Hydrogen, Fuel and the Future

I was reading an e-mail by NY Times columnist David Pogue about the future of car fuels, and I thought that he served up an interesting solution via BMW and a new car they a prototyping.

Basically, BMW has created a prototype of hydrogen car that runs on both hydrogen and regular gasoline. Like current hybrids it seamlessly switches between gasoline and hydrogen power, when the hydrogen runs out. This is necessary as there are not enough hydrogen refueling stations to make an all-hydrogen car viable yet. The big benefit here is that hydrogen fuels by product is pure water instead of Carbon Dioxide, and other greenhouse gases.

You can read all of David Pogue's Column on BMW & hydrogen fuel here.

As I was reading about it, I thought to myself that there are probably a lot of opinions about this technology, and I might have my own, but it's certainly not as informed as those who are currently working in fields related to fuel technology. So, I e-mailed three of my chemical engineering friends who do do work in the field to see what they thought. Below is a condensed version of their thoughts, as one statement. I thought their thoughts were worth sharing:

"Fossil fuels are finite."

Agreed. In the meantime oil company salaries are probably only going to keep going up and up as we try to squeeze out every last drop. If you are interested in a good read about the future of oil, check out either of the two books here: Hubbert's Peak and Beyond Oil are both fantastic. Ken Deffeyes weaves an excellent story about the past, present, and future of oil.

"Hydrogen as a fuel."

I am extremely skeptical of the hydrogen economy. In my opinion there is currently no viable technology to store hydrogen. Activated carbons have been promising, but we are nowhere near DOE targets. Anything involving nanotubes is a load of crap. Adsorption on MOFS is partially irreversible. I think all of these chemical storage methods are likely to be better than compression though. How far did that car go before refueling or before the tank heated up? How are they cooling it? If the tank is "a tank so bulky, it makes a visible bulge behind the rear seats," what family is going to want that in their car? How will they fit in their 5 kids? Storage is the big problem. How much weight does it add to the car to have these high-pressure tanks?

"Their primary objection, of course, is the amount of energy that's consumed (and pollution generated) in producing hydrogen in the first place."

Yes! Hydrogen can solve the fuel problem. Burning hydrogen is clean but making hydrogen is not- although it should be cleaner than burning gas. Big Al Gore (and I mean big, have you seen that dude lately?) won't be too happy to find out that although greenhouse gases aren't coming out the tailpipe, they are coming out somewhere else. OK, what about CO2 sequestration? This is not completely feasible at the present time, but it is closer to working than any of the methods to store hydrogen.

"Ethanol?"

The efficiency of ethanol is very low. And corn prices are skyrocketing. This idea is better for the American farmer than anything else.

In conclusion...

I pretty much agree with Pogue. I have bashed all of the technologies out there, but I do think all of them are only in their infancy. Importantly, none of them is the silver bullet. Each will only makeup a portion of the total solution. People out touting the greatness of just one of these technologies drive me nuts. Especially when they quote figures to make a case that their solution can make up 100% of the total. No freaking way. Whatever the final solution is, it doesn't exist right now. In the meantime, we need to conserve. All new vehicles should be hybrid within 5 years, 10 at the most. If we can double efficiency, then we have double the time to come up with a better solution before oil runs out.

I propose a minimum 25-50 cents a gallon tax on gas with all money going toward renewable energy research. This would also encourage people to drive less and buy more fuel efficient cars.

The holy grail is hydrogen from water using sunlight. There is an infinite supply of both.

Many new technologies plus conservation need to contribute to the total solution. I am actually part of a collaboration that is working on solar-powered water splitting to make hydrogen. There is "capital" CO2 produced in making the device but no "operational" CO2 produced to keep it going. Our method is just one of many being tried. Hopefully one will work. At least we are trying, the worst thing anyone can do is the same thing that we've been doing for the last 50-100 years.

Anyone else have an opinion?