- cross-posted to:
- science_memes@mander.xyz
- cross-posted to:
- science_memes@mander.xyz
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Isn’t it just blasting water with loads of electricity to split it up? That’s how I learned it in school at least. So yeah, just use the electricity directly for now.
To my knowledge, with plenty of carbon emisssions
how could hydrogen power possibly produce carbon dioxide
Using hydrogen doesn’t emit carbon. But the principal way hydrogen is produced is called steam reformation. It’s a process that turns methane (CH4) and water (2* H2O) into hydrogen (4* H2) and CO2 (i think, I’m not an expert). So all the carbon get emitted as co2. So it’s not better, and there are a bunch of inefficiencies too. (The reformation process itself, and transportation challenges, and leakage). But theoretically, it does centralize the emissions which would make them easier to sequester so there’s that.
In the USA for example about 99% of commercial Hydrogen is a byproduct of Steam Cracking Petroleum refinement. We have the technology to create hydrogen via other methods, but so far we’re not really utilizing them. Still, as a byproduct it’s better to use it than to not.
Is it less than using fossil fuels for power exclusively? If so then it’s a step in the right direction. Yes I know it sounds like I’m shilling for BP now but we get lost in the doom spiral so fast we forget we are indeed making progress. We just have to keep their feet to the fire or…erm… solar panel?
They’re not using electrolysis and water to make hydrogen, they’re using power and steam to crack petroleum products into hydrogen.
And this is still a large step in the right direction, because cheap hydrogen creates an incentive to develop hydrogen infrastructure, which increases the demand for hydrogen, and can help lay the groundwork for a future in which hydrogen is produced from renewable sources.
Also, steam reforming lends itself well to CCS, and as such it can be performed without carbon emissions.
There isn’t a real need for hydrogen. We have plenty of other solutions. People have the expectation that our society changes from unsustainable to sustainable by just swapping in clean technologies in place of the dirty one’s. That isn’t going to happen, and hydrogen won’t change that.
I mean it’s not bad to have alternatives though.
My roomie is a trucker, and the idea of an electric truck is laughable, at least in my country, because of how trucking works here. Unless the truck is out of order, being loaded, or being refuelled, it’s always on the road; they just swap drivers around like a relay race. Unless a truck came with a swappable battery it wouldn’t be feasible to operate like that, they’d have to at least double their arsenal, (at which point we can already start to question how environmentally friendly that is), and that’ll increase the overall operating costs, which will ultimately end up on the consumer; everything will get more expensive because that’s what they transport. Another problem with pure electric is also that the batteries weigh a shit ton, so the trucks end up being able to transport less because they have to lug the battery around everywhere.
Biogas is an alternative, and as far as I know it works alright; they already use it. They end up not as powerful as diesel trucks though.
Something I wonder if it might be applied is something like Toyota’s hybrid system, with regenerative braking etc. I wonder if it scales. My roomie recently had to leave his Golf at the shop for a week, and got it swapped with a Yaris. It cut his fuel consumption by three quarters.
In the spirit of the comic - how is the solar panel made?
short answer: once
Wow, solar panels that last forever? That’s quite the technological achievement…
“Oh, your solution doesn’t break the laws of physics? Trash it, we’re gonna keep burning shit to make more shit we can burn forever until you have a magic solution or until we kill the planet”
- You
The hundred year solution is nuclear. The thousand year solution is colonizing other planets.
Ultra dense energy has its place, namely where weight and volume are critical like in aerospace. Everything else can deal with not putting more carbon and worse things in the air.
Solar panels lasting for decades here and now, that’s close enough for all practical purposes. Solar has a proven track record, hydrogen technologies never made it past gospel.
This is the dumbest fucking argument. I’m sorry but what point do you think you’re making?
Is it imperfect? Yes. Just like ALL OTHER THINGS. Is it a major improvement compared to burning coal? OBVIOUSLY YES.
It was sad when the Physics Girl took Shell’s money to shill hydrogen fuel cells.
I get you need to eat but still…a very shitty move.
