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Alternative to the Battery wows?
On 3/9/2021 11:23 AM, Dan Marotta wrote:
That's terrific!* The energy content in H2 beats anything except nuclear power, and wouldn't it be great to fly a 72 ton glider around with unlimited launch and retrieve capability?* But one statement in the article has me perplexed: "Current hydrogen extraction is highly energy intensive, so ways to harvest “green hydrogen” using water electrolysis are being explored." I believe that it takes more energy to extract the hydrogen from water than is realized by burning the hydrogen.* I have no idea of the energy cost to liquefy and distill hydrogen.* Can anybody shed some light on that?* I can see giant smoke stacks spewing sooty black smoke into the air due to burning coal to generate the electricity to compress the air to harvest the hydrogen.* Well...* Maybe not.* Perhaps covering Europe with wind mills to make the electricity and using sailing ships to deliver the H2 around the world. Credit to Dr. Seuss and Rube Goldberg for the inspiration. Yeah, the wide-eyed talk about hydrogen being "the most common element in the universe" is pure nonsense. There are no "hydrogen wells" on our planet. It's an energy carrier, not an energy source. And it's not a good energy carrier, since it leaks through everything etc. You can use natural gas or other fossil fuels to produce hydrogen from other materials. Or solar. But currently it's mostly natural gas. And yes it uses more energy to "produce" than you get from burning it. Or even from using it in fuel cell$. About 4x more, all told, relative to using electric power directly. But the "hydrogen economy" rah-rah seems to emerge from the shadows for another round every decade or so. Then it goes back into the shadows to keep fusion energy company. If the issue is what to do with surplus solar or wind energy, in the (few) times and places where it's available, there are many other ideas, including the production of liquid fuels which are much more practical than hydrogen. Methanol and ammonia are some I've heard of. Yes they are toxic if spilled. So is gasoline. At least you know when there's a leak. |
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