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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

#271

Post by defrost »

liketochill wrote: post #207
defrost wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

South Australia’s incredible week: 104.1 per cent wind and solar over seven days https://reneweconomy.com.au/south-australias-incredible-week... South Australia aims to reach 100 per cent “net renewables” within a few years – over a full year – but in the past week it has already done better than that. It would appear they are aiming to export excess renewable power to Victoria (neighbouring state).

I thought we were taking about battery capacity preventing a blackout during a major grid outage and not installed renewable capacity meeting the demand.

.South Australia had (maybe still has) the "world's largest battery" (installed by Tesla | Musk) which is an integral part of the SA state power grid that carries it through night times with no wind . . .

If there's "a major grid outage" no large scale battery (or gas fired plant or coal fired plant, etc) will prevent blackout .. as there is "a major grid outage" preventing power from being delivered.

Individual homes would be left to do what individual Australian homes do during bush fires, floods, tree falls, etc and turn to gas lanterns, home generators, and any community hubs that feed local rooftop solar through a local small scale battery (not common as yet, but they're about and increasingly so).

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

#272

Post by KSteffensen »

eptcyka wrote: post #217
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…

Hydrogen is a less efficient energy store than a battery, requires high pressure systems, leaks are dangerously explosive, distributing it is more difficult than petrol or electricity. It has applications, but in general, its often significantly worse than any other greener alternative.

> requires high pressure systems, leaks are dangerously explosive

Is this different in some way from natural gas? Why can't we use the existing storage and distribution infrastructure for natural gas for handling hydrogen?

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

#273

Post by landemva »

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…

That just compared coal 'to produce energy once' to batteries which have no inherent energy. These are different things.

Coal is an existing form of energy reserve which has stable long-term storage and can be consumed once. Batteries are not native energy, though batteries can be manufactured and then charged to temporarily time-shift energy.

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

#274

Post by pezezin »

rippercushions wrote: post #164
TheRealPomax wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't know Toyota was a fossil fuel company, or was owned by one? Japan is uniquely trying to make this thing work. They have no domestic oil production, and so few coal mines as to basically be irrelevant: all their fossil fuel is imported. Anywhere else on the planet: sure, this might be another way for big fossil to push for relevancy, but in Japan's case, hydrogen would be something that they can produce thems…

> The very idea of "my car needs to go 300 miles on one charge/tank" just isn't a thing there. Citation needed. No, you don't need to go 300 miles on one charge/tank if you live in a big Japanese city, in fact you don't even need a car in that case. However, if you live in rural areas or need to travel long distances, 300 mi is not a lot to ask for: the main island of Honshu is >800 mi long and 300 won't even get you…

People seem to forget that Japan is not only Kanto and Kansai. I live in Aomori and here everybody needs a car. I have to drive around 500 km per week, and I would really appreciate if my car would have better mileage.

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

#275

Post by jnsaff2 »

jnsaff2 wrote: post #230
Mikeb85 wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes but batteries contain toxic materials and rare earth minerals, require lots of energy to make, lots of energy to recycle, etc... So energy to mine the materials, energy to assemble the battery, energy to recycle the battery after it's useful lifespan (5-10 years)... None of these are ever counted in people's calculations. I tried to find data on energy required to produce the batteries and they still didn't count…

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.

More context here: https://twitter.com/visaskn/status/1616813002547773444

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

#276

Post by jnsaff2 »

landemva wrote: post #273
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…

That just compared coal 'to produce energy once' to batteries which have no inherent energy. These are different things. Coal is an existing form of energy reserve which has stable long-term storage and can be consumed once. Batteries are not native energy, though batteries can be manufactured and then charged to temporarily time-shift energy.

Sure, same goes for hydrogen. I don't think there are any hydrogen deposits that can be readily used.

But important distinction nonetheless.

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

#277

Post by cactusplant7374 »

1) How would we compare Porsche's gasoline experiment [0] with Hydrogen? Because the Hydrogen article seems to suggest that it's useful just not expedient in the entire landscape of energy.

2) The hydrogen insight has what looks to be interesting articles. I'm going to read through them more.

[0] https://arstechnica.com/cars/2022/12/porsches-synthetic-gaso...

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

#278

Post by jojobas »

eru wrote: post #102
jojobas wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fuel cells might end up better than batteries if you consider the cost/lifetime of batteries. Energy density and safety are also valid considerations, the batteries are already at the limit of what you'd want to sit on top.

Hydrogen isn't really anything you'd be more keen to sit on top than other batteries, or is it?

Hydrogen by itself has the energy density of zero. Batteries are nearing the energy density of high explosives (and for some types, such as Li-S, exceed it), and, unlike hydrogen, have all the components required for energy yield within micrometers of each other.

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

#279

Post by cactusplant7374 »

ekidd wrote: post #241
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—u…

I totally get the risk. As a consumer I feel similar fear about EV car batteries. Even if you can find the escape hatch in a pinch (some EV doors aren't normally manually opened), your house could still burn down or there could be other life changing property damage. It's a small risk but still feels like a real risk.

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

#280

Post by jnsaff2 »

ekidd wrote: post #270
6510 wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The internet says storing hydrogen in metal hydrides is safe and offers similar kwh/kg as lithium ion batteries. It seems to me Japan is going all in on their new high-temperature gas-cooled reactor (which supposedly cant melt down)it transports the heat with helium in stead of water which allows for temperatures that allow for hydrogen production. Just repeating what I read and hear online. This isn't an endorsement…

Yes, bonding the hydrogen with something could really change the tradeoffs dramatically. For example, the main ingredient in gasoline is C8H18. It has good energy density at atmospheric pressure, and the fire risks are manageable. We already use carbon/hydrogen systems today! I think one of the candidates for metal hydride fuel cells is MgH2? It apparently also has decent energy density. Of course, magnesium poses so…

I would also guess bonding and then using that adds two conversions worth of losses to the equation and are not free.
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