By Steve Goreham
Originally published in Master Resource.
World leaders tout “green hydrogen” as an essential fuel in the renewable energy transition. Today, heavy industries use huge amounts of coal and natural gas to produce products needed by society. Governments propose to replace hydrocarbon fuels with hydrogen fuel, using hundreds of billions of dollars in subsidies. But vast subsidies won’t be enough to overcome the insurmountable problems with green hydrogen fuel.
Four big industries—ammonia, cement, plastics, and steel—are powered by natural gas and coal, also called hydrocarbon fuels, while emitting large amounts of carbon dioxide (CO2). The world’s ammonia industry produced almost 200 million tons of ammonia in 2020, primarily for agricultural fertilizer, using natural gas and coal as fuel and feedstock. About 4.3 billion tons of cement, the essential material for concrete, were output that same year, while exhausting CO2 and burning hydrocarbons in furnaces. Over 300 million tons of plastic are produced each year using gas for feedstock and fuel. Annually, 1.9 billion tons of steel are produced using coal and gas.
To reduce CO2 emissions, world leaders call for heavy industry to switch from natural gas and coal to hydrogen fuel. When hydrogen burns, the only combustion product is water vapor.
Most hydrogen in nature exists in compounds, such as water (H2O) or methane (CH4). But hydrogen is not expensive. When produced from hydrocarbons, it costs only about a dollar a kilogram. About 99 percent of the world’s 70 million tons of annual hydrogen production comes from gas, using steam methane reforming, or from coal, using coal gasification. But advocates propose to produce green hydrogen from electrolysis of water, using electricity from wind, solar, and other renewable sources.
Electrolysis uses electricity to decompose water into hydrogen and oxygen gas. Industrial electrolyzers use complex cell structures, catalysts, and electrolytes to maximize efficiency and reduce cost. But few electrolyzers operate today because the hydrogen they produce is very expensive. Hydrogen from electrolysis, called green hydrogen, typically costs more than $5 per kilogram, or more than five times the price when produced from natural gas.
Electrolysis is expensive because it uses huge amounts of electricity. Production of one kilogram of hydrogen from electrolysis requires about 50─55 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity, or almost double the daily power consumed by a US home. In 2022, the industrial price of electricity was about six cents per kWh in the United States and about 12 cents per kWh in Germany. To produce a kilogram of hydrogen, the electricity alone costs about $3 in the US and $6 in Germany, or three and six times the price of hydrogen produced by natural gas.
Nations plan to pour vast amounts of subsidy money into hydrogen production to try to overcome the cost problem. This month President Biden announced $7 billion in subsidies for regional hydrogen hubs to try to rein in climate change. Announced hydrogen subsidies have passed $280 billion globally, with the US expected to provide $137 billion over the next ten years.
The US Inflation Reduction Act offers an astounding subsidy of $3 to produce a kilogram of green hydrogen, three times the market price. Imagine a subsidy of $150,000 to purchase a $50,000 electric car or a subsidy of $12 to produce a $4 gallon of gasoline. There appears to be no end to the cash governments will pay to try to establish a hydrogen economy.
Most hydrogen produced today from gas or coal is used on site to produce ammonia to make synthetic nitrogen fertilizer. There are no regional markets for hydrogen because hydrogen is very difficult to transport. Transportation adds additional costs to the already exorbitant price of green hydrogen.
Advocates propose that gas pipelines be used to transport hydrogen. But hydrogen is very reactive and degrades metal by a process known as hydrogen embrittlement. Embrittlement can cause cracks, leaks, and even explosions in metal pipelines. The US National Renewable Energy Laboratory recommends that pipeline blends be less than 20 percent hydrogen to minimize embrittlement.
Transporting hydrogen by ship is also costly. Liquefaction of hydrogen to -253oC requires energy equal to about 25─35 percent of the hydrogen itself, compared to the 10 percent needed to liquify natural gas. Hydrogen can be transported in the form of ammonia, which liquifies at 35oC, but must then be converted back to hydrogen, requiring energy equal to up to 30 percent of the energy content of hydrogen itself.
For hydrogen to be green, electrolyzers must use electricity from renewable or nuclear sources. But most electricity still comes from coal, oil, and natural gas, including 61% of US power in 2021, and most of the power in China (66%), India (78%), and Japan (65%). Only 37 percent of Europe’s electricity comes from hydrocarbons, but today Europe hardly has enough electricity to keep the lights on, and little to spare for electrolysis.
Converting industry to use green hydrogen fuel would require vast amounts of renewable electricity. For example, the average European steel plant produces about four million tons of crude steel per year. Hydrogen Europe, a hydrogen advocacy group, estimates that running one average plant on hydrogen would require about five GW of solar-array capacity to drive the electrolyzers. This is more than 13 times the output of California’s Ivanpah solar facility. A solar facility that could generate this much electricity would cover more than 70 square miles. To convert the world’s steel industry to run on green hydrogen, over 5,000 TWh of electricity from renewables would be needed to drive electrolyzers. This is more than the world’s total output of renewable electricity today.
.jpg){kind=link}
Alternatively, to power electrolyzers for the steel industry, the world would need to build 600 nuclear plants, added to the 437 nuclear plants operating today. This isn’t going to happen. There won’t be enough renewables to produce green hydrogen for heavy industry.
Advocates appear to believe that a landslide of money can create a new green fuel industry. But a hydrogen fuel industry, if created, will be small and based entirely on government subsidies, not sound economics.
Steve Goreham is a speaker on energy, the environment, and public policy and the author of the new bestselling book Green Breakdown: The Coming Renewable Energy Failure.
Electrolysis is expensive because it uses huge amounts of electricity. Production of one kilogram of hydrogen from electrolysis requires about 50─55 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity, or almost double the daily power consumed by a US home.
Hmmm
So it takes 55KWh of electricity to produce 1kg Hydrogen.
1kg Hydrogen contains 113,725 btu energy. https://rbnenergy.com/hydrogen-conversion-calculator
113,725 btu is equivalent to 33.3KWh. https://www.convertunits.com/from/Btu/to/kWh
So the “Green Economy” believes using 55KWh of energy to produce 33.3KWh of energy is … Smart???
And remember the efficiency of ‘renewable’ energy production is only around 33% for wind and less than 20% for solar.
With that in mind, the 33kWh contains in the 1 Kg of hydrogen requires at least 3 times the 55 kWh of energy to produce it from renewables. That brings us up to 165kW of installed wind or >275kW of solar to produce just 1kg of hydrogen.
At some point the impossibility of a hydrogen based energy option will dawn on the Green energy zealots. It may happen when the socialists pushing this nonsense run out of other peoples money, that could soon happen.
It may dawn on SOME green energy zealots, but most of them are liberal arts majors, good at demonstrating, which they practice in college, before they drop out
How many Liberal Arts Majors selected that major because it started with the word Liberal??
Yes: totally SMART – stupid moronic asinine ridiculous thick-headed
Then the hydrogen has to be burned in order to turn it back into electricity.
Direct combustion is maybe 30 to 35% efficient, depending on how much you spent on the boiler.
Fuel cells are perhaps 50% efficient.
And don’t get me started on how much hydrogen will be lost in transmission and storage.
The math is simple. Wind and sun are free, so the result is infinite efficiency per dollar. Of course, the calculators have forgotten that coal, oil, and gas are free too. No one gets a bill from mother earth for these, either.
The cost of energy comes from getting it from where it’s gotten and delivering it to the customer in the time and form that it’s needed.
Ivanpah coves an area of 5 sq mi. 13 Ivanpahs would cover 65 sq mi. The City…San Francisco…covers an area of 46.89 sq mi. So a single averaged size steel plant would require a solar thermal array 1-1/2 times the size of San Francisco
It’d be better to cover up Oakland.
Even better…Washington DC ?
New York City, and DC, and Oakland.
O, hell we would not have enough cities for just the steel industry
OK, we will just outsource it to China?
That’s the whole point! Tie up what’s left of western industry with green fantasies so that China can completely and permanently take over.
“To reduce CO2 emissions, world leaders call for heavy industry to switch from natural gas and coal to hydrogen fuel. When hydrogen burns, the only combustion product is water vapor.”
Water vapor is a more potent GHG than is CO2, correct? If so, I’m at a loss here.
In theory the air’s CO2 content is unbounded (Vunus-like) but water vapor is constrained by 100% RH?
Kevin,
I guess I would like to know then what happens when we humans keep putting more water vapor in the air from hydrogen combustion when the RH is at or near 100%.
Is messing with the water vapor levels in the atmosphere less of an issue than adding to CO2 and methane levels in the eyes of the warmunists?
Rain happens “when the RH is at or near 100%.”
Im not a hydrogen energy proponent because it would be so uneconomical and inconvenient, but too much water vapor doesn’t sound like the strongest factor against.
Kevin,
So, our water vapor emissions would cause it to rain more often than otherwise, yes? Rain is usually a good thing unless we get too much of it. At any rate, we are talking about more cloudiness and less sun, right?
Still sounds to me like we are messing with the climate, which the warmunists are wailing about now.
And yes, this discussion about how water vapor and hydrogen is probably not the strongest argument against a hydrogen economy. The costs, production and storage issues are probably greater.
Rain happens when the RH is at 100% high enough in the atmosphere for the initial tiny water droplet that forms a cloud can begin to accumulate more water until it begins to descend through the cloud (growing along the way), and gets big enough to fall all the way to the ground without evaporating. (The RH is rarely 100% at or near ground level during a normal rainstorm.)
Fog is what forms when water vapor is discharged at ground level into an atmosphere already at 100% RH.
Think about it. All the carbon in coal, petroleum, limestone and chalk came from CO2 in the atmosphere.
Dan,
Correct me if I am wrong here: I presume we are talking here about humans involving ourselves in the carbon cycle vs. involving ourselves in the water cycle.
Don’t know if either one is a bad thing.
All coal is but wood that nature has compressed and heated for easy storage. It’s as green as trees.
We get to be hot AND humid with it.
IIRC, the atmosphere of Venus is 97% CO2, whereas ours is 0.042%. 42 thousandths of 1%. We are a long, long way from turning Earth into Venus.
And Venus is much closer to the sun.
And it’s atmosphere is nearly an order of magnitude denser than Earth’s.
Nearly TWO orders of magnitude – about 92 bar or 1350 psi! Like almost a kilometre under the ocean!
Relative Humidity is a false metric to gauge with. Absolute Humidity in ppm is more instructive. Right now at my location in South Florida, the absolute humidity is 21,452 ppm. And annual average is roughly 23,000 ppm. Whereas CO2 is only ~400 ppm. Water vapor being about 2-3x more effective as the so called greenhouse effect.
So you see water vapor is the control knob, not CO2. But the general public and most so called scientists viewing only the relative humidity don’t grasp the relationship properly.
Even in cold climates the absolute humidity can still be 5-6,000 ppm.
Here is an online calculator for the absolute humidity using temperature, relative humidity and barometric pressure:
https://www.aqua-calc.com/calculate/humidity
The extra water vapor from burning either hydrocarbons or pure hydrogen is far more “greenhousy” than is the CO2 emission, but the narrative cannot use that to fear monger, because even the most ignorant among us will immediately realize you cannot demonize water. (but they fail to recognize that demonizing CO2 is to be against life itself, for below 180 ppm all plant life dies and then so does all animal life)
I have been doing my own testing of the so called greenhouse effect with emphasis on the role of water vapor for the past almost 4 years. I take the ground temperature, clear sky vertical temperature, air temperature and relative humidity and barometric pressure at just before dawn every day. I determine the absolute humidity and calculate the net upward radiative emission from the SB equation and plot the results. The idea being that at just before dawn the system has reached peak emission without the sun’s heating influence. And cross checks with the IR instrument I use shows it reads the vertical air column temperature up to roughly 27,000 to 32,000 feet by checking cloud base temps and obtaining their altitude from aviation weather info.
The result is a straight line corresponding to the absolute humidity. I can predict what the emission to space is given the air temp, ground temp and absolute humidity, or any combo of those parameters given the others. Attached is a chart of the data. Notice the difference between the coldest/lowest absolute humidity and the warmest/highest absolute humidity is roughly 150 W/m², while the IPCC says CO2 amounts to roughly 2 W/m².
Ergo water vapor is the thermostat, not CO2. (and this is not accounting for the role of water in liquid and solid form, nor convection, evaporation, precipitation, or clouds – which are further amplifying the role of water in regulating the climate as opposed to CO2 whose effect is minuscule by comparison)
(ground temp is on grass, well away from any asphalt or buildings, and vertical sky temp is without clouds)
I’m confused about what you are doing D. Boss. As sunlight evaporates moisture and warms the surface, absolute humidity will greatly increase. This absorbs more IR causing more warming if the conditions are “clear sky”, but only a few watts worth of back radiation (I hate to mention here). However moist warm air rises and forms low level clouds which locally reflect up to half of the incoming 1361 watts from the Sun. You say you check cloudbase temps, so you don’t really have “clear sky” conditions. Your numbers are pretty big to be only IR. Maybe put your methodology and data report on your website for us inquisitive minds, who are too lazy to put your effort into it, which you are to be commended for.
It can be made even more complicated, which both DMacKenzie and D Boss
seem equipped to understand. My point was that modeling or a Physics-to-English project aren’t worth doing because other issues come first. Burning Hydrogen for tranel or electricity usually does not make economic sense and creates as many problems as it could solve.
Another point most people miss is that it takes fuel cells to use that stored hydrogen to generate electricity. Those Naftion membranes don’t come cheap. Just burning it with air is often quoted as just producing water vapor, but unfortunately produces copious nitrogen oxides due to high flame temperature…that nobody talks about.
I think we’re agreeing in an argumentative way. My point was that we could keep putting one thing into Earth’s air until it _is_ the air instead of Nitrogen. The other thing will eventually saturate, condense and fall on Earth as a liquid.
I would never argue that co2 is a good tool for controlling air temperature.
Without H2O and CO2 from God’s gift to mankind fossil,, there would be no life!!
The interesting thing about the ‘greenhouse effect’ is that commercial greenhouses increase atmospheric CO2 therein to 1 000 to 1 200ppm to improve plant growth. What I don’t understand is why they don’t catch fire, or boil.
If I have understood correctly. The ‘theory’ is, CO2, because it delays outgoing long wavelength I/R radiation, results in this being absorbed by atmospheric water vapour thus increasing temperature. This increase then leads to more water vaporisation and increased atmospheric water vapour to be warmed by the indirect CO2 effect = more water vaporisation, rinse, repeat until Yikes! tipping point, runaway global warming.
This they call radiative forcing. There is no evidence to support it or what the forcing factor is. CO2, all other things being ignored, can cause, supposedly, an increase of about 1C for a doubling of its concentration. The forcing factor multiplies this effect. They started with 4 to 6, but physics didn’t get the memo, and their computer model predictions were far too high, so they reduced it to 2 to 4, still no joy. I think it’s now 1 to 2, but still guesswork.
The dreaded possibility is that it might be below 1, in which case it is a cooling effect, or even 0. Gasp!
But it does seem odd that the whole CO2 global warming theory is predicated on increased water vapour, but increasing it with hydrogen somehow has a different effect than if CO2 were the culprit. But then only Manmade CO2 can cause global warming, so the lunatic thinking is, if nothing, consistent.
“The dreaded possibility is that it might be below 1, in which case it is a cooling effect”
Check whether you mean less than 1 or less than zero.
A few million years ago, CO2 levels were over 5000ppm. If that wasn’t enough to trigger a runaway greenhouse, 400ppm doesn’t stand a chance.
There are hundreds of miles of hydrogen pipelines in the Gulf Coast region where hydrogen is used for refining and petrochemicals production. Wouldn’t hurt to paint them green.
The irony is that burning fossil fuels has no significant effect on climate. Water vapor molecules radiate in any direction but throughout the atmosphere, outward directed radiation can make it all the way to space. Within the troposphere, radiant energy absorbed by CO2 is conducted to replenish the energy radiated to space by water vapor.
Isn’t it time that all parties agreed that so-called renewable generation is impossible, and hydrogen is totally impracticable? Time to remove decision-making from the hands of ignorant politicians, and those who have jumped on the band-waggon!
Which side has the biggest army?
Is your society armed??? Second amendment (The right to keep and bear arms to form a militia) means the civilian army is the largest, but the gooberment army just has the best toys.
Until the free lancers take it away from them.
Perhaps that’s why the gooberment wants to lock Lancers behind bars.
World leaders can take a hike. We need to show them the door. We are not in a climate crisis, CO2 is not the control knob for our climate, we are not going to reach a tipping point and suffer irreversible global warming. Remove all mandates, subsidies and tax preferences.
Insert “other people’s” before “money,” and it is amazing what some people “believe.”
Luckily the Dept. of Energy is on top of this situation and everything is looking good for green hydrogen.
Green water vapor.
Of course it needs vast sums of “subsidies”. Stealing tax dollars is all climatards are interested in.
and of course the fossil fuel industry doesn’t get any… Oh wait.
https://www.imf.org/en/Topics/climate-change/energy-subsidies
Ahh, its simpleminded! Here to spew more stupidity.
from that site:
Assumed contributions to climate change and assumed pre-mature deaths from pollutants like fine particulates. As for traffic congestion and accident externalities- it sounds like they think EVs won’t have accidents and traffic congestion? Oh, that’s right- we won’t have private vehicles in the green Utopia.
I’d like to see anyone prove that 7 T figure. Surging energy prices is a form of subsidy?
Who caused those surging energy prices??? Oh…Wait…it was Government induced double digit inflation!!! Government is responsible for surging energy prices.
Asking for proof just proves that you are anti-science.
I’m working on a model that proves it…😂
It is provable that more CO2 in the air, is good for the planet. By simon’s logic, this proves that CO2 should be subsidized.
NOTE: I’m not calling for subsidies, just pointing out the absurdity of simon’s claims.
Let me say it again:
A subsidy is when the government robs someone else at gunpoint and gives the money to you.
A tax break is when the government robs you at gunpoint but does not take all of your money.
Fossil fuels get tax beaks, not subsidies.
Not only that, but these tax breaks are the equivalent to tax breaks ALL other businesses get.
Depletion allowances are nothing more than standard, every day, depreciation.
Simon in the past, has gotten bent out of shape because oil companies get to deduct the costs of drilling a well. In his mind, since no other company gets to deduct drilling costs, oil companies shouldn’t be allowed to either.
“Fossil fuels get tax beaks, not subsidies.”
Except tax breaks are subsidies…… according to every reputable site that references the issue.
The FF industry gets breaks specific to the FF industry. That means they get specific subsidies just like other energy sectors. The difference is the ones hated here are vilified for receiving subsidies and the FF sector is excused. Olympic level hypocrisy.
A TAX BREAK is money you don’t have to pay to the government as part of taxes on money earned for work done delivering a goods or services.
A SUBSIDY is money the government pays you for doing NO WORK producing any goods or services
“…Except tax breaks are subsidies…”
I’ll say it real S L O W this time for you Simon:
A subsidy is when the government robs someone else at gunpoint and gives the money to you.
A tax break is when the government robs you at gunpoint but does not take all of your money.
Net flow of money is from hydrocarbon energy companies to the government.
It really doesn’t matter how many times slimon’s little list gets debunked, he will keep dragging it out. Reality just isn’t part of his skill set.
“It really doesn’t matter how many times slimon’s little list gets debunked,”
Saying they are not subsidies is not debunking anything. It is merely exposing your dishonest bias. The FF industry gets subsidies pure and simple. The fact you want to twist yourself into a pretzel so you can lie to yourself is your decision, but it is pretty hypocritical. For the record I’m for subsidies if they help things along.
Then, by your definition, the following is a list of subsidies in the USA…
Having Children
Turning 65
Going blind
Buying a house
Paying mortgage interest
Buying health insurance
Paying doctor bills
Mileage to the doctor
Prescriptions
Paying student loans
Work travel expenses
Hotels
Air travel for business
Setting up a home office
Sales Taxes paid
Taxes on Cars
Taxes on Appliances
…
All have Tax Deductions associated with them
Money you Don’t have to pay the government on money earned for work performed.
NOT money the government pays you for doing nothing … A subsidy
OK that’s a little bit looney, but I’m sure you feel better.
Dictionary definition of a subsidy…
“a sum of money granted by the state or a public body to help an industry or business keep the price of a commodity or service low.”
Could there be a more precise description of what the government pays FF companies?
Simon says:”… price of a commodity or service low.”
When oil was near $150 a barrel was there still a subsidy? When it then crashed down to near $30 a barrel was there still a subsidy?
Subsidies don’t seem to work.
“Subsidies don’t seem to work.” Well take them off then. I’m good with that. Hate tax payers money wasted.
Store large Blimps of Hydrogen next to those who support this idea.
Thousands of Hindenbergs! Oh, the humanity!
Author should have included the Left’s financial plan. Instead of the $millions currently spent on curtailment that avoided expense wil be credited to the input cost of electricity to the electrolyzer. Negative value, cheaper than free! No wind farm can ever be overbuilt. With current tax credits and more the actual production cost of more than $0.18/kwh can continue to be considered available at the “cheaper than fossil fuel ” $0.03/kwh price and low information voters will believe it. Ouch.
Bloomberg’s green energy research team estimates the cost to reduce warming by 2050 is $US200 trillion.
There are 2 billion households in the world so that would be $US100,000 per household.
The developing world and the poor in developed countries can’t afford to pay anything and that is 90% of the population.
That means the other 10% of the working household will have to pay $US1 million per household to keep the temperature from rising one are two degrees.
That $US1 million dollars will be over 27 years, so that will be about $US35,000 per year.
Ask most households and they would rather that $1 million and the temperature rise be a degree or two.
No doubt that 200T is a huge underestimate. More likely in the quadrillions.
What’s above quadrillions? Pentillions?
The developing world has said that they are more interested in growth than a degree or two of warming, and they are 85% of the world’s population,
They want growth and don’t care about the CO2 that comes with that growth.
They are currently developing over 1,000 coal-fired plants.
The developed world can stop producing CO2 at a cost of many $US trillions but that will only make a small dent in the total CO2 in the atmosphere
It’s the simplistic, naive, gullible/obedient and tribalistic mentality of children.
As is NetZero and all of climate science.
So why are what outwardly appear to be ‘Adults’ behaving like that?
Couldn’t possibly be something they ate could it – or something they’re not eating that they should be?
Feel/sense the bristling indignation at merely asking that question of anyone these days
“Oh no, not me“
“I eat a balanced diet”
“I can handle it”
“My doctor says”
“Science/research, Sputniks and computers ‘say'”
“Things have never been better”
OK. Now explain to me how a Hot Air Balloon works and how that might possibly affect ‘Weather’
“The world’s ammonia industry produced almost 200 million tons of ammonia in 2020, primarily for agricultural fertilizer….”
And, thus, this industry secondarily, beneficially, fertilizes the air with that wonderful plant food, CO2, so desperately desired by all plants.
Green hydrogen also needs huge, reliable, secure power supplies that won’t be available from renewables
the amount of CO2 from transportation & industrial activities in the atmosphere is so small it is barely measurable so removing it couldn’t possibly have any effect on the climate
Steve,
You wrote an excellent article.
A car running on highly compressed hydrogen in California, which has a few hydrogen stations, would the equivalent of $12/gallon of gasohol.
That hydrogen would be made from natural gas, at your price of $1/ kg.
That might be the price in Russia, but most elsewhere, EU, US , it would be higher
Today in California Hydrogen retails for $36/kg H2 in Southern California, and $26/kg in Northern California for fuel cell vehicles. A kg is equivalent to a gasoline gallon.
And I just completed an analysis of EVs and found that they have not reduced any NOx or PM pollution compared to new gasoline vehicles. Do EVs reduce NOx or PM emissions more than combustion engine vehicles? The answer may surprise you. – Stillwater Associates
I did a rough and ready calculation based on the cost of electricity supplied to me in the UK. Cost of electrolysis produced hydrogen came out at 51p per kWh. I’m currently paying 6.44p per kWh for natural gas.
There are many problems with electrolysis that people tend to overlook. Pure water is not the greatest conductor of electricity, so that the water in an electrolysis cell must contain a dissolved “electrolyte” (usually an inorganic compound) to improve the conductivity. However, this introduces the possibility that the electrolyte itself can decompose (if the voltage is not carefully controlled), possibly leading to emission of other gases besides hydrogen and oxygen.
I had the experience of working briefly around a large electrolysis plant in Europe, whose purpose was to use electrolysis of brine (sodium chloride dissolved in water) to produce chlorine gas and sodium hydroxide (caustic), with hydrogen gas emitted at the cathode. This process used liquid mercury as a catalyst, and has fallen out of favor recently due to fugitive mercury emissions. The floor area of this electrolysis plant was comparable to that of a football field.
Electrolysis requires Direct Current, at relatively low voltage (3 to 5 volts) but very high currents, which in large plants can be in the thousands of amperes. Since electricity provided by power plants is Alternating Current (voltage and current varying sinusoidally), an electrolysis plant requires huge rectifiers to convert AC input at higher voltage to DC output at low voltage and high current.
The rectifiers located at one end of the electrolysis plant produced very strong magnetic fields, so that if someone walks past the rectifier carrying a steel tool, the magnetic field can forcibly twist the tool in the person’s hand, to the point of causing a sprained wrist or elbow. It is not clear what effects such strong magnetic fields would have on workers’ nervous system.
There was also a lingering bleach-like odor in the electrolysis plant, indicating that there were fugitive leaks of chlorine gas.
In an electrolysis plant with the express purpose of producing large amounts of hydrogen, there is always the danger of a spark or short-circuit which could ignite the hydrogen and cause a fire and/or explosion.
Hydrogen is also extremely light. If it was produced at atmospheric pressure and 20 C (68 F), it has a density of only 83.8 g/m3, meaning that 1 kg of hydrogen (with a heating value of 28.7 Mcal or 120 MJ) would occupy a volume of 11.93 m3, or about 421 cubic feet. On a volume basis, the heating value of hydrogen is 10.06 MJ/m3, compared to 19.31 MJ/m3 for methane (natural gas) at the same conditions.
Expressed another way, a tanker truck with a tank diameter of 6 ft and a length of 50 ft would have a volume of about 1,414 ft3, or 40 m3. It could carry about 30,000 kg of liquid hydrocarbon fuel, but only 3.35 kg of hydrogen at atmospheric pressure.
In order to make hydrogen easily transportable in a pipeline, it would have to be compressed to at least 50 times atmospheric pressure, and the compressors would likely be driven by electric motors.
Does the 50 to 55 kWh (180 to 198 MJ) electricity consumption per kg hydrogen produced include the cost of compression of hydrogen to a pressure where it can be transported in reasonably-sized pipelines?
Whoa! You are hurting feelings on the Left, pesky facts.
I wouldn’t advise taking your debit card anywhere near that magnetic field either.
Prolonged exposure to magnetic fields is claimed to be able to cause feelings like paranoia. The claimed field strengths that cause this effect are many orders of magnitude smaller than a field that could try to take a iron wrench out of someone’s hand.
FCV fuel cost is three times higher per mile than a gasoline hybrid and two times higher than that of a conventional gasoline vehicle at $16/kg. How does the cost of Hydrogen stack up against gasoline? – Stillwater Associates
Article says:”But a hydrogen fuel industry, if created, will be small and based entirely on government subsidies, not sound economics”
Nor sound physics.
The photo of the Ivanpah Faclity brings a question. Does the facility work at night?
You know, not every metal in existence is susceptible to hydrogen embrittlement. If they were, we wouldn’t be able to use hydrogen in any high-pressure application. That clearly isn’t the case.
Here’s a link to a NASA Technical Memorandum on hydrogen embrittlement. https://core.ac.uk/reader/84914440 Pages 9-13 are tables of metals rating their susceptibility to hydrogen embrittlement under various conditions.