stdreb27
Active Member
Originally Posted by Nordy
http:///forum/post/2650043
This is the real issue here-producing hydrogen from water costs more energy than is realized by returning those hydrogen moleclues to its oxygen partner, releasing energy and water in the process. Prducing H2 from fossil fuels is just about the most foolish use of resources that you could possibly imagine, but it does in fact happen. Producing H2 from say, solar arrays, wind farms, or hydrelectric does make sense from a carbon emission standpoint and also as a fairly efficient way to store excess energy that can't be used by the grid at the time that it is produced.
As for ethanol, don't even get me started-using fertilizers produced by fossil fuel powered processes, diesel fuel for all the farm equipment required to produce the corn, energy costs involved in fermenting and actually producing the ethanol, etc, etc. The energy budget for that boondoggle couldn't possibly be positive. Using switchgrass? a little better than corn, but not a whole lot better.
Then of course, there's the all electric car powered by Li Ion batteries-performs very well, but the electricity is produced by majority fossil fuel powered generators. By the time you factor in generating and transmission losses, a high tech direct injection Buetec diesel engine is looking pretty good.
There is no such thing as a free lunch, in fact you can't even get it if you pay for it sometimes. Once an infrastructure is in place to produce non fossil fuel based energy (nuclear, solar, wind, hydro) that can be used in road, rail, air, and sea based transportation, then H2 and ethanol based cars will make sense from an energy budget standpoint.
Well the argument there is that eventually with "economies of scale" it will become more efficient. Than it is now. It is hard to compete against oil because it has so much energy and is pretty cheap to refine. The real question is, and I'm sure it will never be done, is producing hydrogen going to be easier, more energy efficient than refining and burning gas. Ethanol was billed at that, but even the chicoms realised that it wasn't.
As far as I know, the most efficient way of producing hydrogen is putting a charge to water. And that is a very inefficient form of producing fuel. I'm not sure about o2. But Seriously, you put energy whether it is electricity or an exposion on o2 and you make o3.
http:///forum/post/2650043
This is the real issue here-producing hydrogen from water costs more energy than is realized by returning those hydrogen moleclues to its oxygen partner, releasing energy and water in the process. Prducing H2 from fossil fuels is just about the most foolish use of resources that you could possibly imagine, but it does in fact happen. Producing H2 from say, solar arrays, wind farms, or hydrelectric does make sense from a carbon emission standpoint and also as a fairly efficient way to store excess energy that can't be used by the grid at the time that it is produced.
As for ethanol, don't even get me started-using fertilizers produced by fossil fuel powered processes, diesel fuel for all the farm equipment required to produce the corn, energy costs involved in fermenting and actually producing the ethanol, etc, etc. The energy budget for that boondoggle couldn't possibly be positive. Using switchgrass? a little better than corn, but not a whole lot better.
Then of course, there's the all electric car powered by Li Ion batteries-performs very well, but the electricity is produced by majority fossil fuel powered generators. By the time you factor in generating and transmission losses, a high tech direct injection Buetec diesel engine is looking pretty good.
There is no such thing as a free lunch, in fact you can't even get it if you pay for it sometimes. Once an infrastructure is in place to produce non fossil fuel based energy (nuclear, solar, wind, hydro) that can be used in road, rail, air, and sea based transportation, then H2 and ethanol based cars will make sense from an energy budget standpoint.
Well the argument there is that eventually with "economies of scale" it will become more efficient. Than it is now. It is hard to compete against oil because it has so much energy and is pretty cheap to refine. The real question is, and I'm sure it will never be done, is producing hydrogen going to be easier, more energy efficient than refining and burning gas. Ethanol was billed at that, but even the chicoms realised that it wasn't.
As far as I know, the most efficient way of producing hydrogen is putting a charge to water. And that is a very inefficient form of producing fuel. I'm not sure about o2. But Seriously, you put energy whether it is electricity or an exposion on o2 and you make o3.
