http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/081803_hydrogen_answers.html

(Original article can be found at the link above.)

From The Wilderness, http://www.fromthewilderness.com/

August 18, 2003

Why Hydrogen is No Solution - Scientific Answers to Marketing Hype, Deception and Wishful Thinking

Seeing One Car Run on a Fuel Cell or Hydrogen Gas Does Not Make It
a Solution for Anything, Especially If You Invest More Energy
in the Hydrogen Than You Get from Burning It or
If You Make More Greenhouse Gas at the Hydrogen Factory or
If You Can't Afford to Ship or Store It

by Michael C. Ruppert

© Copyright 2003, From The Wilderness Publications, www.copvcia.com
All Rights Reserved. May be reprinted, distributed or posted on an
Internet web site for non-profit purposes only.

[August 18, 2003, 1930 PDT, (FTW) -- For months FTW has been besieged
by misguided activists arguing that hydrogen is a real solution
to the world's energy crisis. Sadly, these critics have been sold
a bill of goods as deceptive and dangerous as Enron's cooked books,
the intelligence "justifying" the Iraqi invasion, and oil reserve
figures quoted by oil companies and government agencies.
Hydrogen's problems are not difficult to understand and
require little more than common sense applied to well-documented
and easily understandable scientific fact.

There are no easy "magic bullet" solutions to the realities
of Peak Oil and serious and irreversible natural gas shortages.
Perhaps one of the most dangerous courses is to accept
widely-hyped solutions without critical judgment and then waste
the days and hours needed to look for real answers. Just because
someone shows you a car that runs on hydrogen today, whether
by burning the gas or by using a fuel cell to produce electricity,
does not mean that they have shown you a solution. Spending more
money or energy on a demonstration model than is produced from
the resulting engine's output is a deception - nothing more.
Snake oil salesmen have been around as long as mankind and
there will be no shortage of unprincipled hucksters making
a buck as the world begins to starve and freeze. Unfortunately,
there will also be a bumper crop of gullible victims, easily
led to the slaughter, who could have made other, more mature
choices. Arguing that hydrogen burned in a car engine produces
no greenhouse gases ignores the fact that those same gases
were produced at the plant that made the hydrogen to begin with.

The truth is that Peak Oil and its implications will kill the
human race a long time before global warming does. Just ask the
innocent civilians who died on 9/11, the tens of thousands of
civilians massacred in Afghanistan and Iraq and all those
who will continue to die in the Empire's sequential war
for oil - the war which Dick Cheney told us will not end
in our lifetimes.

Hydrogen proponents need to answer FTW's 9 Questions for
Evaluating Alternative Energy Sources at:

http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/052703_9_questions.html

Beyond that, they need only read the following two excerpts from
FTW stories to understand that any rescue by a "hydrogen economy"
is about as likely as George W. Bush withdrawing US troops from
Iraq and saying it was all a mistake. - MCR]

PART I -- Excerpted from "Much Ado About Nothing" - Published
by FTW Dec. 5, 2002. written by Dale Allen Pfeiffer

Spencer Abraham's Hydrogen Dream

The media was all aglow recently with Spencer Abraham's announcement
that the U.S. now has a roadmap for making the transition to a
hydrogen economy. Secretary of Energy Abraham announced the plan
at the Global Forum on Personal Transportation held in Dearborn,
Mich. In his presentation, he touted the line that hydrogen
produced from renewable resources can provide unlimited energy
with no impact on the environment. Secretary Abraham noted
that the transition to hydrogen would be a long-term process,
which will require the participation of both industry and
government.

As a first step, in January 2002 Secretary Abraham, along
with officials from the automotive industry and Congress,
unveiled a FreedomCAR partnership to develop hydrogen
fuel cell vehicles.26

The National Hydrogen Energy Roadmap is available on the internet in
pdf form (http://www.eren.doe.gov/hydrogen/pdfs/national_h2_roadmap.pdf).
This roadmap glows with positive energy. In all areas of production,
delivery, storage, conversion and applications, the document beams
about what we can achieve if we put our minds to it, but inevitably
winds up by saying that we have a long way to go in order to make
it a reality.

The document does mention the various challenges to each area
of fuel cell development, but makes little of the obstacles and
instead comes off sounding like a pep talk. Buried in the text,
they admit "The transition to a hydrogen economy... could take
several decades to achieve."27

The document speaks of wind, solar and geothermal production,
biomass, nuclear-thermo-chemical water splitting, photoelectrochemical
electrolysis, and bioengineering. But they admit that all of these
processes will require a great deal more research.

The intention is to bootstrap the move by first developing small
"reformers" that will run on natural gas, propane, methanol or
diesel. But the authors admit that even this technology requires
further refinement for improved reliability, longer catalyst life,
and integration with storage systems and fuel cells.

The document also includes a short list of people who are
in charge of various areas of development and transition.
The list includes: Frank Balog of Ford Motor Company, Gene
Nemanich of ChevronTexaco Technology Ventures, Mike Davis
of Avista Labs Energy, Art Katsaros of Air Products and
Chemicals Incorporated, Alan Niedzwiecki of Quantum
Technologies, Joan Ogden of Princeton University Systems,
and Jeff Serfass of The National Hydrogen Association.28
This team will ensure that the new technology remains
firmly in the hands of the top corporations.

The document is at least 80 percent public relations. While
admitting that in all areas there are serious problems to be
overcome before we will be able to make a transition to
hydrogen fuel cells, nowhere does this document take a
serious look at the obstacles. Instead, this paper paints
a pretty picture of our hydrogen future and leaves the details
to future research and investment. So let us look at a few
of the difficulties of developing a hydrogen fuel cell economy.

First off, because hydrogen is the simplest element, it will
leak from any container, no mater how strong and no matter
how well insulated. For this reason, hydrogen in storage tanks
will always evaporate, at a rate of at least 1.7 percent per day.29
Hydrogen is very reactive. When hydrogen gas comes into contact
with metal surfaces it decomposes into hydrogen atoms, which are
so very small that they can penetrate metal. This causes
structural changes that make the metal brittle.30

Perhaps the largest problem for hydrogen fuel cell transportation
is the size of the fuel tanks. In gaseous form, a volume of 238,000
litres of hydrogen gas is necessary to replace the energy capacity
of 20 gallons of gasoline.31

So far, demonstrations of hydrogen-powered cars have depended
upon compressed hydrogen. Because of its low density, compressed
hydrogen will not give a car as useful a range as gasoline.32
Moreover, a compressed hydrogen fuel tank would be at risk of
developing pressure leaks either through accidents or through
normal wear, and such leaks could result in explosions.

If the hydrogen is liquefied, this will give it a density of
0.07 grams per cubic centimeter. At this density, it will
require four times the volume of gasoline for a given amount
of energy. Thus, a 15-gallon gas tank would equate to a
60-gallon tank of liquefied hydrogen. Beyond this, there
are the difficulties of storing liquid hydrogen. Liquid
hydrogen is cold enough to freeze air. In test vehicles,
accidents have occurred from pressure build-ups resulting
from plugged valves.33

Beyond this, there are the energy costs of liquefying the
hydrogen and refrigerating it so that it remains in a liquid
state. No studies have been done on the energy costs here,
but they are sure to further decrease the Energy Return on
Energy Invested (EROEI) of hydrogen fuel.

A third option is the use of powdered metals to store the
hydrogen in the form of metal hydrides. In this case,
the storage volume would be little more than the volume
of the metals themselves.34 Moreover, stored in this form,
hydrogen would be far less reactive. However, as you can
imagine, the weight of the metals will make the storage
tank very heavy.

Now we come to the production of hydrogen. Hydrogen
does not freely occur in nature in useful quantities,
therefore hydrogen must be split from molecules, either
molecules of methane derived from fossil fuels or from
water.

Currently, most hydrogen is produced by the treatment
of methane with steam, following the formula:

CH4 (g) + H2O + e > 3H2(g) + CO(g).

The CO(g) in this equation is carbon monoxide gas,
which is a byproduct of the reaction.35

Not entered into this formula is the energy required to produce
the steam, which usually comes from the burning of fossil fuels.

For this reason, we do not escape the production of carbon dioxide
and other greenhouse gases. We simply transfer the generation of
this pollution to the hydrogen production plants. This procedure
of hydrogen production also results in a severe energy loss.
First we have the production of the feedstock methanol from
natural gas or coal at a 32 percent to 44 percent net energy
loss. Then the steam treatment process to procure the hydrogen
will result in a further 35 percent energy loss.36

It has often been pointed out that we have an inexhaustible
supply of water from which to derive hydrogen. However,
this reaction, 2H2O + e = 2H2(g) + O2(g), requires a substantial
energy investment per unit of water (286kJ per mole).37
This energy investment is required by elementary principles
of chemistry and can never be reduced.

Several processes are being explored to derive hydrogen from water,
most notably electrolysis of water and thermal decomposition of
water. But the basic chemistry mentioned above requires major
energy investments from all of these processes, rendering them
unprofitable in terms of EROEI.

Much thought has been given to harnessing sunlight through
photovoltaic cells and using the resulting energy to split
water in order to derive hydrogen. The energy required to
produce 1 billion kWh (kilowatt hours) of hydrogen is
1.3 billion kWh of electricity.38 Even with recent advances
in photovoltaic technology, the solar cell arrays would
be enormous, and would have to be placed in areas with
adequate sunlight.

Likewise, the amount of water required to generate this
hydrogen would be equivalent to 5 percent of the flow
of the Mississippi River.39 As an example of a
solar-to-hydrogen set up, were Europe to consider such a
transition, their best hope would lie in erecting massive
solar collectors in the Saharan desert of nearby Africa.
Using present technology, only 5 percent of the energy
collected at the Sahara solar plants would be delivered
to Europe. Such a solar plant would probably cost 50 times
as much as a coal fired plant, and would deliver an equal
amount of energy.40 On top of this, the production of
photovoltaic cells has a very poor EROEI.

The basic problem of hydrogen fuel cells is that the
second law of thermodynamics dictates that we will always
have to expend more energy deriving the hydrogen than
we will receive from the usage of that hydrogen.
The common misconception is that hydrogen fuel cells
are an alternative energy source when they are not.

In reality, hydrogen fuel cells are a storage battery
for energy derived from other sources. In a fuel cell,
hydrogen and oxygen are fed to the anode and cathode,
respectively, of each cell. Electrons stripped from the
hydrogen produce direct current electricity which can be
used in a DC electric motor or converted to alternating
current.41

Because of the second law of thermodynamics, hydrogen
fuel cells will always have a bad EROEI. If fossil fuels
are used to generate the hydrogen, either through the
Methane-Steam method or through Electrolysis of Water,
there will be no advantage over using the fossil fuels
directly. The use of hydrogen as an intermediate form
of energy storage is justified only when there is some
reason for not using the primary source directly.42
For this reason, a hydrogen-based economy must depend
on large-scale development of nuclear power or solar
electricity.

Therefore, the development of a hydrogen economy will require
major investments in fuel cell technology research and nuclear
or solar power plant construction. On top of this, there is
the cost of converting all of our existing technology and
machinery to hydrogen fuel cells. And all of this will have
to be accomplished under the economic and energy conditions
of post-peak fossil fuel production.

Based on all of this, I submit that Secretary of Energy Spencer
Abraham does indeed have ulterior motives for his Hydrogen
Energy Roadmap. First, I suggest that this distant goal will
help to pacify the public once they begin to suffer from the
effects of fossil fuel withdrawal. Secondly, this project will
allow the elite to transfer more money from the general public
to the pockets of the rich. Third, in the words of Karl Davies,
this proposal will deflect a stock market collapse once news
of declining oil production becomes generally recognized.

Tied to this, it will brace stock prices of the auto corporations
and oil majors to help them survive well into the era of oil
depletion. And finally, the idea that we are working on a
transition from fossil fuels to a hydrogen-based economy
will help to destabilize OPEC, hopefully making it easier
to deal with that organization and the Arab oil states.

ENDNOTES TO EXCERPT

(The full original story is at:
http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/120502_caspian.html)

26 Energy Secretary Abraham Gives Major Address on the Future of
Personal Transportation. Government Press release.
http://www.energy.gov/HQPress/releases02/novpr/pr02.htm

27 National Hydrogen Energy Roadmap, November 2002. United States
Department of Energy.
http://www.eren.doe.gov/hydrogen/pdfs/national_h2_roadmap.pdf

28 Ibid.

29 Hydrogen FAQ. Stanford University.
http://www.formal.stanford.edu/pub/jmc/progress/hydrogen.htm

30 "The World will End not with a Crash, but in a Whisper...."
by Ian Forrest, 10-03-98. University of California.
http://darwin.bio.uci.edu/~sustain/global/sensem/Forrest98.htm

31 Ibid.

32 Op. Cit. See note 23.

33 Ibid.

34 Op. Cit. See note 24.

35 Ibid.

36 Energetic Limits to Growth, Jay Hanson. Energy Magazine,
spring 1999. http://www.dieoff.com/page175.htm#_edn21

37 Op. Cit. See note 24.

38 Renewable Energy: Economic and Environmental Issues,
David Pimentel et al. BioScience, Vol. 44, No. 8, September 1994.
http://www.dieoff.com/page84.htm

39 Re: Hydrogen and Solar Energy Question, Message 25271, EnergyResources
List. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/energyresources/message/25271
Also message 25245
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/energyresources/message/25245 and
other messages in the string Hydrogen and Solar Energy Question.

40 An Outline of the Global Situation, the Sustainable Alternative
Society, and the Transition to it, Ted Trainer. University of
N.S.W. http://www.dieoff.com/page190.htm

41 Hydrogen & Fuel Cell Vehicles. California Consumer Energy Center.
http://www.consumerenergycenter.org/transportation/future/hydrogen.html

42 Op. Cit. See note 23.

Part II -- Excerpted from FTW's exclusive report on the May, 2003
conference of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil (ASPO) in Paris.

http://www.fromthewilderness.com/members/053103_aspo.html

One conclusion generally accepted by almost every attendee
was that hydrogen, contrary to popularly accepted comfort
promotions by writers like Jeremy Rifkin, was not a solution
either in the near or long term because of intensive costs
of production, inherent energy inefficiencies, lack of
infrastructure and impracticalities. Speaking for Daimler
Chrysler, which paid lip service to Peak Oil yet acknowledged
that it had done extensive research on hydrogen vehicles,
Dr. Jorg Wind told the conference that his company did not
see hydrogen as a viable alternative to petroleum-based internal
combustion engines.

"We use fossil fuels to make hydrogen. That does not result in a
significant CO2 reduction. We predict that by 2020 only 5% of
fuel use will be hydrogen and that infrastructure and the
political framework is the most important factor. In order
of relevance and likelihood from the standpoint of the auto
industry Wind stated that we would see improved conventional
vehicles, starter hybrid vehicles, electric hybrid vehicles
and, finally, fuel cell vehicles as solutions, but he had
little optimism that fuel cells would ever amount to a
significant market share. In a telling left-handed
acknowledgement of Peak Oil, Wind noted that one third
of all diesel fuels currently used in Germany were biodiesel
relying on recycled waste and or plant feedstock. He was
particularly critical of ethanol stating that it was not
energy efficient.

French presenters confirmed that ethanol was only viable
in France due to a three hundred per cent government subsidy
to farmers. Otherwise it was a net energy waster.

When asked by FTW if Daimler-Chrysler had estimated the costs
for infrastructure changes and capital investment to produce
fuel cell vehicles Wind stated that the company did not know
these costs. The implication was that having evaluated the
technology involved in the vehicles themselves the company
didn't consider it worthwhile to undertake further financial
evaluation.

Wind elicited groans from the audience when he asserted that
everything was customer driven and that corporations bore
no responsibility for the shortage of practical solutions
to the looming crisis.

Hydrogen's Lead Financial Balloon

Pierre-Rene Bauquis, Vice President of the French Energy
Institute, associate IFP professor and former special advisor
to the president of TotalFinaElf, confirmed prior research
by FTW citing hard scientific data showing that hydrogen
is not a practical solution. As a member of Environmentalists
for Nuclear Energy he made no secret of his advocacy of
nuclear power. And it is quite probable that if Total or
any other oil company could make a profit from hydrogen
they would rush to do it, especially since they know that
they are running out of their current product.

Noting that one half of all oil is used for transportation,
Bauquis insisted that renewable energy sources would not
solve the problem and stated flatly that "Hydrogen is not
the fuel of tomorrow." He noted that the first internal
combustion engine, built in 1805, was a hydrogen engine
and that it was quickly discarded because of the problems
hydrogen poses with transportation, storage and efficiency.

Bauquis observed that, "Commercial production of hydrogen
is two to five times the cost of the fossil fuels used to
make it. Transportation is impossible. It is two times as
costly to transport hydrogen as it is to transport electricity.
The storage costs for hydrogen are one hundred times the cost
of liquid petroleum products."

He was equally unforgiving when it came to ethanol. "To replace
forty per cent of the oil in use you would need three times the
currently available farmland just for feedstock."

Bauquis drew some groans from the audience when he insisted
that the "Chernobyl" disaster was a hoax perpetrated by Green
Peace which had grossly exaggerated the number of deaths
resulting from the 1986 nuclear accident but his observations
about hydrogen are consistent with a wide number of scientific
studies from a number of differing political and economic
interests. He did acknowledge that perhaps in several decades,
so-called green or white hydrogen (produced by electrolysis
rather than from methane) might become feasible but only as
a result of nuclear energy to power the conversion process.

One audience member elicited boisterous audience laughter
by asking another presenter, "Now we have one situation
in the market in which we get conventional fuel, namely oil,
we burn it in a combustion engine, and we do work. Now what
I understand the hydrogen defendants are promoting, led by
Mr. Jeremy Rifkin, is a hydrogen economy consisting basically
in getting the conventional fuels again and producing
alternative/solar energies or clean energy... or a wind generator...
to produce electricity to then split the water molecules into
hydrogen and oxygen and then compressing the liquefied hydrogen
for transportation and storage and then injecting the hydrogen
into the fuel cell to produce electricity to do work in the
machine. Do you really believe that this is efficiency?"

###

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