The Reality of the Hydrogen Economy-Hydrogen=Nuclear

[poe]

The hydrogen economy is really a nuclear economy. Investors and the rest of corporate America may not realise how close the country is to making a gigantic bet on a nuclear future. The scientists and engineers at the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory have been developing the advanced nuclear technologies that would power the hydrogen world.

Among the designs the INEEL has been working on is the Very High Temperature Reactor, the one best suited to provide the process heat necessary to break hydrogen apart from water so it can be turned into fuel. (There are a few issues with storing hydrogen, but we won't deal with them here.) Among the high temperature reactor variants is the Pebble Bed Modular Reactor being developed here and in China.

I asked Dr Steve Herring of the INEEL how many of these new, relatively efficient reactors would be needed to displace the estimated US fuel import requirements 20 years from now. Based on the Energy Information Administration's estimate of 2025 fuel imports (measured in quads, or quadrillion British thermal units), the output of 300MW per VHTR reactor, and the comparative efficiency of hydrogen fuel compared to gasoline, you come up with a requirement of about 4,000 reactors.

Now these reactors are much smaller than most of the power reactors in operation, but that's still a significant number. However, the US used to have more than 1,000 land-based nuclear ballistic missiles in underground silos. The relatively small VHTR reactors might be housed in underground facilities that wouldn't be much bigger.

Anti-nuclear activists want hydrogen fuel to come from renewable energy sources, such as wind power. However, that arithmetic doesn't work. For example, California has the most developed wind power industry in the US. Its share of those reactors in 2025, based on population, would be about 480. The entire current wind development in California would only account for four reactors' worth of energy for hydrogen production.
<snip>


Hydrogen and the Environment

Before we waltz all starry eyed into a hydrogen economy, we need to answer some very tough questions. Remember the Periodic Table that your science teacher showed you in High School? Where is hydrogen on that table and why is it there?

The short answer. Hydrogen is a very reactive element. It will readily combine with any other element or chemical it contacts in the environment that has a suitable electron structure. Because it is lighter than air, hydrogen always dissipates upward.

In our existing world, we use tons of liquid hydrogen and millions of cubic feet of hydrogen gas every year. But most of these applications are for industrial use. In theory, hydrogen is used under carefully controlled conditions using specified procedures by trained personnel. Now we propose to make hydrogen a widely distributed fuel for mobile and stationary applications. Who will use this fuel? Millions of people with little or no training or real concern for the commodity they are handling. Leaks are inevitable. Accidental release will be a fact of life.

As this highly reactive gas ascends upward into the atmosphere, it will combine with oxygen and form water droplets. Will this contribute to global warming? Or cooling? And will hydrogen reach the ozone layer? If so, do we humans run the risk of destroying the ozone layer with our hydrogen energy solution?

The average composition of the low atmosphere (up to 15 kms) includes: nitrogen, oxygen, argon, carbon dioxide, ozone, methane, nitric oxide, hydrogen, nitrous oxide, carbon monoxide, and water vapor. The ozone layer or ozonosphere is generally the region in the upper atmosphere between 15-40 kms. The ozone layer contains nitrogen, oxygen, argon, hydrogen, hydroxyl and methyl radicals, hydrogen peroxide, and water vapor. There are continual photochemical reactions in the stratosphere because of the influx of short-wave radiation. Ozone is continually created and destroyed in catalytic reactions with oxides of hydrogen, nitrogen, and chlorine.

What are the potential chemical reactions if excess hydrogen accumulates in the atmosphere? The answer to this question is presently the subject of scientific debate.


Fuel Cells

Has anyone developed a reliable, practical and affordable fuel cell for automotive applications? Is it possible to develop a fuel cell that will last the expected life of the vehicle? How will we distribute, install, maintain, collect and recycle the exotic and sometimes highly corrosive chemicals used to sustain fuel cell reactions?

Until there are suitable answers to these questions, automotive fuel cells are, and will remain, interesting laboratory experiments. As a service to your readers, BusinessWeek's editorial evaluation should reflect this reality.

Hydrogen as a Fuel.

We have to remember that hydrogen is not a source of energy. It is merely a carrier of energy.

Hydrogen is a manufactured product. Your article glosses over and ignores a key fact about the production of hydrogen.

It's energy intensive.

Using existing and proven technology, it takes substantially more energy to make, compress, liquefy, store and distribute hydrogen than we can expect to get from hydrogen. If electricity is used to make hydrogen by electrolysis, and the hydrogen thus produced is used in an automobile fuel cell, at least 45 percent of the original energy used to manufacture the hydrogen will be wasted by the time it is consumed in a fuel cell using best available technology. The net energy efficiency of a vehicle which burns hydrogen as a fuel is substantially worse.

Where will we get this energy?

Biomass

Your article ignores the facts. Biomass collection, transportation, processing and distribution yields little net energy and assumes the use of gasoline or diesel fuel. As the reality of oil depletion becomes a factor in public policy, the direct use of available oil resources for energy consumption will take precedence over their indirect use to produce another form of energy. The use of biomass for hydrogen production is problematic because it is not, on a net energy basis, a self sustaining process nor is there enough arable land on this planet to grow the crops that would be necessary to support a biomass solution to the emerging energy crisis.

http://www.energybulletin.net/4221.html

[EVDebs]

1. Pffffft. Hydrogen fuel cells depend upon platinum catalysts

And that's a rare element and expensive to boot. Better to look into Zinc Air Fuel Cells (zinc oxide pellets with potassium hydroxide catalyst) or metal air fuel cells in general. Also, vast quantities of methane hydrates in the Artic if the bugs can be worked out....

[buddysmellgood]

25. Nickel is looking good. There will be lots of ways to make hydrogen.

http://www.engr.wisc.edu/news/headlines/2003/Jun30.html

[murray hill farm]

2. sure hope no one learns to make ..

human bodies into an energy source....yikes!

[Dark]

12. It's too late. The Matrix has you, mexicoxpat. n/t

[RPM]

34. burn the bodies...

the nazis figured this out a long time ago... they didnt care to harness the energy released..
:scared:

[LiberalEsto]

3. Hydrogen is extremely hard to contain and store

It embrittles metals, for example. I've heard some scientists are looking into using carbon nanotubes for hydrogen storage, but I've also heard there are serious concerns that nanoparticles may be carcinogenic.

Unless this storage problem can be resolved, I don't see us filling up cars with hydrogen at hydrogen stations or buying a can of hydrogen for the lawnmover.

Also, hydrogen can make one heck of an explosion. Ever hear of the Hindenberg zeppelin disaster?

[BoogDoc7]

5. Almost...

But not quite. The Hindenburg disaster - though hydrogen had some to do with it - was caused primarily because the glue or coating on the Hindenburg "shell" or whatever was closely akin to rocket fuel - that was why there was so much flame and smoke.

[Hugin]

6. That's what I heard BoogDoc7...

The paint was made from aluminum powder... The fabric had a
nitrogen based fungicide in it... Mix those together and what
do you get?

GUNPOWDER!

[jmowreader]

74. The paint was rocket fuel

On http://www.unmuseum.org/hindenburg.htm you can find out that the paint on the Hindenburg was cellulose butyrate acetate with aluminum powder stirred into it--which was similar to the composition of the solid rocket motor fuel of the day.

Paint an airship with fuel and see if it burns.

[Hugin]

77. Great Thanks!

"cellulose butyrate acetate with aluminum powder stirred into it"
I said this down below somewhere, but, it's great you found a link
with the actual stuff.

Yeah, can you imagine stirring aluminum powder into a lacquer base and
not thinking... Hey, this stuff could explode.

Thanks again. :)

Hey, if anybody needs me I'll be over there at the UN museum reading
about the Hindenburg.

[DrWeird]

8. Not really.

I saw that Discovery Channel show to, they really overstated the case.

Hydrogen storage is a very serious engineering problem that needs to be overcome for hydrogen fuel cars to become realistic.

[Hugin]

31. The how come all modern cell phone batteries...

... are essentially hydrogen fuel cells?

[DrWeird]

35. LOL. Where are you getting your information?

metal hydride batteries are nothing like hydrogen fuel cells.

And what does this have to do with the Hindenburg?

[Hugin]

36. Umm... What do you think "HYDRIDE" is dude?

Chocolate?

The world waits to hear.

[DrWeird]

38. It's a proton with two electrons, a negative charge, and a counter cation.

Where as molecular hydrogen is two hydrogen atoms bonded together via a covalent sigma bond.

But then the world already knew that.

:eyes:

Personally, I suggest a course in remedial chemistry. Nothing personal.

[Hugin]

40. And how does a fuel cell work?

Maybe you need an *ADVANCED* chemistry course Mr.Funnyman.

The current research in transporting and storing hydrogen all
involve metal hydrides.

Don't believe me... Look it up.

http://www.fuelcellstore.com/information/hydrogen_storage.html

The world laughs...

[DrWeird]

41. How do hydrogen fuel cells work?

by reacting hydrogen and oxygen to produce water.

I've taken advanced chemistry.

But that's not the point.

Indeed, the world's probably having a good chuckle. And not at my expense.

[Hugin]

42. All I can say...

... is I intend to be part of the solution and not
part of the problem.

I have plenty of documentation to support my claims.
You've offered none.

"by reacting hydrogen and oxygen to produce water."...
and... and... what? Maybe some electrical current?

They work the same way as cell phone batteries. In
fact some companies produce emergency fuel cell
chargers for phones.

That's all I said.

I've wasted enough time on this circular argument.

[DrWeird]

43. Ooo, sorry. No.

Yes, hydrogen fuel cells produce electricty. No, they are not the same as metal hydride batteries, which you find in cell phones. The redox reaction involving a metal hydride, nickel hydroxide, and nickel peroxide is hardly the same thing as the burning of hydrogen with oxygen.

" is I intend to be part of the solution and not
part of the problem."

That's all well and good. Now keep in mind, the best way to be a part of the solution is to know what it is we're talking about.

[Hugin]

50. BTW... Do you work for a tobacco or oil company...

Because you sure sound like someone who does.

What negativity.

Especially when you're wrong.

[DrWeird]

52. Nope.

I'm just a chemistry student.

You keep saying I'm wrong. Which is deeply ironic, since you've pretty much been posting pseudoscience and basic high school level chemistry errors, and I've done nothing but correct your mistakes.

[Hugin]

72. Hmmm... So you haven't been working in the field...

... like I have for over 15 years and 8 years of college before that.

No experience.

I figured... That's why you're so full of can't.

No wonder you don't have a complete understanding of proton
transport.

BTW... A battery *is* proton/electron storage until it's
used and if you'd read any of the links I'd pointed you
too you'd know that.

The way you're trying to discredit me I'd think you'd be
happier posting on a different site.

I thought we had "Progressives" here.

[airfoil]

48. Cellphone batteries NOT fuelcells

Cellphone batteries are overwhelmingly LiIon or LiPoly. There is zero water byproduct when these cells produce energy. Fuel cells have a water byproduct in every case I've seen.

[Hugin]

49. Both you and Dr. Weird are wrong.

Here's the tip of my iceberg... Where's yours?

http://www.fuelcellstore.com/information/hydrogen_storage.html

[DrWeird]

54. LOL.

You're confusing metal hydride hydrogen storage tanks with metal hydride batteries. Also, two different things.

[Johonny]

13. They are not

solvable. You can not compress Hydrogen into a liquid. Thus is takes a much larger tank to store it. Also it is so small it can easily excape. The hydrogen economy will not use hydrogen gas. It will most likely use methane or methanol as the hydrogen storage molecule.

[buddysmellgood]

27. Hindenberg disaster was caused by the aircrafts skin. Anyway, check this

out. Hydrogen from sugar.
http://www.engr.wisc.edu/alumni/perspective/29.1/Article14_hydrogen.html

[Toucano]

37. I think the latest on the Hindenberg is

that static electricity and the chemical coating on the skin caused the disaster.

The hydrogen wasn't the cause, for what it's worth.

[DrWeird]

39. Hydrogen was very much involved.

That crap show on the Discovery Channel was ridiculous. The skin could have been made of asbestos, she still would have gone up.

It's like sticking a match in a water balloon filled with gasoline and saying it blew up because the rubber was flammable.

[BoogDoc7]

46. Sources?

What do you base your argument on?

My understanding is that it's generally agreed that the skin coating was responsible for the explosion...the Hydrogen was INSIDE the balloon, and static electricity wouldn't have gotten inside to ignite it. Yes, the hydrogen is explosive, but just that - explosive, NOT flammable. It would have just been a big flash-boom, not a continual burn. If there were helium inside that dirigible, I suspect the same thing would have happened.


Probably would have just traveled around the exterior of the skin?

http://www.pilotfriend.com/century-of-flight/Aviation%20history/coming%20of%20age/Hindenburg.htm

[DrWeird]

55. LOL. Well, there's the original investigation that concluded that.

"Yes, the hydrogen is explosive, but just that - explosive, NOT flammable. "

Now, you're just being silly. Hydrogen will only explode if it's mixed with the correct amount of oxygen, above or below the explosion limits, it just burns like, well, the Hindenburg.

[BoogDoc7]

57. Yes,,,

I get your point, but the Hindenburg didn't explode because it had hydrogen in the balloon, it exploded because the static electricity ignited the coating about the balloon.

Unless you have a source that well reputes what a TON of offering have shown.

[DrWeird]

58. The Hindenburg went up in flames...

because something ignited the hydrogen. The original investigation concluded that it was static electricity that ignited the hydrogen being vented during the landing. Some retired NASA goofball thinks that it was a static charge that ignited the skin, which in turn ignited the hydrogen. Unfortunately, he's got Occam's Razor and the burden of proof working against him.

[BoogDoc7]

60. THAT'S...

What I was looking for....more or less. Got websites to look at on the contoversy? I really haven't found any...

[DrWeird]

61. No, sorry.

I haven't got any websites on the "controversy."

[Hugin]

75. They've shown their evidence...

You haven't.

The burden of proof is in your court. Put up or shut up.

As a student you should be well aware of the Scientific Method.

That is unless you're one of those flat earth types.

[Zynx]

64. The original investigation didn't think anything was wrong with the skin

We now know that the skin was extremely combustable.

[DrWeird]

65. I'm willing to bet they knew full well the skin was combustable.

But compared to the flammability of the hydrogen, the combustability of the skin is irrelevant. It could have been made out of asbestos, the thing would have still gone up.

[Zynx]

66. Um, no, it wouldn't have.

If the electrical spark had gotten to the hydrogen regardless of the asbestos, then yes, it would have. However, it probably would not have gotten to the hydrogen.

The shell of the blimp was extremely flammable and would make an excellent medium for a static spark to ignite first the skin and then the hydrogen.

[Toucano]

47. In the first place

it was PBS's "Nova", not the Discovery Channel! ;)

In the second place, you might take a look at the following:

Myth: Hindenburg Fire In 1937 Proves That Hydrogen Is Too Dangerous For The Public To Use.
Excerpted from "The Philosopher Mechanic" by Roy McAlister.
Notes that an investigator in 1937 realized the cause was not hydrogen, and then explains the recent verification by Dr. Bain.
http://www.clean-air.org/hindenberg.htm

Hydrogen Didn't Cause Hindenburg Fire, UCLA Engineer, Former NASA Researcher Find. UCLA News.
This paper explains the cause of the Hindenburg disaster. It contains quotes from William D. Van Vorst, professor emeritus of chemical engineering at UCLA and Addison Bain, former manager, Hydrogen Programs Kennedy Space Center, NASA—the men who discovered the actual cause of the fire.
http://engineer.ea.ucla.edu/releases/blimp.htm

"When hydrogen burns, it has a pale blue, almost invisible flame. Contrary to what some people may believe, it is not inherently explosive. It must be mixed with air or oxygen before detonation can occur. Since it has such a high dispersion coefficient, it dissipates rapidly. Because of this, it is almost impossible for a hydrogen explosion in an open area, and a hydrogen fire will burn out faster than a petrol fire."

May I suggest you examine your resistance to facts and discoveries that challenge your preconceived ideas? Otherwise, you might be more comfortable on the fundie side of issues. :)

[Hugin]

51. Thanks Toucano...

Clears up that Myth.

(not that any of these people will listen.)

=)

[DrWeird]

56. Was it PBS? That's a shame.

The documentary was particularly one sided, it glossed over and ignored a number of facts.

""When hydrogen burns, it has a pale blue, almost invisible flame."

Well that's just patently untrue. I've seen many a hydrogen fire that was orange and red.

"'Contrary to what some people may believe, it is not inherently explosive. It must be mixed with air or oxygen before detonation can occur. Since it has such a high dispersion coefficient, it dissipates rapidly. Because of this, it is almost impossible for a hydrogen explosion in an open area, and a hydrogen fire will burn out faster than a petrol fire.'"

Well, no kidding. What this has to do with the Hindenburg I don't know. Since the Hindenburg wasn't an explosion, but a very fast moving fire.

[Hugin]

73. Now that I know you're a "student"...

... I'll try to explain things a little clearer.

"I've seen many a hydrogen fire that was orange and red."
What you were seeing are called "Impurities". Probably
caused by improper lab technique. (You should work on that.)

or better yet hook yourself up with a spectrometer. You'll
see a high spike on it (assuming you've managed to get pure
hydrogen.) That spike corresponds to photons (Don't think
you know what those are yet.) in the blue wavelengths. This
happens because hydrogen is a very small and energetic
molecule.

Call back when you've had a few modern physics courses and
taken your training wheels off for awhile.

[Hugin]

4. I respectfully disagree.

Especially with this...

"it takes substantially more energy to make, compress, liquefy, store and distribute hydrogen than we can expect to get from hydrogen"

Check out "On Demand Hydrogen".

Beats paying the Arabs with blood.

[poe]

10. Who's blood-13 years of sanctions 1.5 million died, 500,000 Iraqi children

Hydrogen is a myth. 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
http://www.dieoff.com/page84.htm
http://www.consumerenergycenter.org/transportation/future/hydrogen.html
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/energyresources/message/25271
http://www.dieoff.com/page175.htm#_edn21
http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/120502_caspian.html

[Hugin]

32. I've seen those sites.

What do you propose to use?

People aren't going to stop being what they are.

I wasn't saying who's blood was being spent for oil... BTW.

I don't like to see any blood spilled and I was offering an
alternative. If you'd rather sit around cold and in the
dark, go ahead. I really doubt many will be there with you.

That's reality.

[Wiley50]

11. About " on demand" hydrogen

Checked it out:

On Demand hydrogen:

Here hydrogen is generated in a controllable, heat releasing reaction from a fuel that is a non-flammable liquid at room temperature and pressure. The hydrogen generated is of high purity (carbon and sulphur free) and is humidified, as the heat of the reaction generates some water vapour. This provides an added advantage for the fuel cell by humidifying the proton exchange membrane, making it more durable.

Sodium borohydride can be stored as a solid and mixed with water, which does not have to be of a high purity, making it easily transportable. It is well suited for long runtimes and the catalyst used in the hydrogen production reaction has shown minimal deterioration with conversions over more than 600 hours of operation (although, of course, some applications will need to show longer durability). The company has plans to recycle the borate produced back into SBH, although the exact route and the energy balance (which can be viewed almost as a well-to-wheels figure) are not yet clear.

How does the process work?

The fuel tank contains SBH solution, which is pumped over a catalyst into a gas/liquid separator, which directs the hydrogen and water vapour through a coolant loop and heat exchanger. Here the temperature and humidity of the hydrogen system is adjustable.

Hydrogen is only produced when the liquid fuel is in direct contact with the catalyst, thereby minimising the amount of gaseous hydrogen on-board at any given time. Pure humidified hydrogen is then sent to the fuel cell. The water produced from the fuel cell can be recycled within the system. This has allowed the HOD system to achieve energy densities in excess of those found in lithium ion batteries. The borate produced is separated off and can be recycled back (at a cost) to SBH elsewhere.

OK What is Sodium borohydride? :


Currently in the US, the production of sodium borohydride (via sodium hydride) is the largest application for sodium. Sodium borohydride is used in pulp bleaching (dithionite bleaching for making high gloss paper) and in brightening recycled newsprint, with smaller volumes used in specialty organic synthesis, chemical purification, and heavy metal recovery. Morton International, recently acquired by Rohm & Haas, is the sole US producer of sodium borohydride with a plant at Elma, WA. With the reduction in use of chlorine bleaching, and the increased recycling of newsprint, demand for sodium borohydride grew rapidly earlier this decade. The other principal application for sodium is in producing agricultural products, most notably herbicides such as Paraquat and Sevin.


How is Sodium Borohydride made?

Sodium borohydride now represents the largest application for sodium in the US, accounting for an estimated 30-35% of US sodium demand. Reaction of sodium with hydrogen yields sodium hydride. Sodium hydride reacts with trimethyl borate to yield sodium borohydride.



Ok. We need Sodium. How is Sodium made?

MANUFACTURING....Sodium metal is typically produced by electrolysis of molten salt (sodium chloride), yielding a light, lustrous metal. The electrolysis of fused sodium chloride yields sodium and chlorine gas. Earlier commercial processes were based on the carbon reduction of sodium carbonate or sodium hydroxide.

The Downs cell is the principal type of cell in use to produce
sodium. The cell consists of three chambers. The upper chamber is outside the chlorine dome and above the sodium‑collecting ring. The other two chambers are the chlorine‑collecting zone inside the dome and diaphragm, and the sodium‑collecting zone outside the diaphragm, and under the sodium‑collecting ring of the collector unit. This arrangement prevents recombination of the sodium and chlorine.

Sodium chloride has a high melting point (804°C), but calcium chloride is added to lower it, and the cell is operated at 600°C. The cell bath consists of about 58 wt% calcium chloride and 42 wt% sodium chloride. A sodium‑calcium mixture deposits at the cathode, but the solubility of calcium in sodium decreases with decreasing temperature so that the heavier calcium crystals, which form as the mixture is cooled, settle back into the bath. The crude sodium is filtered at 105 to 110°C, giving a sodium of 99.9% purity. This sodium is run molten to storage tanks or into a nitrogen‑filled tank car, allowed to solidify, and shipped.Sodium manufacture requires large amounts of energy. DuPont's Niagara Falls, NY plant uses hydroelectric power

Ok. The fuel cells run on Sodium Borohydriode. Sodium Borohydride takes Sodium to manufacture. Sodium is produced by Electrolysis of molten salt. It takes LOTS of electricity and Hydroelectric power is recommended.

Sounds like we are back at square one to me.
But, at least we don't have to deal with those evil nukes.

No pre-conceptions here. I don't like nukes or fossil fuels. Just thought I'd do some research, post it and take the conversation along further

[hansberrym]

14. Not easy stuff to handle that SBH

SBH in liquid form is stabiized in a concentrated sodium hydroxide solution, it is only 12% by wt SBH. At most the Hydrogen available is only about 1.2% by wt of the liquid solution. That is assuming all of the hygrogens are liberated from the NaBH4 in gaseous form (100% conversion and not bound up as hydroxide)

[420inTN]

15. Are you talking about Millennium Cell?

I know that they have a system for cars called "Hydrogen On Demand" that uses SBH. I've thought about investing in them.

My biggest questions are:

1) How much energy does it take to create the SBH?
2) I've read elsewhere that SBH is a natural resource and can be drilled /pumped like oil. Is this true?
3) While we may not have the COx/NOx byproducts, there is borate. What happens if your borate capture tub is full? What happens if borate is just dumped, and leaches into the groundwater?


okay, a quick wiki search has partially answered #3. The borate produced is also known as borax, which is used in detergents, water softeners, etc. Here is the Hazardous Chemicals Database entry for Sodium tetraborate

[Wiley50]

16. I got much of this from Millineum site

the stuff about how it works

[hansberrym]

33. SBH is not mined

The earlier post(wiley) explained that metalic sodium is one of the raw materials, but Hydrogen(H2) is also one of the raw materials, so the efficiency is way out of wack.

Not only is electricity required to produce the metalic sodium but large amounts are need to produce the Hydrogen(H2), you can only get back a portion of the energy required to produce the hydrogen (by combustion or use of the hydrogen in a fuel cell), and none of the other energy required to produce the SBH.

What is gained in being able to transport the H2 (bound as SBH) in solid form (or as a non-flamable liquid) costs a lot in terms of energy/efficiency.

[Hugin]

29. Very cool!

Thanks! I like your approach. =)

[Hugin]

30. The process I was thinking of...

... involved.

8" of 4" PVC
Two end caps.
4 valves.
Some stainless steel mesh.
A lead acid battery. (I know... I know...) :(
Tubing.

and, of course, H2O.

But, if you guys are going to be difficult, be my guests.

Most of the... "Hydrogen doesn't produce enough energy types" forget
about the "latent heat" in the water molecule.

Check it out here:

http://www.fortunecity.com/greenfield/bp/16/index.html

[louis-t]

7. Thank you, very interesting

to a lay person who is suspicious of * when he claims hydrogen is the answer. I knew some of the problems with it, but this clarifies some issues. Lou

[Massacure]

9. Hydrogen is too hard to store.

Your probably better off making sythetic gasoline.

[420inTN]

17. Biodiesel could work.

Heck, you can run your car off of kitchen grease/vegetable oil.

I'm not exactly sure what the COx/NOx emissions are.

Do a Google News search for "biodiesel". There are quite a few interesting developments in this area recently.

[Massacure]

19. I did some math on this.

Rapeseed gets about 120 gallons pers acre. There are 640 acres in a square mile. That is about 76,800 gallons per square mile. Divide that by 42 and you get 1820 barrels.

The U.S. goes through 20,000,000 barrels a day, or 7.3 billion per year. 7.3 billion divided by 1820 is about 4 million square miles.

That is 2000 miles by 2000 miles. It isn't a pretty picture.

Algae shows more promise though. It can get 10,000-20,000 gallons per acre. Hopefully they can get some of the problems with it ironed out.

[420inTN]

21. Wow. I'm impressed.

Good answer. However, I must state that I wasn't proposing biodiesel as a single source solution. I am quite aware that we'd have to pretty much convert all of our arable land to biodiesel production in order to come near our energy demands, in which case we'd starve to death.

[poe]

18. Most of the discussion surrounding peak oil and its attendant quandries

focus on the replacement possibilities for fuel in the transportation sector. this is understandable but doesn't usually include the considerations of how much energy (read fossil fuels) actuall y goes into to creating the automobile once one considers all the processes involved. we could begin by simply considering the amount of enrgy that goes into the extraction of materials for one average sized vehicle. it's mind boggling. then consider the amount of fossil fuels that is required to maintain the highway infrastructure-mind boggling.

My grandfather rode a camel, his son drove a car, i ride in a jet, my son will drive a car, his son will ride a camel

[JohnyCanuck]

23. 7 gallons of oil in your average car tire.

From Mike Ruppert's speech to the Commonwealth Club of California:

There are between 600 and 700 million internal-combustion-powered vehicles on the planet and the demand for them is exploding exponentially, especially in China where GM’s sales rose 300% in one year alone. According to the National Geographic this last June, there are seven gallons of oil in every tire. Want to suddenly build 600 million new vehicles that run on something else, hydrogen perhaps? How much oil will be required to do that? To mine and melt the ore? To transport it to factories that don’t exist, using electricity that isn’t there? To make the paints, solvents and all of the plastic needed? All plastic is made from oil.

http://www.hopedance.org/new/issues/47/article2.html

[clem_c_rock]

20. At 1b per week for colonialism, we could have had a hydrogen econoymy w/in

5 years. If not hydrogen, I'm sure we could be well on our way to having some other form(s) of alternative fuel. The US is probably spending, at best, 100 million per year on alternative fuel development.

PNAC-It's more fun to go after towelheads.

[6th Borough]

22. "Hydrogen is a manufactured product" What. The. Hell? /eom

[rman]

44. Do you think hydrogen is not a manufactured product?

If so then where do you think hydrogen comes from?

There are oil fields, but there's no such thing as hydrogen fields.

Oil is an energy source (as long as it doesn't cost to much energy to get it out of the ground) - hydrogen is not an energy source but an energy carrier; it takes energy to create hydrogen, in fact it takes more energy to make a given volume of hydrogen then the amount of energy that volume contains.

[Peak_Oil]

24. My chem professor was just talking about this yesterday.

"As this highly reactive gas ascends upward into the atmosphere, it will combine with oxygen and form water droplets. Will this contribute to global warming? Or cooling? And will hydrogen reach the ozone layer? If so, do we humans run the risk of destroying the ozone layer with our hydrogen energy solution?"

He was just saying that this might have implications for the ozone layer similar to the effect that spray cans have.

On another note, I spoke with one of the engineers on Schwartzenegger's energy team a few months ago, and he told me that hydrogen vehicles are three generations away from operational reliability. That's 90 years, folks.

[buddysmellgood]

26. Well there you go. You listened to Schwartzenegger's team.

[rman]

45. hydrogen use does not cause hydrogen as an exhaust product

using hydrogen to power machines will not cause hydrogen to ascends upward into the atmosphere. the exhaust product of hydrogen use is water.

[DrWeird]

53. Yeah, but a hydrogen based fuel economy...

will cause large amounts of hydrogen to be leaked into the atmosphere.

One of the biggest sources of pollution now is the gas that's leaked everytime you pump gas into your car. That's why modern fuel stations have those little cups that fit around the nozzle, to help reduce that pollution.

[DefenseLawyer]

28. Don't you mean "Nucular"?

[NNadir]

59. Nonsense. I am very pro-nuclear but very anti-hydrogen.

Nuclear is safe and clean, whereas hydrogen (in many forms) is dangerous and dirty.

I know this flys in the face of what you heard on TV, but it is nonetheless true.

[Egalitariat]

63. I totally agree. Nuclear makes way too much sense

How many years have we had to improve nuclear technology since the last disaster? How many people have died from nuclear reactor problems compared to those who died from conditions related to burning fossil fuels?

Nuclear energy is a no-brainer. All we have to do is have the environmentalists come around; and there's been some recent evidence that they might just do that. When they stop comparing nuclear power to utopia, and start comparing nuclear power to reality, it just might come about.

[poe]

68. A false consciousness about reality leads to nuclear madness-consider....

I Nuclear Technology:
The Inappropriate Exercise of Human Intelligence
-- and Given This, What Is Appropriate?
by dave ratcliffe



It is not a normal situation when the people who are in charge
of the fate of a whole civilization lie quite openly to the whole world.

--Dr. Vladimir Chernousenko,
     Physicist and Scientific Director of the Chernobyl "clean-up", 1986-91,
     testifying at the World Uranium Hearings in Salzburg, September, 1992.



PART I: Shattering Treacherous and Lethal Assumptions


We need now, as we have for more than fifty years, to articulate and then dispel and shatter the false and exceedingly lethal assumptions underlying the "promises" of nuclear technology. The hierarchies of centralized authority, which have the greatest vested interest in perpetuating the employment of this technology, have lied about its true costs from the very beginning. These hierarchies include the Fortune 500 <1> / Global 500 <2> corpses <3>, G7 governments, the World Bank <4> <5> <6> and International Monetary Fund, known by "grassroots" as players in The World Game. These players have a deep, abiding financial interest in and obsession with the promotion of nuclear weapons and energy.

It is essential to recognize that what is euphemistically labeled "the nuclear fuel cycle"<9> is not a "cycle" at all, but rather the route uranium travels starting from the hundreds of millions of tons of uranium tailings left at mine sites around the world<10>, past intermediate stops such as enrichment, the reactor fuel process, and reprocessing, to "final storage" which doesn't exist. Calling this process a cycle promotes the deception that it is a circular, closed loop implying the possibility of recycling. All the radioactive fission products (the radioactive elements that are generated when uranium atoms are split) created in this route uranium travels, constitutes the most pernicious and poisonous physical matter being generated by man on the planet.<11> The unrivaled incoherence of this human activity is laid bare in the fact that no one in the above-cited hierarchies of authority has acknowledged that they do not have any idea how to ensure 100% containment and isolation of this material from the biosphere over its lifetime of upwards of millions of years.<9> <12>

Chernobyl: Some of the Actual Costs of Nuclear Power

It has now been only 10 very short years since the worst industrial catastrophe ever created by man occurred on Earth near the town its people know as Chornobyl. The results of this staggering assault on the integrity and viability of the biosphere will remain present and ongoing for thousands of generations of human existence. This is one of the actual costs of nuclear energy: a legacy of poisonous contamination of immense areas of the earth that will continue to negatively impact the health of all life for millenia.

A very partial list of some of these costs includes:
• Death rates are 30 percent higher for those in contaminated regions in the Ukraine compared to the rest of the country.
• Birth rates in Belarus have fallen 50 percent.
• Thyroid cancer, particularly among children, is up 285 percent in Belarus.
• About 7,000 in Russia alone who helped put out the fire and seal the reactor are believed to have died and 38 percent are recovering from some kind of disease.
• Belarus, the most heavily affected country, spends 20 percent of its budget on dealing with Chernobyl's aftermath; Ukraine devotes four percent and Russia, one percent.<13>
• Contamination of Lake Kojanovskoe -- downriver from Chernobyl and used by more than 30 million people -- with "radiation levels 60 times above European Union safety norms".<14>
• Repair estimates for the disintegrating sarcophagus range from $1.28 to $2.3 billion.<15>
• 125,000 people alone have died "from diseases related to the accident" according to Ukraine's Health Ministry.<16>


6. For what perceived benefit can society sacrifice the health of future generations?


7. What is the true meaning and value of a technology which, by its fundamentally toxic nature, requires the abdication of each person's freedom and liberty in order to ensure it is not acquired and employed by "terrorists".


8. Who are the real "terrorists", in a world where governments possess nuclear weapons and are the primary promoters of nuclear energy?


9. How can the actual health, environmental, psychological, and economic costs of nuclear technology be honestly and accurately assessed by governments -- the largest single sources of funding for such studies -- who are at the same time the single largest promoters of this technology for purportedly "peaceful" purposes?


10. If government authorities truly believe what they pronounce about the "clean bill of health" they give to the nuclear industry, then why do they only allow certain scientists to examine and study their voluminous records from places like Hanford, Washington, Muroroa, and Savannah River, Georgia?


11. If nuclear power is "safe," why did the US government pass the Price-Anderson Act to circumvent the fact that since the 1950s the insurance industry has refused to insure homeowners against nuclear accidents via the Nuclear Exclusion clauses included in all homeowner's policies?<21>


1. Peter Bossew, "The True Price of Nuclear Power, The Economic, Environmental and Social Impacts of the Nuclear Fuel Cycle," Poison Fire, Sacred Earth, pp. 88-93.
http://www.ratical.org/radiation/WorldUraniumHearing/PeterBossew.htm



1. Ulrike Fink, "The Nuclear Guardianship, Concept for a Radioactive Future," Poison Fire, Sacred Earth, pp. 135-138.
http://www.ratical.org/radiation/WorldUraniumHearing/UlrikeFink.html


1. "Chernobyl becomes science lab without help funds," Reuter, Tuesday, November 28, 1995.
http://www.ratical.org/radiation/Chernobyl/Costs1.txt


1. "30 million still at risk from Chernobyl," Reuter, Thursday, March 21, 1996.
http://www.ratical.org/radiation/Chernobyl/Costs2.txt


1. "Kiev says Chernobyl repair leaves danger unchecked," Reuter, Wednesday, February 14, 1996.
http://www.ratical.org/radiation/Chernobyl/Costs3.txt


1. "Deformities Found At Chernobyl," Reuter, Tuesday, March 26, 1996.
http://www.ratical.org/radiation/Chernobyl/Costs4.txt


1. "Belarus puts $265 billion price tag on Chernobyl disaster," Reuter, Tuesday, February 13, 1996
http://www.ratical.org/radiation/Chernobyl/Costs5.txt


1. Yuri M. Shcherbak, "Ten Years of the Chornobyl Era, Confronting the Nuclear Legacy -- Part 1," Scientific American, April 1996, pp. 44-49.
http://www.sciam.com/0496issue/0496shcherbak.html


1. Sustainable/renewable energy technologies have come a long way in the past 20 years. The following resources provide an inkling of just how biospheric sustaining and economically competitive these fundamentally de-centralizing by definition alternative energy technologies currently are:
? http://www.foe.co.uk/CAT/ -- The Center for Alternative Technology
"We are an educational charity striving to achieve the best cooperation between the natural, technological and human worlds. We test, live with and display strategies and tools for doing this. We are working for a sustainable future."
Centre for Alternative Technology
Machynlleth, Powys, SY20 9AZ, WALES, UK
Phone: [phone], Fax: [phone]
? http://rredc.nrel.gov/solar/ -- Solar Radiation Resource Information
? http://www.slip.net/~ckent/earthship/ -- Earthship
innovative, truly self-sufficient home-building living with the land
Solar Survival Architecture
P.O Box 1041
Taos NM 87571
505.758.9870


There is a great deal about all that has been cited here that oppresses one's sense of viable responses to properly deal with this incoherent state of affairs. What is called for is recognition of our own innate "response abilities" given any challenge as demanding of all our wits and skills as this one clearly is. We are naturally endowed with an extraordinary resourcefulness, inner strength, and clarity in dealing with emergency situations. There is much about our post-industrial culture that dissipates our innermost self-reliance and sense of confidence. Much of this paralysis of inner strength feeds on the thought that we are not "response able" -- that we are somehow not capable of being able to respond decisively to situations that have been on-going and, by degree, more and more adversely affecting our world and our lives. This is understandable of course, given the barrage of lies and untruths we see, read, and hear every day.

We conclude by articulating three of the more obvious life-affirming responses to this conundrum we find ourselves facing -- these are by no means the only approaches open to us. (What other health-promoting responses can you articulate?)
1. The justifications for "needing" nuclear power are as hollow as they are lethal. De-centralizing, sustainable technologies for alternative energy sources have come a long way in the past 20 years. Their adoption is an essential step towards asserting our own response ability for our life, the life of our community, and by extension, all life on Earth.


2. The need to take care of and protect ourselves and our planetary home from the poison fire of uranium and all radioactive matter transmuted from it is the challenge we must now answer and address for millenia to come. Adopting the practice and ethics of Nuclear Guardianship appears to be the most appropriate exercise of our true intelligence as a health-promoting response to the legacy we have created and saddled ourselves and future generations with.


3. The need for a factual, complete assessment of our current collective health status cannot be overemphasized. It is time for independent analysis and articulation of exactly what the true health is of our children and hence, of our genetic future. Only with such understanding can we appropriately and effectively respond in reversing the effects of what we have suffered ourselves and how we have damaged the biosphere.


http://www.ratical.org/radiation/NTechIEHI.html

[NNadir]

69. All this talk about Chernobyl is nonsense - in context.

I have covered all this silliness over in the environmental threads.

The most comprehensive thread on the subject of the so called dangers of "nuclear technology" in comparison to is that which began a discussion of the European Union's discussion of the external cost of energy. The thread is called the "External Cost of Energy: What You Pay With Your Flesh."

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=5609&mesg_id=5609

All the nonsensical antinuclear objections are brought up there, and all are effectively demolished.

Less than 2000 people are likely to die from Chernobyl, the only nuclear accident to have taken lives in 50 years of nuclear power. That number of people die pretty much every week every damn year every decade from air pollution alone.

The numbers of persons killed to steal oil in Iraq dwarfs Chernobyl.

Every year there are thousands upon thousands of Chernobyls associated with energy, usually unremarked by the likes of the clowns at Greenpeace or Ratical.org.

Ratical.org, first introduced here to my knowledge by a guy named Seventhson is a site for people who know zero science. It is so silly I'm not even going to dignify your questions with an answer.

Nuclear power saves lives. Nuclear power is the ONLY option available to us in the short term to prevent the collapse of the atmosphere. We have very little time left to recognize this. The matter is quite urgent.

[poe]

80. the god of science speaks

albeit in a limited way looking at a narrow range and with a limited perspective. got an energy problem, whats the solution? go to an energy source which is not actually a source that requires copious amounts of energy.
nature is the law-one would do well to live in accordance with that law. sadly the arrogance of humanism is the most stubborn of philosophies.

[Zynx]

62. And what's wrong with using nuclear power?

It's not exactly a revalation that you have to put more energy into making hyrdrogen than you get out of it - that's physics. The only way it has ever made sense is with using nuclear power to make it. Once again, this is not news.

[poe]

67. Here is a short laundry list if what is wrong with nuclear

Nuclear Technology:
The Inappropriate Exercise of Human Intelligence
-- and Given This, What Is Appropriate?
by dave ratcliffe



It is not a normal situation when the people who are in charge
of the fate of a whole civilization lie quite openly to the whole world.

--Dr. Vladimir Chernousenko,
     Physicist and Scientific Director of the Chernobyl "clean-up", 1986-91,
     testifying at the World Uranium Hearings in Salzburg, September, 1992.



PART I: Shattering Treacherous and Lethal Assumptions


We need now, as we have for more than fifty years, to articulate and then dispel and shatter the false and exceedingly lethal assumptions underlying the "promises" of nuclear technology. The hierarchies of centralized authority, which have the greatest vested interest in perpetuating the employment of this technology, have lied about its true costs from the very beginning. These hierarchies include the Fortune 500 <1> / Global 500 <2> corpses <3>, G7 governments, the World Bank <4> <5> <6> and International Monetary Fund, known by "grassroots" as players in The World Game. These players have a deep, abiding financial interest in and obsession with the promotion of nuclear weapons and energy.

There is a great deal about all that has been cited here that oppresses one's sense of viable responses to properly deal with this incoherent state of affairs. What is called for is recognition of our own innate "response abilities" given any challenge as demanding of all our wits and skills as this one clearly is. We are naturally endowed with an extraordinary resourcefulness, inner strength, and clarity in dealing with emergency situations. There is much about our post-industrial culture that dissipates our innermost self-reliance and sense of confidence. Much of this paralysis of inner strength feeds on the thought that we are not "response able" -- that we are somehow not capable of being able to respond decisively to situations that have been on-going and, by degree, more and more adversely affecting our world and our lives. This is understandable of course, given the barrage of lies and untruths we see, read, and hear every day.

We conclude by articulating three of the more obvious life-affirming responses to this conundrum we find ourselves facing -- these are by no means the only approaches open to us. (What other health-promoting responses can you articulate?)
1. The justifications for "needing" nuclear power are as hollow as they are lethal. De-centralizing, sustainable technologies for alternative energy sources have come a long way in the past 20 years. Their adoption is an essential step towards asserting our own response ability for our life, the life of our community, and by extension, all life on Earth.


2. The need to take care of and protect ourselves and our planetary home from the poison fire of uranium and all radioactive matter transmuted from it is the challenge we must now answer and address for millenia to come. Adopting the practice and ethics of Nuclear Guardianship appears to be the most appropriate exercise of our true intelligence as a health-promoting response to the legacy we have created and saddled ourselves and future generations with.


3. The need for a factual, complete assessment of our current collective health status cannot be overemphasized. It is time for independent analysis and articulation of exactly what the true health is of our children and hence, of our genetic future. Only with such understanding can we appropriately and effectively respond in reversing the effects of what we have suffered ourselves and how we have damaged the biosphere.


It is essential to recognize that what is euphemistically labeled "the nuclear fuel cycle"<9> is not a "cycle" at all, but rather the route uranium travels starting from the hundreds of millions of tons of uranium tailings left at mine sites around the world<10>, past intermediate stops such as enrichment, the reactor fuel process, and reprocessing, to "final storage" which doesn't exist. Calling this process a cycle promotes the deception that it is a circular, closed loop implying the possibility of recycling. All the radioactive fission products (the radioactive elements that are generated when uranium atoms are split) created in this route uranium travels, constitutes the most pernicious and poisonous physical matter being generated by man on the planet.<11> The unrivaled incoherence of this human activity is laid bare in the fact that no one in the above-cited hierarchies of authority has acknowledged that they do not have any idea how to ensure 100% containment and isolation of this material from the biosphere over its lifetime of upwards of millions of years.<9> <12>

Chernobyl: Some of the Actual Costs of Nuclear Power

It has now been only 10 very short years since the worst industrial catastrophe ever created by man occurred on Earth near the town its people know as Chornobyl. The results of this staggering assault on the integrity and viability of the biosphere will remain present and ongoing for thousands of generations of human existence. This is one of the actual costs of nuclear energy: a legacy of poisonous contamination of immense areas of the earth that will continue to negatively impact the health of all life for millenia.

A very partial list of some of these costs includes:
• Death rates are 30 percent higher for those in contaminated regions in the Ukraine compared to the rest of the country.
• Birth rates in Belarus have fallen 50 percent.
• Thyroid cancer, particularly among children, is up 285 percent in Belarus.
• About 7,000 in Russia alone who helped put out the fire and seal the reactor are believed to have died and 38 percent are recovering from some kind of disease.
• Belarus, the most heavily affected country, spends 20 percent of its budget on dealing with Chernobyl's aftermath; Ukraine devotes four percent and Russia, one percent.<13>
• Contamination of Lake Kojanovskoe -- downriver from Chernobyl and used by more than 30 million people -- with "radiation levels 60 times above European Union safety norms".<14>
• Repair estimates for the disintegrating sarcophagus range from $1.28 to $2.3 billion.<15>
• 125,000 people alone have died "from diseases related to the accident" according to Ukraine's Health Ministry.<16>

6. For what perceived benefit can society sacrifice the health of future generations?


7. What is the true meaning and value of a technology which, by its fundamentally toxic nature, requires the abdication of each person's freedom and liberty in order to ensure it is not acquired and employed by "terrorists".


8. Who are the real "terrorists", in a world where governments possess nuclear weapons and are the primary promoters of nuclear energy?


9. How can the actual health, environmental, psychological, and economic costs of nuclear technology be honestly and accurately assessed by governments -- the largest single sources of funding for such studies -- who are at the same time the single largest promoters of this technology for purportedly "peaceful" purposes?


10. If government authorities truly believe what they pronounce about the "clean bill of health" they give to the nuclear industry, then why do they only allow certain scientists to examine and study their voluminous records from places like Hanford, Washington, Muroroa, and Savannah River, Georgia?


11. If nuclear power is "safe," why did the US government pass the Price-Anderson Act to circumvent the fact that since the 1950s the insurance industry has refused to insure homeowners against nuclear accidents via the Nuclear Exclusion clauses included in all homeowner's policies?<21>

1. Peter Bossew, "The True Price of Nuclear Power, The Economic, Environmental and Social Impacts of the Nuclear Fuel Cycle," Poison Fire, Sacred Earth, pp. 88-93.
http://www.ratical.org/radiation/WorldUraniumHearing/PeterBossew.htm

1. Ulrike Fink, "The Nuclear Guardianship, Concept for a Radioactive Future," Poison Fire, Sacred Earth, pp. 135-138.
http://www.ratical.org/radiation/WorldUraniumHearing/UlrikeFink.html


1. "Chernobyl becomes science lab without help funds," Reuter, Tuesday, November 28, 1995.
http://www.ratical.org/radiation/Chernobyl/Costs1.txt


1. "30 million still at risk from Chernobyl," Reuter, Thursday, March 21, 1996.
http://www.ratical.org/radiation/Chernobyl/Costs2.txt


1. "Kiev says Chernobyl repair leaves danger unchecked," Reuter, Wednesday, February 14, 1996.
http://www.ratical.org/radiation/Chernobyl/Costs3.txt


1. "Deformities Found At Chernobyl," Reuter, Tuesday, March 26, 1996.
http://www.ratical.org/radiation/Chernobyl/Costs4.txt


1. "Belarus puts $265 billion price tag on Chernobyl disaster," Reuter, Tuesday, February 13, 1996
http://www.ratical.org/radiation/Chernobyl/Costs5.txt


1. Yuri M. Shcherbak, "Ten Years of the Chornobyl Era, Confronting the Nuclear Legacy -- Part 1," Scientific American, April 1996, pp. 44-49.
http://www.sciam.com/0496issue/0496shcherbak.html


1. Sustainable/renewable energy technologies have come a long way in the past 20 years. The following resources provide an inkling of just how biospheric sustaining and economically competitive these fundamentally de-centralizing by definition alternative energy technologies currently are:
? http://www.foe.co.uk/CAT/ -- The Center for Alternative Technology
"We are an educational charity striving to achieve the best cooperation between the natural, technological and human worlds. We test, live with and display strategies and tools for doing this. We are working for a sustainable future."
Centre for Alternative Technology
Machynlleth, Powys, SY20 9AZ, WALES, UK
Phone: [phone], Fax: [phone]
? http://rredc.nrel.gov/solar/ -- Solar Radiation Resource Information
? http://www.slip.net/~ckent/earthship/ -- Earthship
innovative, truly self-sufficient home-building living with the land
Solar Survival Architecture
P.O Box 1041
Taos NM 87571
505.758.9870

http://www.ratical.org/radiation/NTechIEHI.html

[NickB79]

71. LOL

Ratical.com? Talk about scrapping the bottom of the barrel for sources.

[poe]

79. could go to many other sources and...

ratical is mostly a place where articles are catalogued. nuclear is insanity and most who defend it want to maintain the current level of energy use in industrial culture so approach the situation through that prism. two other things to consider, one being the entire mining,processing etc. of materials to get nuclear up and running, not only is it costly in the narrow financial sense and extarordinarily polluting (have you ever been to a site where uranium was mined?) tailings etc. but it is also costly in a true economic sense in that it leaves in its wake permanent scars for the next generations. humans tend to think in short term and don't want to confront the level of change necessary. secondly, in short nuclear distracts us from focusing on the simpler, low cost, low energy solutions which are out there and ready to go.

[Hugin]

81. I was trying to write a similar idea earlier...

Thanks Poe...

I appreciate what you're saying. I think it's completely
possible.

[Locut0s]

70. It's not that Hydrogen Fuel Cells are impossible but that....

they are impractical as a viable solution to the worlds looming energy crisis in the near to mid range future, for some of the reasons you mention. The very fact that Bush and Co. lauded the hydrogen economy as the solution to the worlds energy problems, something he conveniently in the same breath denies is even a problem, should be enough of a reason for people who are serious about the environment to take notice. The reason of course that Bush pushes for a pure hydrogen based economy is that people in the petroleum industry know that a hydrogen economy isn't going to be a practical alternative for a long time to come if ever. So it's a great banner to wave if you want to make it look like you are pro environment, you're delivering a utopian view of the future and appear progressive to those who aren't in the know, but really don't plan on doing squat. I bet if you ask the average person on the street how much infrastructure that's currently in place and vital to the current world economy would need to be completely replaced or overhauled that they would have no idea the enormity of the change that would be needed to move to a pure hydrogen economy. The real solution will be found in a combination of conservation*, life style changes, population reduction policies, urban design changes (aka a move away from urban sprawl and toward high density decentralized cities), AND technological adaptations such as electric vehicles and the like. Unfortunately I don't see any of these things being high on the to do list in the near future.

*For those who don't know or don't remember Cheyney said about conservation:

"Conservation may be a sign of personal virtue, but it's not a sufficient basis for a sound, comprehensive energy policy."

[Hugin]

76. Alternative Energy...

... has long been part of the progressives quest.

I agree with most of what you said.

I don't think we'll ever find another silver bullet like fossil
fuels. Or even that we'd want to seeing how it's turned out.

The conservatives give it lots of lip service and not much
else. When someone comes up with a viable plan they are
discredited by the conservatives.

They are only interested in energy they can control and
charge $$$. All the rest is bunk to them.

Wind, solar, hydrogen, geothermal... it's all good. But,
we need variety. No more monopolies.

[Hugin]

78. Don't all gas stations also have water?

"enormity of the change that would be needed to move to a pure hydrogen economy"

I'm just saying... I usually buy one of their "Bladder Busters" or
whatever.

Yes, if we try to use hydrogen in the centralized manner (for billing
purposes) like we use fossil fuels.