Energy Independence: Hydrogen and Fuel Cells Are Not the Answer

The greatest problem of the 21st Century is energy independence. It's the problem of single-person commuting in petroleum cars, and the upstream, downstream, and associated war and defense costs of our dependence on overseas oil supplies. We rely on cheap oil, and this situation is unique to the United States, where gasoline is subsidized and public transit is not.

Hydrogen ("H2") has been proposed as the answer, but it's not any sort of solution at all. H2 is a method of powering the ultimate solution, which is the electric motor. Electric "traction", or motive, power is the most efficient and logical for most forms of ground transport now performed by other power.

All traction power for locomotives has been diesel-electric for many years precisely because Internal Combustion ("IC") engines are not suited for driving the wheels of moving vehicles. In the case of trains, the deciding factor was the "clutch problem", the fact that the engine is moving constantly and the locomotive must come to a halt, or shift into new gears to go up hills or for more weight. And braking...electric braking is so much superior to mechanical pressure of replaceable pads.

More generally, the up-and-down motion of pistons is not suited for conversion into the rotary motion required for cars, nor for the up-and-down torque requirements. An electric motor makes all those conversions with movement of electrons, not greased piston rings, and needs no timing belt, cam shaft, flywheel, fuel filter, rods, wrist pins, fuel injection, oil filter, etc., etc. The latest advanced technology 3-phase brushless electric motor has, essentially, only one moving part, and in an Electric car, it's moving in the right direction - same as the wheels.

How you get electric power to a moving vehicle and its electric motor is the problem; one method is an engine-generator ("genset") to make the electric power that ultimately runs the wheels, eliminating clutch, transmission and keeping the engine at a constant speed - the diesel-electric solution. Another method is battery power, and yet another is fuel cells powered by tanks of hydrogen. There are various combinations of these methods of getting electric power to the "traction" motor. But everyone agrees that the electric motor is the only choice for serious solutions to motive power.

The problem with Hydrogen is that it's all hype based on a tiny shard of truth. Fuel cells work, of course, invented in 1839; but they only do "government" work, where cost and common sense are not in the reckoning. The oil companies would like to spread the myth of hydrogen, because it postpones alternatives at least until 2025, and gives them another generation of sterling profits. There is no guarantee that in 2025 Hydrogen will be any less of a hype, unless the laws of nature change by then. While the problem of electric traction power is getting the electric to the motor in a moving vehicle, fuel cells just push the problem back - a problem of getting the H2 gas (or liquid H2) to the fuel cell in the moving vehicle.

The fuel density of H2 is low, unless it's carried in liquid form. Gasoline take much less energy to manufacture than H2, and it takes much less space to store it. A kilogram of H2 has the energy of about three kilograms of gasoline, but the Hydrogen occupies a much larger space than a gallon of gasoline. Like cars powered by Compressed Natural Gas ("CNG"), the tank of the fuel cell car is immense, and its range limited. Dramatic improvements in tank linings have lessened the problem of hydrogen "embrittlement", where the very small H2 molecules infiltrate and weaken the metal itself, but also mean that the life of the car will end when the expensive tanks need replacement.

If compressed H2 and fuel cells are practical, why are we ignoring CNG? CNG works, powers trucks, vans and cars, is plentiful in North America (often flared off to get rid of it), and does not require an expensive research program to lower the cost of fuel cells from $300,000 to $300. Moreover, CNG is a clean fuel, allowing single-person travel in the HOV lanes. So if H2 were more than a scam and a lie, why not CNG?

Rather than its touted use in fuel cells, H2, like CNG, can be burned in the engines of IC vehicles with slight modifications. H2 is no mystery; it's sold in refillable tanks at welding shops. But for use in IC cars, it's frightfully more expensive than CNG or gasoline. Lowering the cost of H2, a dream of advocates, would mean lowering the cost of the energy to make it, when examined in the cold light of engineering reality. But energy costs are rising, not falling; H2 prices will rise from current high levels to even higher prices as the cost of freeing, compressing and storing rises.

Hydrogen advocates retreat to the position that the only reasonable storage for H2 is not in gas form, but in liquid. Yet liquid H2 ("LH"), like any H2, must be manufactured; it's only present in nature in combined form, and its very volatility means that separating it is going to be very energy-intensive, as is compressing and liquefying it. Moreover, it is explosive, and must be stored in cryogenic tanks at hundreds of degrees below zero. That's why they don't load the space shuttle until just before launch, and why stand-downs are so expensive: compressing LH is almost as expensive as its cryogenic storage and energy-intensive manufacture.

In fact, you can't store LH for long; like Liquefied Natural Gas ("LNG"), it leaks out and dissipates, a consumable item.

So whatever our "solution" is to be, it's not going to be fuel cells, and not even H2 that's used in combustion engines.

H2 advocates must be prepared to answer the question, "why not CNG?" or, indeed, "why not LNG?". CNG is a much cheaper clean fuel, and does not require manufacture. While making H2 actually loses net energy (you must build power plants to make it happen), CNG is a net power win, it's stored power free for the taking.

But in general, cars or individual mobility are not the most efficient form of transportation; what's needed is a general transportation plan, from air corridors to regional airports to electric shuttles to electric trains and people-movers, and impinging even on the way we build cities so that transportation options are considered when they are designed. We still design cities in the old way, build it and then worry about logistical support and transportation; better planning would reduce the need, for example, for single-passenger automobile commuting and even for commuting itself. Only the most advanced planners even consider passive heating and cooling, rooftop solar PV and water systems, and how the home fits into the community (for example, whether the surrounding streets and infrastructure can support the new residents; there's an estimated $15,000 net deficit for each new home in terms of ancillary support services funded by existing residents, not funded by the developer and only partially shared by the new residents).

To uncritically accept the "Hydrogen Hype", the myth that "hydrogen will solve our Energy Independence problem", is not common sense; it's folly, if not an outright scam. The hypesters almost use "Hydrogen" as a mantra, a totem, that they never examine, just wave around. Examining the myth is something that the scamsters don't want you to do.