I'm not anti-hydrogen. I think it has an important role to play in our future energy economy. I doubt that that role will be as a transportation fuel, however. The problems are formidable, and there easier and more efficient alternatives. But there will be a huge need for hydrogen and oxygen to drive the synthesis of hydrocarbons from coal, biomass, and CO2.

It's certainly possible to produce synthetic hydrocarbons without using externally supplied hydrogen and oxygen. But it means burning roughly half of the feedstock to supply the energy needed to convert the other half to synthesis gas. The result is as much extra CO2 from producing the fuel as the fuel will produce when it is burned. Plus only half as much fuel yield from each ton of carbon feedstock compared to the hydrogen-driven process. That becomes vitally important when the feedstock is biomass.

Electrolysis of water to produce hydrogen and oxygen is a perfect way to deal with the intermittency of solar and wind power. So by all means, let's fund research into lowering the cost and raising the efficiency of electrolysis equipment. But the price of oil is already creating a market for synthetic hydrocarbons from coal. What we mostly need, at this point, is legisltation that mandates the use of carbon-free energy to drive the coal-to-liquids process. Creating a large, reliable market for clean, non-fossil energy is the best way to bring its price down quickly.

I personally doubt that we'll ever see the day when hydrogen fueled vehicles will be a significant part of our transportation system. The storage problem is pretty fundamental, and the problems with fuel cell cost and durability are formidable. It's not that there's no possibility of solving them, and I think we should continue supporting research.

Thank you for your comments. I am also disappointed with your pessimistic view of Hydrogen Economy. The reality is far more different than your negatives views expressed in your comments. Hydrogen is very promising technology because it can be used across the spectrum of energy use – for transportation, portable and stationary applications. The Hydrogen Fuel Cell is not a dream. We have been using Hydrogen fuel cells on board the space shuttle for over 40 years to generate electricity to power life support systems, computers, and produce drinkable water as a by-product. In addition, military and government agencies are already developing hydrogen-fueled air, sea, and land vehicles. Hydrogen powered cars, buses, vans, and scooters are already running on the streets of major U.S., Canadian, and European cities.

I have personally test driven GM’s HydroGen3 fuel cell minivan and Toyota’s FCHV SUV. Honda’s FCX is already available for limited marketing to public in California and Japan. These vehicles are very impressive and energy efficient. Almost every car company has already produced several models of Fuel Cell vehicle for sale/lease. However, due to the lack of hydrogen refueling infrastructure these vehicles can not be mass produced to reduce the cost. Government support is urgently needed to jump-start the Hydrogen Economy by provide funding and tax incentives to support development of a hydrogen refueling/distribution infrastructure nationwide. Additional Government help is also needed to overcome technical challenges associated with the development of hydrogen infrastructure on a large scale including the lack of domestic and international regulations and standards for hydrogen production, distribution, storage, and fueling.

The Federal Government already has a roadmap to achieve the Hydrogen Economy vision in the next 20 to 40 years. I have proposed a bold new strategic plan for commercialization within the next 10 years for a true energy security for America.

The purpose of writing this paper is to encourage Congress and the Administration to provide needed funding to kick start the infrastructure for advancing the Hydrogen Economy. In addition, my goal is to create awareness among scientist, industries, utilities, universities, research organizations, government, politicians, and general public (for acceptance of this new technology) that the energy independence is well with in our reach. This paper has outlined how these challenges can be addressed and how this transition can be used to eliminate America’s addiction to oil.

Roger, I have a huge volume of information on the latest developments on Fuel cells and Hydrogen Economy. In case you need more updated information, please send me an email using “Email This Author.” I will be pleased to share this information with you. Thanks.

These comments by: Darshan Goswami, author of this article

Interesting article on the information provided. Unfortunately, I think it's a little to rosey for me to believe. I would love to see a hydrogen economy take hold. I don't think your suggestions or the administration's road map have the scale of the problem in mind. There are just too many considerations to keep in mind.

Are we supposed to stand by while the government buys everyone an expensive fuel cell to run from government subsidized H2 generation? To speed up the market to the 10 year time frame you offer, that is essentially what will be needed. Here's a few reasons why:

You suggest to increase funding for funded research. In my experience, this produces the slowest advancement possible. Not only is this having politicians choose the technologically best winner (bad idea) but most professional research facilities are in the business of staying solvent, not making breakthroughs. I can site numerous friends and relatives quoting this exact goal for their organizations. I'm not saying that the individual researcher can't make progress, but continued funding is the larger concern of the overall organization. Take this one to the bank.

Forcing a technology to market before its time is bad in two fundamental ways. The price gets masked early on which makes it harder to compete when the subsidies go away. It also artificially negates any competing technologies that might have become commercially viable. The only way to overcome the magnitude of the problem is with a mix of solutions. I personally don't see a single one we know about now that won't be part of the solution. (Although the one about capturing car-generated wind in a tunnel seems less than promising to me.)

No government agency can offer the innovation available from the collective public. Grants for research should not be given to the GMs and GEs of the world that can afford their own research, they should be given to Joe down the street who's made his pickup truck run from peanuts. These are the creative minds that need assistance getting to market. Our current grant offerings all require the applicant to have substantial monitary input which is wrong and they also don't allow for unsolicited ideas. I know of 3-4 very promising technologies from the very readers of this forum who cannot obtain grants.

I have yet to see either a working scenerio or forcasted one where H2 is a winner in all the following comparisons along it's full well-to-wheel path. It must be economicly acceptable, its emissions must be vastly less and it must use increasingly less finite natural resources. Remember, to be fully adopted, it must win in all 3 categories. I can easily see how running electrolysis from a wind turbine can create H2 cheaply, but that hasn't powered any cars in L.A. yet.

So while a hydrogen economy is a nice thought, pushing it too fast would be very bad. After all... no mention has even been made to potentially the cheapest method of generating it (concentrated solar thermochemical).

As to your stated goal of "Creat[ing] awareness among scientists, ...", believe me, they are aware. The last thing we need is another governmental agency created to offer information on other places to find information. I think these agencies are already self propagating with the sole function of linking to each other!

If you would like a list of specific provable examples of any of the above info, feel free to E-mail me at todd.mckissick@charter.net and I will be happy to supply it.

Todd

Actually, I'm a raving optimist about the hydrogen economy, in comparison to some prominent hydrogen critics. Ulf Bossel, for example, founder and organizer of the annual European Fuel Cell Forum held in Lucerne, Switzerland. He's quite adamant that the hydrogen economy is a delusion, and that there is no future in low temperature hydrogen fuel cells. He's refocusing the forum on other types of fuel cells--direct carbon, direct methanol, and high temperature SOFC and molten carbonate cells that can be fueled by hydrocarbons.

I personally find Bossel's staunchly anti-hydrogen bias unjustified--just as I find the staunchly pro-hydrogen bias of others. As an environmentalist and a peace activist, I care very much about the goals of slashing CO2 and curbing our dependence on foreign oil. As an engineer, however, the only thing I care about is what path will get us to those goals most expeditiously. Having an ideologically-based commitment for or against a particular technical approach just strikes me as silly.

My "pessimism" about hydrogen as a transportation fuel is not based on any conviction that it can't be made to work. Clearly it can. But it would take some unlikely breakthroughs to make it a very good solution, in comparison to alternatives. Battery technology is now advancing rapidly, and plug-in hybrid vehicles look set to become a much quicker and more economical route to major savings in oil consumption.

My disappointment with your article, however, isn't that you're an enthusiastic supporter of the hydrogen economy. There's nothing wrong with that. I like to read positions that differ from my own. It can be stimulating and educational. And, to your credit, you gave plenty of references that will help many readers learn more about the subject. My gripe is that there were too few specifics in the program you advocated.

Todd McKissick makes some very good points above. Funded research programs and ill-advised subsidies do not just waste money and resources, they can actively poison the chances for effective solutions to the problems they're nominally trying to address. Exhibit A: NASA and the manned space program.

I'm not unconditionally opposed to funded research and government incentive programs. When they're well designed by people who understand the technology and business landscapes, they can do much good. But the devil is in the details. Specifics matter, and your article (IMHO) fell short on that score.

The key question is how much is hydrogen going to cost? For hydrogen, what is the equivalent price to gallon of gasoline? It seems like if you are spending a $100 billion on this “Manhatten Project” for hydrogen and using electricity to make the hydrogen, then the hydrogen is going to be really expensive. Just eye-balling it, I can’t see hydrogen costing less than $5 to $10 per gallon equivalent of gasoline.

An alternative to hydrogen is the plug-in hybrid vehicle. The plug-in folks point out that the hydrogen approach is to take electricity, make it into hydrogen, make the hydrogen into electricity in a fuel cell, and then power the car. Why not just put the electricity in the car (in a battery)? The infrastructure already exists for plug-in hybrid vehicles – it’s called the electric system.

The better approach would seem to be to take the $1.72 billion slated for hydrogen development and spend it on development and implementation of plug-in hybrid vehicles. Then the entire $100 billion for the hydrogen “Manhatten Project” could be avoided. Plug-in vehicles have all of the benefits cited in the article for hydrogen, reducing American’s addiction to oil, reducing air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions, and improving the economy and employment.

By-the-way, there has also been talk of developing a coal-to-liquids and gas-to-liquids industry in the U.S. to displace imported oil. The massive expense of this effort can also be avoided by plug-in hybrid vehicles. Coal-fired generation coupled to plug-in hybrid vehicles is a coal-to-liquids technology.

Chris

I apologize for getting your name wrong.

Chris

My primary questions/concerns are:

1) Where does the electricity come from to produce hydrogen from water? Since only a very small fraction of the world’s electricity currently comes from renewable sources, is it realistic to assume we can replace all the existing fossil fuel power plants with new renewable plants? And how many additional power plants are required to supply the transportation sector? Without answering these questions, a large scale hydrogen economy doesn’t appear to solve any real problems and will likely make the existing problems of fossil fuel dependency and global warming worse.

2) I can see how the hydrogen-powered fuel cell vehicle is a potential solution to our oil dependency, but how does it compare to the bio-fueled hybrid (or plug-in hybrid) vehicle?

3) I’m an advocate for fuel cells for stationary power. My doctoral research has been on using SOFC for distributed tri-generation applications and it appears this technology will be competitive in the near future. A major problem I have with many of the Hydrogen Economy advocates is their implied linking of the fuel cell and hydrogen as a fuel. The Hydrogen Economy may depend to some degree on fuel cell technology, but fuel cells DO NOT depend on the Hydrogen Economy. I would hate to see fuel cells get a bad public opinion if and when the hydrogen hype fizzles out.

1) Current technology rquires about 1 kG of hydrogen, compressed to 5,000 to 6,000 psi, which is needed to bring the volume to a manageable level. The energy in 1 kG is roughly equal to the energy in 1 gallon of gasoline. 2) The Great Plains has numerous areas that can produce wind energy at an annual level of 40% capacity factor. That high capacity factor translates into roughly 5 cents/kWh (3 cents/kWh after tax benefits) 3) Combining 1) and 2) above yields an energy input cost of about $1.80 to $3.00 per equivalent gallon of gasoline, depending on whether tax benefits are assumed. That is a reasonable energy cost. 4) The expensive part of this issue is the capital cost of the electrolyzer and storage at high pressure. Our 175 kW electrolyzer will cost about $1.5 Million installed and it will be able to produce 60 kG per day. That translates into a very high "at the pump" cost to cover the capital cost. The good news is that economy of scale is strong (as in most energy technologies). For a 20% increase in cost, our negotiations indicated we could have installed a unit 100% larger. Our unit is small at 175 kW. A 10 MW unit should be able to deliver production at a much lower cost per kg. In fact, DOE cost projections for hydrogen (delivered at a centralized facility, using economy of scale electrolyzers) are in not far from existing pump prices. 5) We found fuel cells for vehicles to be prohibitively expensive, not to mention the fact they are not ready for prime time -- or readily available. However, we were able to convert 3 full-size pickups with "Flex-fuel Engines" to hydogen at a much lower cost. In addtion, they are now "tri-fuel", able to burn hydrogen, gasoline and E85 Ethanol. The consultant who converted these vehicles is projecting fuel mileage with hydrogen to be comparable or better than gasoline only.

Given what I've learned with this project, my conclusion is that we need to focus on storage. Compressing to 6,000 psi is using muscle (and energy), rather than brains. Storage represents the biggest opportunity to reduce our dependence on foreign oil.

The Plug-in Hybrid is an excellent place to start, but has limited battery storage. Hydrogen can complement Plug-in's, since internal combustion engines can be readily to converted to hydrogen. When fuel cells become available, they have the potential to double the range of a hydrogen-fueled internal combustion vehicle.

Meanwhile, technology advances in hydrogen storage -- in areas such as nanotechnology or metal hydrides -- are the key to energy independence. If storage is solved, the rest of the infrastructure will fall into place. Put another way... "If you store it, they will come".

Ron Rebenitsch, PE Basin Electric Power Cooperative

I know the USDOE is actively involved in hydrogen research programs, but does the US Dept of Agriculture have (or planning to have) any R&D programs to support the hydrogen economy.

Anton Paul Science Applications International Corporation

Thank you for including numbers in your comments. Those allow some frank discussion that is otherwise impossible.

1. Can you provide the additional assumptions underlying your 5 cents per kilowatt hour figure for the cost of generating electricity using wind turbines in the Great Plains? Obviously there is more than capacity factor involved in the equation - how much does a turbine cost per kilowatt capacity, what is the interest rate, what is the assumed lifetime, how much does it cost to maintain the turbine, is the hydrogen production facility located in the middle of the Great Plains, or is there a transmission cost that must be added, etc.

2. What is the scaling factor that you would assume for determining the cost of a 10 MW electrolyzer? Are there any scale diseconomies?

Though many people seem focused on the technically very challenging task of replacing petroleum based fuels in personal transportation, it seems to me that there is a huge opportunity to work on replacing fossil fuel consumption in vehicles like locomotives (where electricity can be provided as the vehicle is operating) and in large ships (where the weight of reactor plant shielding is less than the weight of the fossil fuel that is needed to push the ship for more than a few days.)

Eliminating oil use in those applications would free up a lot of petroleum for personal automobiles.

Rod Adams

As noted by Mr Rejikumar and Len Gould, more nuclear and more hybrids are what we need at present. The question is, will we get what we need, and will we get it in time.

I am afraid I can't share your optimism for the Hydrogen Economy. Not because it is a bad idea, but because there is a better, cheaper, cleaner and more efficient idea: the Electron Economy.

Oil is mainly used for transportation and that is what I am going to concentrate on. The other uses, heating, power generation and industry, can (at least in theory) quite easily be replaced by other energy sources, be they natural gas, electricity from a number of sources, or something else.

But transportation is almost completely reliant on oil. There are a few alternatives like trains and trams, and they are very good alternatives indeed and should be supported.

But if we are interested in continuing driving autos after global oil production peaks, we need an alternative to oil that can be used to fuel our cars.

Hydrogen is such an alternative. But there is a better alternative. First plug-in electric hybrids and later "pure" electric cars.

Why are electric cars better than hydrogen cars?

1. They are cheaper.

2. The vital technology, the batteries, are developing at a much faster rate than hydrogen fuel cells are developing. See for example http://www.a123systems.com/html/home.html

3. Due to the fewer and more efficient energy conversions involved, electric cars are _at least_ twice as energy efficient as hydrogen cars. This means that electric cars will always be cheaper to own than hydrogen cars, except if the capital cost of hydrogen cars were much lower than those of electric cars. In reality the opposite is true and the capital cost gap is widening.

4. For hydrogen to become a relevant fuel a vast hydrogen infastructure must be created, at an astronomic cost. And there is also a hen-or-egg problem here. Who would invest in pumps and pipelines if there are no hydrogen cars, and who would buy a hydrogen car if there were no fuel for it?

For electric cars, the transmission system already exist and it's called the grid (though it might need be a bit strengthened due to increaed power demand). A very rough back of the envelope calculaltion shows that electrifying all vehicle transportation in an industrialized country would require something like 10-50 % more power. Hydrogen would require at least twice as much new power.

5. Hydrogen vehicles do not exist on the market. Electric vehicles already exist, unsubsidized, on the market. I know this as I happen to own one. http://www.e-max-scooter.com/en/produkte-e-max.php

For those with fatter wallets there are other alternatives, like the widely published Tesla Roadster. http://www.teslamotors.com/index.php?js_enabled=1

----------------- By the way, it's fun to see that Rod Adams also writes here. I use the name "Starvid" on his blog. And it's also fun to see that I happen to live in the same city as Prof. Banks.

The author blandly, in the same paragraph, contradicts himself:

"...Hydrogen (hydrogen is an energy carrier not an energy source) will play a significant role for meeting our future energy needs...the world is already moving toward acceptance of hydrogen as a viable alternative source of energy..."

Hydrogen must be manufactured, so it's not a "source" of energy, but the author equivocates and relies on Hydrogen as a "source of energy".

It's easy to sling terms such as "renewable energy" around, but the only proven non-gasoline automobile transportation is battery electric vehicles charged by plugging-in to off-peak electric power paid for by on-peak solar PV generation.

There are hundreds of us doing this "PV-EV" lifestyle right now; the only fact stopping more people adopting PV-EV is that bureaucrats allowed the auto and oil industries to kill the Electric plug-in car program, and crush almost all the Electric cars. There are only a few hundred highly valued Toyota RAV4-EV on the road, and they are all in use, largely to allow their drivers to go oil-free.

The author shoud perhaps study existing facts before calling for a push to Hydrogen.

The problem is not that PV-EV is unavailable; the problem is not that the people aren't ready. The problem IS that the auto and oil industry took away the EV in "PV-EV". The program that's needed is forcing the oil industry to disgorge the patent rights to the NiMH batteries, and the auto industry to sell an EV on the free market.

What are some other things that could be done in the renewable energy field with the $100 billion mentioned in the article?

A 1MW wind turbine has an installed price tag of roughly $1 million. For $100 billion one could theoretically buy and install 100,000 1MW wind turbines, with enough electrical generating capacity for about 30 million homes. (If one uses the figure of 300 homes supplied with electricity for one 1MW wind turbine)

If one accepts the logic of this argument, then it is not hard to see how the U.S. could stop using coal, oil, and nuclear for electrical generation in less than a generation. New technologies may make the job easier, but existing technologies look they can be used to get the job done now. If the human race waits too long, new technologies may be useless.

Hydrogen Production:

Hydrogen can be produced from varieties of resources. Initially hydrogen can be extracted from diverse domestic sources including natural gas, solid fossil fuels, nuclear power or biomass, and renewable resources (e.g., wind, solar, hydro, bio-fuels, etc). The ultimate goal should be to produce hydrogen from renewable resources.

Researchers are developing a wide range of technologies that include reforming of natural gas or liquid renewable, electrolysis using renewable, nuclear or thermo chemical energy, gasification, and microbial metabolic processes to produce hydrogen economically from a variety of resource. Hydrogen may be produced at large-scale central locations and then transported to multiple end use destinations. Alternatively, it can be produced on-site at small-scale decentralized locations closer to the point of use.

To date most hydrogen is produced from natural gas and is used immediately, generally at the same site it is produced, because hydrogen storage and transport is expensive. The total worldwide hydrogen production, using primarily natural gas, is estimated to be around 40 million tons per year. This is equivalent to 1/9th of the world gasoline consumption or 34.6 billion gallons of gasoline. Although hydrogen has been produced and utilized for industrial applications for decades, a primary challenge to large-scale hydrogen production for mass market utilization continues to be achieving production costs that are competitive with conventional fuels.

Attaining greater energy security and environmental benefits from hydrogen requires 1) use renewable resources like sunlight and wind to generate electricity that then splits water into its component elements, hydrogen and oxygen; 2) or extracts hydrogen from renewable liquid fuels, such as ethanol or bio-diesel. Research on the use of renewable energy in hydrogen production involves improving efficiencies that would allow for large-scale production of hydrogen.

An important advantage to using hydrogen as an energy carrier is that it can be produced at a large centralized location or on-site at small-scale decentralized locations closer to the point of use. On-site production is currently the most viable approach because the demand for hydrogen is low. As demand for hydrogen grows, it can then be economically produced in semi-central (10-50 miles from point of use) and centralized large facilities to take advantage of economies of scale. Research and development efforts are focused on reducing capital, operating and maintenance costs and improving hydrogen production efficiencies of these various technologies.

Currently there are over 100 hydrogen fueling stations operating worldwide. These hydrogen fuel stations look much like modern gas stations, only with fuel dispenser for gaseous or liquid hydrogen instead of a traditional gasoline or diesel hose. The hydrogen is either delivered to the station via truck from a centralized location, like gasoline is delivered from a refinery to gas stations; or is generated on-site through the use of reformers, which produce hydrogen from natural gas or other liquid fuels, or through the use of electrolyzers, which produce hydrogen from water. The hydrogen is stored in tanks that are sited either below-ground like gasoline, or above-ground, like propane gas. A recent experiment comparing a hydrogen fuel cell car experience with that of a traditional car, in terms of daily driving demands, confirmed that refueling a fuel cell car is not much different from refueling traditional cars in that the pumping is similar and the process only takes a few minutes.

These comments by: Darshan Goswami, author of this article

On the other hand, maybe hydrogen can work better as large scale electrical storage for peak demand at stationary power plants. Here, the efficiencies can be raised and the safety issues are less of a problem.

William I. Griffith, Ph.D.

P.S. for anyone interested in discussing this, call 864-363-0743.

I still don't see how hydrogen in any way would be a better energy carrier than electricity stored in modern batteries.

"Hydrogen can be produced from varieties of resources. Initially hydrogen can be extracted from diverse domestic sources including natural gas, solid fossil fuels, nuclear power or biomass, and renewable resources (e.g., wind, solar, hydro, bio-fuels, etc)."

So can electricity.

"Hydrogen may be produced at large-scale central locations and then transported to multiple end use destinations. Alternatively, it can be produced on-site at small-scale decentralized locations closer to the point of use."

So can electricity.

"An important advantage to using hydrogen as an energy carrier is that it can be produced at a large centralized location or on-site at small-scale decentralized locations closer to the point of use."

So can electricity.

"Currently there are over 100 hydrogen fueling stations operating worldwide. "

Currently there are hundreds of millions of wall sockets able to charge electric vehicles. Constructing high voltage fast charge machines at gasoline stations should be a piece of cake.

I really can't see how hydrogen in any way is better as an energy carrier than electricity in batteries. The only relevant pro for hydrogen is that it is faster to load a tankfull of hydrogen than it is to charge a li-ion battery. But what does this matter when the electric car has a range of 250 miles, like the Telsa Roadster has?

Furthermore, Toshiba and other companies are developing high capacity batteries that are allegedly going to have a charge time of just a few minutes.

Thanks for your article. As a physicist, I'm pretty up-to-speed on the ideas of energy conversion and the whole "energy carrier" vs. "energy source" debate. And I think that they create large technological obstacles to the wide-spread adoption of hydrogen as a primary energy-storage medium.

Part of me wants to be optimistic about hydrogen, but part of me has a nagging feeling of doubt. Not doubt over the technological or economic feasibility, but doubt over our humanity and our ecology.

If we could (or did) move to a hydrogen-fueled economy, would be swapping one set of promblems for another. Some examples: 1) wind power has been demonstrated to alter region weather patterns--what would be the overall impact of millions of wind-towers around the country? 2) Hydroelectric power reeks havoc with the environment--would we need even more hydroelectric power to generate our hydrogen? 3) The production of ethanol (from any source) requires copious water inputs--this has already been an issue in southern Minnesota, and many places around the world (and the US) are already past their source capacity.

I'm not advocating or endorsing an anti-renewable energy platform; in fact, I support renewable energy wholeheartedly. I also think we need to look at the overall human footprint issue.

The real issue with global warming and energy production is not the nature of the fuel, but the nature of the fueled: we must curb our ambitions and see ourselves as a part of the ecosystem and not as something separate from it. We need a new model for how to run our civilization, our economies. Growth as the metric of progress will lead to disaster in the end--no matter what source of energy is utilized.

-Sean M. Cordry, PhD

As a side note, the only fuel that's a true source (in the scope of Earth's history) is solar. All others can be considered a storage medium. :)

Regarding the issue of which storage medium is better between hydrogen and batteries, they both share lots of benefits, but one primary difference never mentioned is the resources required to manufacture the 'tank'. I can forsee each being possible on the scale we need for our transportation needs. However if AA batteries already cause concern of landfil contamination, what will half a ton of batteries per car do? What natural resources will be required? What chemical processes and wastes are created along the way and how will they be dealt with? On the side of hydrogen, is it possible that a new industry of breaking down water here and transporting it to there will be able to aid our potable water shortage in some way?

Beyond those concerns, for me the H2 vs. battery debate comes down to individual convenience, total system EROEI and overall adoption costs.

For starters, the storage issue is absolutely paramount. To date, there is neither an energy-efficient way to store hydrogen at the meaningful densities, nor even a theory of whether or not it's possible. Compression to the ~7000 psi needed to give a 300 mile range in a 90 mpg-equivalent fuel cell vehicle uses about 7% of the energy in the hydrogen just to compress (I don't imply that the energy comes from the hydrogen, rather that this 7% loss must be factored into the fuel chain). Liquefaction takes a whopping 30%. By contrast, the current petroleum fuel chain has a well-to-pump fuel chain efficiency of about 80%. So even if you could get the hydrogen for free (e.g., from a fully renewable source), you may still be in a losing game as far as raw energy use.

There are no metal hydrides out there that have the right size/weight characteristics, and the other contenders (sodium borohydrides, carbon nanotubes, etc.) are either far from commercial and/or subject to their own technical constraints. I'm an optimist on technology, and would like to believe that given enough effort, we could like this problem. However, until we do, any fuel chain that relies on hydrogen as an energy carrier would be more efficient withOUT the H2 intermediary. (e.g., there's no reason to convert solar, wind, hydro er even coal power into hydrogen if you then convert the hydrogen back into electricity in the same spot - and vehicular uses don't work without storage.) Thus, if we don't solve this problem, a hydrogen economy would actually consume more raw energy than the current status quo. There is also a good case to be made (made most eloquently by John Heywood at MIT) that even if a hydrogen vehicle fuel chains shows a slight increase in energy/cost relative to the current gas/IC engine - for instance, as from a natural gas fueled hydrogen infrastructure - this goes away if one assumes modest increases in on-board efficiency; from this logic, we get much more bang for our limited bucks by shifting to Priuses than to FCVs - to say nothing of some of the more fuel efficient (but still cheap compared to an FCV) hybrid vehicles now in development.

The reason that all this makes for danger, rather than simply an academic debate is that (a) the scale of investment in a H2 economy is so enormous from an infrasturcture perspective that once we go down that path, it will be politically difficult to "go back" if it turns out our investment was wrong. Therefore, we better make sure that the goal is actually a positive one before siinking big $ in, R&D or otherwise; and (b) without dramatic reductions in the cost of renewable energy, the hands down cheapest way to produce hydrogen is from natural gas, off-peak coal & nuke. Thus, if we encourage hydrogen, we are actually increasing our use of these conventional sources. And if we don't solve the storage problem, we're going to end up using those conventional sources much less efficiently than we are today.

Bottom line is that if I worked for the coal, gas or nuclear industry, I'd be rooting for hydrogen. If I worked for the auto industry, I'd be rooting for hydrogen, if only to get the emissions-compliance monkey off my back. And if I could root for it while cloaking myself in the guise of an environmentalist, all the better. But if the intent is to reduce fossil fuel use and lower emissions (including GHGs) I'd be rooting against it.

So - as someone who cares an awful lot about the economic and environmental consequences of our national energy policy, I'd like to see uss put our collective eggs in more responsible baskets. Let's keep investing in R&D for hydrogen storage - but until that nut is cracked, let's keep our other focuses on efficiency, combined heat and power, biomass (since any future fuel/feed/chemical chain will require carbon) and those other measures that don't have such severely negative consequences.

How does a different alternative fit in here in this discussion? I was recently introduced to (for me) a new alternative, along the lines of recycling. Has anyone here in this learned community heard about MagneGas? (see www.magnegas.com) I hadn't seen this before last week, and it seems that this gentleman has addressed a lot of issues around transportation fuel generation and conversion of vehicles using existing technology. Is there something wrong in his technology or is it just that he has a poorly formatted site? Please let me know. PM Dekker

Next, Ron Rebenitsch above appears to have some very useful numbers for hydrogen costs as well as insight into a hydrogen system. Mr. Rebenitsch indicates that hydrogen can probably be produced for $1.80 to $3.00 per gallon equivalent and my quick check confirms these numbers.

I have long thought that duplicating the pipelines of the oil system would add billions to the cost of hydrogen. Mr. Rebenitsch implicitly says that one way to design a hydrogen distribution system would be to have electric power lines to the service station and an electrolyzer at the station. The only pipes would be from the electrolyzer to the pump on the station. In short, the hydrogen distribution system might not be a problem or a massive cost.

The power demand for generating hydrogen would be significant. At 10 MW per service station, this would be a huge electric load. One million hydrogen powered cars would require about 3,500 MW of generating capacity, which is about three nuclear plants (at 90% capacity factor) or all of the country’s existing wind generating capacity of 10,000 MW (at 35% capacity factor). This assumes Mr. Rebenitsch’s 60 kg of hydrogen per day for 175 kW at 100% load factor, 12,000 miles per year per car and 27.5 mpg. If the storage issue can be resolved, power generation is not a show stopper but is an important consideration.

Chris

The oil companies are exploring as aggresively as possible, but there are no oil provinces left to exploit. Offshore in the Gulf of Mexico is being exploited and so is offshore Western Africa. There might be some oil in eastern Greenland and in northern Siberia and in the Antarctic, but exploration and exploitation cost will be immense, not counting all the political problems.

The few places left where production can be expanded is either under control of national oil companies (mainly in the Persian Gulf region) who of course want to husband their reserves to maximise long term profits, or in Iraq.

Many of the questions being asked about the hydrogen transportation economy are already answered in Europe which has had many years of experience already and which is rapidly advancing to the level of a commercial operation.

MAN, the German bus manufacturer, started developing the hydrogen fueled internal combustion engine (HICE) in 1996. As early as 2001 the Munich Airport has had a hydrogen infrastructure and five hydrogen fueled buses from MAN. Three buses were hydrogen fueled internal combustion engine (HICE) vehicles and two were fuel cell vehicles. The buses have driven over 500,000 kilometers already.

Nine cities in Europe have had more than three years experience each with three fuel cell buses. The Berlin transit authority (BVG) also had 14 MAN HICE buses. Recently BVG announced they would purchase 250 MAN HICE buses representing 20% of their fleet. The Rotterdam transit company has also announced that they would become the largest hydrogen fueled public transit company in the world and have recently purchased MAN HICE buses. MAN has expressed the intent of building mass production facilities.

BVG announced that the decision in favor of the HICE bus reflected the fact that the initial cost was lower, the maintenance was less, the reliability was greater and a less pure hydrogen was required for the HICE vehicle than for the fuel cell vehicle.

Quantum Technologies has recently sold to Norway 15 hydrogen-modified Prius vehicles and expects orders in the next two years for 200 to 300 hydrogen fueled Prius vehicles in Europe. The United Nations Development Program includes hydrogen fueled transit vehicles in six cities. Beijing recently put three buses in service and Shanghai will be putting three buses in service in December. Eight hydrogen-modified GM Silverado pickup trucks have been sold to Vancouver. There are 115 fueling stations in operation and 57 more being built in various countries.

In the United States Quantum has sold 34 hydrogen-modified Prius in California and two to my company, American Wind Power and Hydrogen, for a project at the SUNY campus in Buffalo.

My first effort was to propose a study to the U. S. Army Material Command for a hydrogen infrastructure and the conversion of a fleet of 20 ICE vehicles to hydrogen fuel which would be refueled at a dedicated fueling station at West Point. The study was done but West Point decided not to go forward with the project.

I tried to get the DOE interested in HICE vehicles but they were fully committed to fuel cell vehicles and the 2015 project and didn’t even want to talk about HICE vehicles. The New York Power Authority became interested and eventually my company was awarded a hydrogen technology demonstration contract for $500,000. We have supplied two Prius vehicles modified by Quantum Technologies to use hydrogen as the fuel and a small fueling station and cylinders of hydrogen gas. We located the vehicle at the State University of New York campus in Buffalo because of the proximity to Niagara Falls. We expected that the Niagara Falls’ hydroelectricity would be used to generate hydrogen in an electrolysis facility eventually.

We now have available as hydrogen modified ICE vehicles the GM Silverado pickup truck and next year will have a Ford Escape hybrid SUV and are preparing proposal to New York State for dedicated fueling stations in various cities that would fuel fleets of HICE vehicles. One of the State agencies is considering an electrolysis facility at Niagara Falls.

Todd McKissack’s comments that it is a bad idea to have politician choose the technology and force the technology to market as it negates any competing technologies is demonstrated by my experience.

The major consumers of carbonaceous fuels, and contributors to global warming emissions, are trucks and buses in vehicle fleets that are fueled at dedicated fueling stations. A small portion of the funds being spent on improving fuel cell technology by 2015, if spent on HICE trucks and buses, as is being done in Europe, could make a major impact on today’s problems.

Using reasonable assumptions and today's Midwest wind resource potential and today's wind energy costs (also listed in my book in Chapter 4 in detail), we can produce H2 at less than $1.00 per KG. Transportation costs are included in the Freedom Plan to get that H2 to population centers to be used in stationary fuel cells and H2 ICE (internal combustion engine) vehicles near term. Or call me to discuss further if you wish at 913.888.0500 x102.

By the way, the Freedom Plan would save the U.S. economy about $20 Trillion by 2025 if it were implemented in 10 years beginning now...

I like Sean Cordry's comment about the issue being "not the nature of the fuel, but the nature of the fueled." I agree with the sentiment.

I also agree with Sean Casten's comments about the central importance and critical nature of the hydrogen storage problem. Short of cryogenic liquefaction—which has its own intractable problems—the best of the direct hydrogen storage approaches available for mobile applications has a working mass efficiency of only 4%. (I.e., there are 25 kilos of storage system for every kilo of stored hydrogen delivered.) That renders hydrogen fuel cell systems little if any better than lithium-ion batteries in terms of mass per kilowatt-hour. Fast refueling is then the only major advantage that hydrogen can offer over batteries.

Even that advantage is lost if one considers battery system designs that spit out depleted battery modules at a refueling station and swallow freshly charged modules. It’s actually quite easy to include a microchip in each battery module that monitors its charge state and health, so that users can be credited if the depleted battery modules they are exchanging are only partially depleted, or are newer with longer lifetimes ahead of them than the modules they are loading up with. The design of the battery module system and of a suitable battery swapping robot is a straightforward mechanical engineering exercise.

Hydrogen really “wants” to be a gas. None of the fancier storage approaches tried to date seems to work significantly better than just cramming the compressed gas into a very strong, pressure vessel. Research continues—as it should—but it looks like the only way to do much better is to bind the hydrogen chemically. Ideally, the bound product will be a liquid, for easy handling. The best candidate to supply the binding force looks to be the carbon atom…

Oops! We know about that solution, don’t we? Depending on the average length of the carbon chains, the resulting liquid carrier is called gasoline, diesel fuel, or kerosene.

Finally, I'd like to thank Troy Helming for the links and the specific information. Without yet having reviewed his material in any depth, I have to note that an estimate of $1.00 per kilogram for hydrogen produced by electrolysis (regardless of the source of electricity) seems extremely optimistic. A fairly recent estimate by a group at the EERE estimated more like $4.50 per kilogram, from electricity at the 4.5 cents per kilowatt-hour available for industrial base load. A good portion of that cost was in the capital cost of the electrolysis equipment. The study was based on what was commercially available in 2004. So there's certainly room for improvement. But to get from $4.50 to only $1.00 per kilogram seems quite a stretch.

Perhaps I'll change my mind after studying his white paper. If so, I'll repost.

Do you mean that, if US voters drove hydrogen-powered cars, then the US president would have the political freedom to bomb Arab oil-wells and Chinese coal-pits into a non-productive state? What other technique would stop these obsenely rich dictators from maintaining their luxurious and powerful lives by operating their wells and mines?

Roger - If you want to up the efficiency of a HICE and recoup some of the liquifaction energy losses, you should consider the Stirling engine (external combustion engine). It's cold side could really make use of the heat sink of liquid H2 & O2. (Unfortunately, I can't offer you working results just yet since my engineering team has let the political games undermine motivation.) In addition to the thermal storage and the chemical storage capacities of compressed LH2, there's also the potential energy available in the pressure. I think there's still a fair amount of creative thinking that has yet to become public when it comes to storing it in compressed form.

Troy - I'm impressed at the detail given in your referenced white paper. It ventures outside the accepted mantra but maintains a level of reality. I'm not quite sure it would be successful tho because only the government could pull off a program of that scale and we know they won't. I am disappointed to find that you so greatly favor wind over solar. If you're only considering solar PV, I can understand your point, but there's no denying that a private endeavor of solar thermal would easily compete with wind in cost, reliability and storage economics. Full residential electrical and heating needs can be met without the need for hydrogen at all, or the hydrogen could back up the heat storage used by the electricity generator. I see this as much easier to adopt by the public than a complete 'final' system with fuel cells and electrolizers and PHEV/BEV autos. Since it would be market driven also, the market alone would set the growth of that industry, not the influencial people.

Andrew - As Troy's cost analysis shows, the cost of consumer energy can be beat. This is the simplest and fastest way to move a vast number of people off oil. Granted that for a long period of time, this will only reduce the cost of oil to India & China, but at some point, the demand will eventually ease. When demand is being met and profitability begins to drop significantly, we'll see some change. This is the point we have to get to before the mines and wells begin to close.

Len - Not only that, but they will be increasing H2 demand right up to the point that we run out of oil and don't need the H2 for refineries anymore. All the more for other uses.

Direct generation of hydrogen by nuclear reactors driving a thermal decomposition of water looks very feasible although a developmental challenge - 900 deg C process temperatures are required. Once free hydrogen is available, distribution and consumption options abound. One is direct combustion of hydrogen gas; another is production of liquid hydrocarbons by reaction with coal.

I agree that a major effort for hydrogen power is needed but the focus must be first and foremost on nuclear production. Once we have confidence that uranium can efficently produce hydrogen in quantity, then we can decide on how we wish to exploit it. "Renewables" are, as usual, pipe dreams.

Like money, making energy is the hard part while spending it is easy.