again eh? I find the best repellant to be the incantation of the words "catalytic dehydrogenation of oil" :)

[El Gato]

Plus it is subject to burning. Remember the Hindenberg?

And gasoline isn't? Diesel or kerosine is certainly less volitile than gasoline, but those too will burn, wouldn't be much use if they wouldn't. :)

[El Gato]

Storing the hydrogen as compressed gas is only one option. Metal hyrdrides are another. No high pressures, but some tricky controls to get it out of the hydride at the rate needed.

[Cvengr]

Hydrogen vehicles have been around for a long time. I can hardly wait for the first fueling stations. Besides, they only produce water and ...heat,.....lots and lots of heat....

[AEMILIUS PAULUS]

Hydrogen will ignite far more easily than gasoline.