The Hydrogen Economy
Cary de Wit
What sort of vehicle will you be driving in 10 years? Quite likely, a petrol car. Many people are working against this, realising it is not the transport future we really want. The question is, what are the alternatives?
I believe electric technology is the way to go, given its history, usability and efficiency. However another option is hydrogen. Norway is aiming to become the world’s first hydrogen economy. Hydrogen is abundant and when burned, produces only water and oxygen. This means you can use it in a conventional internal combustion engine, or run it thorough a fuel cell to make electricity for an electric car.
The idea of hydrogen is good. Vehicles powered by hydrogen have ZERO pollution. But the hydrogen issue is more complex than this. Here are some of the problems we don’t often hear about.
Making it
Making hydrogen takes lots of energy, usually in the form of electricity. So much so that you would be way ahead if you just used the electricity in a normal electric vehicle. Hydrogen can also be extracted from natural gas but again, using the gas in a conventional way is a more efficient use of energy. Some buses in Australia already run on natural gas.
Storing it
Hydrogen is very hard to store in a car. It can be compressed but you need huge pressure, around 10,000psi, to get any reasonable range. Even then, the tank would be much larger than a normal petrol tank, and there are concerns about its safety in the event of a collision. Also, compressing hydrogen requires more energy, further decreasing the overall efficiency.
New technology
The existing transport infrastructure cannot be used for hydrogen in the usual way: tankers, gas pipelines and other equipment must be built from scratch or refitted.
Many of the ideas for how to use hydrogen involve inventions and technology that either do not exist or need major refinement for mass use. History tells us not to doubt what the future may bring, however a lot of time, effort, money and resources are needed for hydrogen technology to become usable, let alone cost competitive.
The hydrogen economy is still a long way away, if it can work at all. Electric vehicle technology is available now and is far cheaper to implement.
