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Japan's hydrogen strategy does nothing for decarbonisation: study

hydrogeninsight.com

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Re: Japan's hydrogen strategy does nothing for decarbonisation: study

#241

Post by ekidd »

rich_sasha wrote: post #210

I find it weird how hostile to hydrogen the "renewable energy gang" is. The story of how renewables take over the world and displace fossil fuels and nuclear totally relies on storage, in some cases seasonal storage, IE overproducing in summer and holding on to the energy til the end of winter. Does hydrogen work for it? Well, maybe, it could, there are unresolved issues but hey we are trying to do science here. It's…

I am not a fan of hydrogen, because I once worked with a former NASA robotics engineer. We were looking for a way to power terrestrial robots, and we asked him about hydrogen.

He told us there were extremely high efficiency hydrogen systems at the time. But they all suffered from similar problems:

- Hydrogen is highly flammable (or explosive) in an oxygen atmosphere.

- Hydrogen has truly awful power storage density—unless you compress it to a couple of hundred atmospheres pressure.

Nobody wants to store potentially explosive fuel at 200+ atmospheres. I'm not aware of current hydrogen technology at all, but that's a fundamental physics challenge that needs to be addressed somehow. And it needs to be addressed in a cost-effective way at each step of the distribution chain.

The problem with high density energy storage is that you're putting a huge amount of energy in a tiny space. Gasoline is flamable, lithium-ion batteries are notorious for ugly fires, and even flywheels can fail catastrophically. A good power storage system needs to manage this risk somehow.

(There was some really interesting work being done with carbon-fiber flywheels and maglev bearings in a vacuum about 20 years ago. Apparently that had decent power density, and it could charge off electric charging infrastructure. But car insurance companies weren't convinced it was safe. Which would also be a problem for hydrogen.)

Re: Japan's hydrogen strategy does nothing for decarbonisation: study

#242

Post by Mikeb85 »

_hypx wrote: post #229
rich_sasha wrote: post #210

I find it weird how hostile to hydrogen the "renewable energy gang" is. The story of how renewables take over the world and displace fossil fuels and nuclear totally relies on storage, in some cases seasonal storage, IE overproducing in summer and holding on to the energy til the end of winter. Does hydrogen work for it? Well, maybe, it could, there are unresolved issues but hey we are trying to do science here. It's…

It’s pretty obvious that many environmentalists don’t want solutions. They just want to feel superior to others because they have solar panels on their roof and others don’t. Anything that could potentially render those solar panels unnecessary is very aggressively opposed.

Even if solar panels are used only for domestic energy consumption (ie. Electric appliances) it's worth it. Entirely different subject than BEV vs HEVs...

Re: Japan's hydrogen strategy does nothing for decarbonisation: study

#243

Post by jnsaff2 »

Mikeb85 wrote: post #237
jnsaff2 wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of the mining waste you refer to is related to COAL. They produce roughly 5 billion tons a year of coal for which many times of that is waste rocks. 5 billion tons of coal gets mostly burned up. Meanwhile 50 THOUSAND tons of lithium is produced per year. For which maybe millions tons of waste gets created.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium Hmmm, 500,000 litres of water per ton of lithium. Electrolysis required to create lithium metal. Plus the required dirt being moved, water being moved, energy for electrolysis, etc... Sounds very energy efficient... /s

I know you are a sarcastic troll.

But still, that 5 billion tons of coal gets mined, transported and then burned to produce energy once.

A kg of coal contains about 8kWh of energy which it can release once. This is the best kind of coal. Also you only get about 40% of it as electricity.

A kg of lithium will store about 1.1kWh energy in a battery .. thousands of times before it needs to be RECYCLED.

Your efficiency is off by many orders of magnitude.

Re: Japan's hydrogen strategy does nothing for decarbonisation: study

#244

Post by rgbrenner »

rich_sasha wrote: post #210

I find it weird how hostile to hydrogen the "renewable energy gang" is. The story of how renewables take over the world and displace fossil fuels and nuclear totally relies on storage, in some cases seasonal storage, IE overproducing in summer and holding on to the energy til the end of winter. Does hydrogen work for it? Well, maybe, it could, there are unresolved issues but hey we are trying to do science here. It's…

The people who like hydrogen should show us all that we're wrong.

- First hydrogen fuel cell: 1842

- Earliest li-ion battery: 1965~

You've had a 100 year head start, and yet hydrogen fuel cell cars are terrible. Hydrogen planes? Some prototypes are being worked on.

I can go buy an entire car with a massive li-ion battery in it right now. I can get batteries to power my house during an outage.

Hydrogen? "There are some unresolved issues"

"Why is everyone so hostile to hydrogen" Like, release a product already. Everyone is moving forward on green energy without you.

Re: Japan's hydrogen strategy does nothing for decarbonisation: study

#245

Post by Mikeb85 »

jnsaff2 wrote: post #243
Mikeb85 wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium Hmmm, 500,000 litres of water per ton of lithium. Electrolysis required to create lithium metal. Plus the required dirt being moved, water being moved, energy for electrolysis, etc... Sounds very energy efficient... /s

I know you are a sarcastic troll. But still, that 5 billion tons of coal gets mined, transported and then burned to produce energy once. A kg of coal contains about 8kWh of energy which it can release once. This is the best kind of coal. Also you only get about 40% of it as electricity. A kg of lithium will store about 1.1kWh energy in a battery .. thousands of times before it needs to be RECYCLED. Your efficiency is…

Who's comparing coal to batteries? We're talking the lifetime energy cost of producing batteries from the ground to the recycling depot.

Coal production is terrible and I'll never support it.

Re: Japan's hydrogen strategy does nothing for decarbonisation: study

#246

Post by TheLoafOfBread »

rgbrenner wrote: post #244
rich_sasha wrote: post #210

I find it weird how hostile to hydrogen the "renewable energy gang" is. The story of how renewables take over the world and displace fossil fuels and nuclear totally relies on storage, in some cases seasonal storage, IE overproducing in summer and holding on to the energy til the end of winter. Does hydrogen work for it? Well, maybe, it could, there are unresolved issues but hey we are trying to do science here. It's…

The people who like hydrogen should show us all that we're wrong. - First hydrogen fuel cell: 1842 - Earliest li-ion battery: 1965~ You've had a 100 year head start, and yet hydrogen fuel cell cars are terrible. Hydrogen planes? Some prototypes are being worked on. I can go buy an entire car with a massive li-ion battery in it right now. I can get batteries to power my house during an outage. Hydrogen? "There are som…

This is disingenuous. Batteries are more convenient for everyday electronics, but not necessarily better for big storage. Reason is, that you can't easily scale a battery storage, while hydrogen can be scaled just by putting more steel tanks.

Re: Japan's hydrogen strategy does nothing for decarbonisation: study

#247

Post by jnsaff2 »

Mikeb85 wrote: post #245
jnsaff2 wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know you are a sarcastic troll. But still, that 5 billion tons of coal gets mined, transported and then burned to produce energy once. A kg of coal contains about 8kWh of energy which it can release once. This is the best kind of coal. Also you only get about 40% of it as electricity. A kg of lithium will store about 1.1kWh energy in a battery .. thousands of times before it needs to be RECYCLED. Your efficiency is…

Who's comparing coal to batteries? We're talking the lifetime energy cost of producing batteries from the ground to the recycling depot. Coal production is terrible and I'll never support it.

You compared them to coal. You put out 100 Billion tons of waste number. Biggest share of that is from mining coal.

So why are you attributing the coal mining waste to lithium then?

If you actually look at the numbers the benefits of mining for lithium FAR outweigh its downsides.

Re: Japan's hydrogen strategy does nothing for decarbonisation: study

#248

Post by teamonkey »

TheLoafOfBread wrote: post #246
rgbrenner wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The people who like hydrogen should show us all that we're wrong. - First hydrogen fuel cell: 1842 - Earliest li-ion battery: 1965~ You've had a 100 year head start, and yet hydrogen fuel cell cars are terrible. Hydrogen planes? Some prototypes are being worked on. I can go buy an entire car with a massive li-ion battery in it right now. I can get batteries to power my house during an outage. Hydrogen? "There are som…

This is disingenuous. Batteries are more convenient for everyday electronics, but not necessarily better for big storage. Reason is, that you can't easily scale a battery storage, while hydrogen can be scaled just by putting more steel tanks.

Seems like only a few years ago people were saying that battery powered cars weren't possible, you'd never be able to fit a big enough battery in there, they'd never have the range, weigh too much, be too expensive...

Re: Japan's hydrogen strategy does nothing for decarbonisation: study

#249

Post by jamil7 »

idiocrat wrote: post #212

Here is an interesting but sad documentary from 2020. (1h40m). It addresses the concerns about hydrogen. "Michael Moore presents Planet of the Humans, a documentary that dares to say what no one else will — that we are losing the battle to stop climate change on planet earth because we are following leaders who have taken us down the wrong road — selling out the green movement to wealthy interests and corporate Ameri…

It also contains a lot of misinformation and outdated talking points, not really worth watching. A whole lot of scientists and activists have spoken out against the documentary. I'm still confused as to why Michael Moore made it.

Re: Japan's hydrogen strategy does nothing for decarbonisation: study

#250

Post by enslavedrobot »

dbspin wrote: post #240
enslavedrobot wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Green hydrogen is made from electricity. The cost of green hydrogen is currently high, but it is dropping faster than pretty much any other energy storage technology. Hydrogen storage is an order of magnitude cheaper (or more) than any other tech. It is expensive because of the cost of electrolyzers/fuel-cells that convert between electricity and H2. These costs are dropping fast at efficiencies of 80%+ along with th…

Unfortunately 'green hydrogen' currently isn't. "Under baseline conditions, the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are around one-quarter that of the currently dominant process for hydrogen production, steam methane reforming (SMR). However, sensitivity analysis shows that GHG emissions may be comparable to SMR under reasonably anticipated conditions. " https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2021/ee/d1ee0...

I think this type of analysis fails to project the future. GHG emissions from solar cell production will decline as the inputs and processes used to make them begin to use renewable energy.

Green hydrogen decouples H2 generation from hydrocarbons, and industrial uses of H2 will be critical in decoupling more processes and industries from fossil fuels. That's the whole point.

The other part of the abstract suggests that grid energy will be required to buffer intermittent renewables. This argument assumes that it is not possible to design H2 electrolyzers that can rapidly adapt to a change in electrical input, which is simply a relatively straightforward engineering challenge.

I find it hard to believe that the authors of this paper didn't already know all of this.

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