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Oil sector is lobbying for inefficient hydrogen cars to delay electrification

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Re: Oil sector is lobbying for inefficient hydrogen cars to delay electrification

#41

Post by rootusrootus »

asdff wrote: post #6
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #2

Not saying the oil sector is powerless by any means, and I guess maybe they're going for regulatory capture, but this is a non-starter from an economic reality perspective so I'm not too worried about it. The train is well out of the station for electric vehicles. I believe every car maker (save 1 that I know about) is fully committed to 100% electrified vehicles in the not-too-distant future. I feel like eventually…

All it takes is a new pump at existing gas stations and what becomes more compelling to the consumer flips overnight. Same cultural process of fueling up at the same place you've always fueled up in about the same amount of time as its always taken. It seems like there's a lot lot less inertia to get consumers over that hurdle than the EV hurdle, where charge times are long and convenient chargers not a guarantee in…

> All it takes is a new pump at existing gas stations

"All it takes" is doing very heavy lifting in that sentence. There's a good reason that hydrogen fueling stations are basically non-existent aside from a few in California. Distribution and fueling is quite complicated compared to conventional liquid fuels.

Re: Oil sector is lobbying for inefficient hydrogen cars to delay electrification

#42

Post by beders »

deviantbit wrote: post #3

The electric car industry is spinning alternatives. Hydrogen is a much better alternative all around. You'll be able to convert existing cars much easier.

What would "convert existing cars" get you?

A BEV is so much simpler to build and maintain.

Re: Oil sector is lobbying for inefficient hydrogen cars to delay electrification

#43

Post by Pxtl »

Clent wrote: post #11

I didn't realize this wasn't common knowledge. They oil companies own a lot of infrastructure for moving fuel around. They cannot use this infrastructure to move electricity but they can use the existing infrastructure to move hydrogen around.

More to the point, currently only 1% (edit: some articles I've seen put it less than 0.1%[1]) of hydrogen is "green". The rest is mostly made out of natural gas, a process that releases just as much CO2 as if you'd burned it. H2 isn't a way to save the Earth, it's a way to save the Natural Gas industry.

[1]https://cleantechnica.com/2021/12/22/0-03-of-hydrogen-is-gre...

Re: Oil sector is lobbying for inefficient hydrogen cars to delay electrification

#44

Post by gmane »

tw04 wrote: post #22
gmane wrote: post #5

Anyone who has followed hydrogen as a fuel for a while sees pretty easily that its a solution in search of a problem. It really doesn't make sense to use renewables to make hydrogen fuel to then burn: batteries are better for storage of energy in most cases (I will grant that there are edge cases where a liquid/gas fuel is a better technical solution than batteries, but I think that options like ethanol are probably…

I don't blame you for being skeptical, but it isn't just the oil and gas industry. The Japanese government went all-in on hydrogen. https://thediplomat.com/2023/07/a-look-at-japans-latest-hydr...

Sure, and it's by and large viewed as a complete failure[0]. Is your argument that we should repeat that failure?

[0] https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/green-tech/a4266501...

Re: Oil sector is lobbying for inefficient hydrogen cars to delay electrification

#45

Post by jacquesm »

asdff wrote: post #6
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #2

Not saying the oil sector is powerless by any means, and I guess maybe they're going for regulatory capture, but this is a non-starter from an economic reality perspective so I'm not too worried about it. The train is well out of the station for electric vehicles. I believe every car maker (save 1 that I know about) is fully committed to 100% electrified vehicles in the not-too-distant future. I feel like eventually…

All it takes is a new pump at existing gas stations and what becomes more compelling to the consumer flips overnight. Same cultural process of fueling up at the same place you've always fueled up in about the same amount of time as its always taken. It seems like there's a lot lot less inertia to get consumers over that hurdle than the EV hurdle, where charge times are long and convenient chargers not a guarantee in…

Not even close. It requires a whole new delivery network, trucks, pipelines need to be re-sleeved and tons of safety measures. Switching to hydrogen from diesel or gasoline is a non-trivial exercise. And large scale storage is yet another problem. That's hard enough with LNG, LPG, diesel and gasoline, with hydrogen it is much more complex and carries more risk.

Re: Oil sector is lobbying for inefficient hydrogen cars to delay electrification

#46

Post by tw04 »

exabrial wrote: post #15

please feel free to vote me down into oblivion because, you know, "I'm wrong"... But I would prefer a hydrogen fuel cell vehicle over a battery-electric for a number of reasons. The first is theoretical recharge/refuel times, but the second is firefighter rescue personnel safety. BEVs are here-and-now technology though, and I don't oppose them, it's just I plan to wait until hydrogen technology matures and reaches de…

If you're worried about firefighters, I'm not sure why you think hydrogen would be the solution. Hydrogen fires are invisible to the human eye, and carry an extremely high risk of catastrophic explosion. While a lithium fire isn't great, it's more the issue of "this is going to ruin the roadway that it's burning on" than "the firefighter is going to die trying to put it out".

https://www.osha.gov/green-jobs/hydrogen/fire-explosion#:~:t....

Re: Oil sector is lobbying for inefficient hydrogen cars to delay electrification

#48

Post by baq »

gmane wrote: post #5

Anyone who has followed hydrogen as a fuel for a while sees pretty easily that its a solution in search of a problem. It really doesn't make sense to use renewables to make hydrogen fuel to then burn: batteries are better for storage of energy in most cases (I will grant that there are edge cases where a liquid/gas fuel is a better technical solution than batteries, but I think that options like ethanol are probably…

Batteries are heavy, expensive and we don’t have infrastructure to charge them at the required scale.

I don’t believe hydrogen is the answer but methane cells could be… liquid energy storage is just so much more practical compared to alternatives.

Re: Oil sector is lobbying for inefficient hydrogen cars to delay electrification

#49

Post by cycrutchfield »

exabrial wrote: post #15

please feel free to vote me down into oblivion because, you know, "I'm wrong"... But I would prefer a hydrogen fuel cell vehicle over a battery-electric for a number of reasons. The first is theoretical recharge/refuel times, but the second is firefighter rescue personnel safety. BEVs are here-and-now technology though, and I don't oppose them, it's just I plan to wait until hydrogen technology matures and reaches de…

The rescue personnel will be safe because there won’t be anything of you left to rescue.

Re: Oil sector is lobbying for inefficient hydrogen cars to delay electrification

#50

Post by otabdeveloper4 »

gmane wrote: post #5

Anyone who has followed hydrogen as a fuel for a while sees pretty easily that its a solution in search of a problem. It really doesn't make sense to use renewables to make hydrogen fuel to then burn: batteries are better for storage of energy in most cases (I will grant that there are edge cases where a liquid/gas fuel is a better technical solution than batteries, but I think that options like ethanol are probably…

Putting two tons of highly toxic and flammable lithium into a car-shaped object just to commute one person a few dozen miles is quite literally insane from all practical points of view.

Our ancestors will never believe that we were nuts enough to not only allow this, but actually legally manndate it. They will think it's an urban legend and no ancient people could have been so short-sighted and egotistical.

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