Reach for the Stars @antares@qoto.org

@Hypx Here in the US West the best use of excess power is to pump water up one side of a hill during the afternoon and [recapture the power](https://clui.org/ludb/site/castaic-power-plant) as it goes down the other side in the evening. Desalination is another useful option that doesn't add any power to the grid but is arguably a higher and better use of the excess solar power than transportation. On a more localized scale, one could use it to freeze water and then cool buildings with the ice in the late afternoon when solar production drops but cooling demand peeks. A [molten salt battery](https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/rechargeable-molten-salt-battery-freezes-energy-in-place-for-long-term-storage/) is another option though admittedly not significantly superior to hydrogen generation in terms of power storage.

@Hypx I can think of lots of better options for excess renewables domestically in the USA where there is not a particular location that is electricity poor. I agree that over long distances molecules are more efficient than aluminum or copper wire. However, if we are going to turn power into gas, lets go a step further drop a carbon atom in the middle and we can use the even less expensive existing natural gas network including LNG for transoceanic transport. https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fenrg.2020.570112/full

@Hypx Find my full response here: https://qoto.org/@antares/110986868805276550

Ok, Let's talk about #hydrogen Fuel Cell Electric Vehicles (#FCEV) as an alternative to Battery Electric Vehicles (#BEV).

A FCEV uses the same electric motors as BEVs but gets its power from chemically reacting H₂ with O₂ from the air in a way that produces an electric current - a fuel cell. None of this is new technology Fuel Cells were a mature and reliable power source by the time the Apollo program was landing people on the moon. The issue with fuel cells is the same as with Enteral Combustion Engines(ICE) they are most efficient in a very narrow energy band great if the goal is to power the life support on a space craft, but not for the extremely variable loads needed to drive a car.

For this reason, FCEVs are hybrids with the same Li batteries as BEVs and ICE Hybrids like the Prius. Like ICE Hybrids they use the battery to accelerate and as storage for regenerative breaking with the fuel cell providing a constant recharge.

**Why I'm skeptical of FCEVs**

1) Greenwashing Hydrogen. FCEV advocates will point out that the only tailpipe emission is water vapor. The question is where does the hydrogen come from. By far the least expensive way to produce hydrogen gas is to crack the hydrogen atoms off of petrochemical hydrocarbons. As a mater of basic chemistry it takes far less energy to crack hydrocarbons than it does to electrolize water. And unlike the electrical grid where technologies like solar, wind and nuclear are already deployed and becoming an increasing share of our electric grid. Processes to produce hydrogen from water at anything close the the cost to strip it off fossil fuels is in the same development stage as cold fusion. at least for the next decade green hydrogen will be a premium product only available to the wealthiest buyers.

2) Hydrogen storage is hard. To fit enough hydrogen on a moving passenger car for it to have a 300 mile range requires pressures of 10,000psi (700 bar). The kinds of pressure vessels that can safely handle that pressure are expensive, and need regular inspection. Having had to keep a compressed air tank of just 200 psi in a fixed certified, I can tell you that there will be significant costs to regularly inspecting a 10,000 psi tank full of flammable gas that needs to survive a collision with one of the 2023 lineup of full sized puck up trucks.

But that is just the start. Hydrogen leaks. No matter how good you think your valves and fittings are the smallest molecule in the universe stored under huge pressure will find a way out. Ask anyone who has experience in the space industry where hydrogen is already the fuel of choice and they will tell you that hydrogen leaks are just a fact that has to be engineered around. On a vehicle this will be a small annoyance but at a fueling station this will be significant. The farther Hydrogen is transported and the longer it must be stored the higher the losses. There is also the energy factor of compressing that gas. To the best of my knowledge the prodigious amount of work done to pressurize the fuel is never recovered

FCEVs and BEVs both started to be produced about a decade ago, and while Tesla has scaled out its supercharger network world wide in that time. Hydrogen has less than 100 filling stations all in California. While these stations can fill a car in 5 minutes, they can only fill 2 to 5 vehicles before spending an hour refilling their high pressure storage tanks. One could argue that all Hydrogen needs is an eccentric billionaire ready to lose money for a decade building out infrastructure, however I think the infrastructure challenges with hydrogen exceed even Musk levels of ambition.

3) Cost. My M3 already costs noticeably less per mile that the equivalent ICE vehicle. Baring a huge technological leap, hydrogen will always be more expensive. because the least expensive hydrogen is processed out of the same fuel that runs ICE cars and provides less energy per molecule than those hydrocarbons when reacted with O₂ hydrogen cannot help but be a more expensive fuel.

So why are hydrogen FCEV still a thing? Well the vehicles are lighter, fueling times are comparable to gasoline, and the petrochemical industry is desperate for them to succeed. The oil industry can see the writing on the wall as states like California will ban new ICE vehicle sales in 2030. While holding out hope for a green hydrogen future a generation away, they can continue to have a market for their product as gasoline and diesel phase out. "Hydrogen will become the green fuel of the future" explain their sock puppets knowing that dirty hydrogen from their product will always have a price advantage. And to be fair, turning a mobile source into a point source of emissions does provide the opportunity for carbon capture ([so called Blue Hydrogen](https://www.petrofac.com/media/stories-and-opinion/the-difference-between-green-hydrogen-and-blue-hydrogen/)), but all this still add even more cost while BEVs already have a price advantage in their fuel - not to mention that every home in the developed world has the infrastructure to charge BEVs.

Why write all this? Because when you get down to it most of the #FUD being spread around #EV s is coming from FCEV advocates who are trying not to let hydrogen become the betamax of the transition away from ICE transportation. In doing so they are making it harder than necessary for the world to move away from ICE transportation.

References:
https://www.thedrive.com/tech/33408/why-we-still-cant-deliver-on-the-promise-of-hydrogen-cars

https://www.caranddriver.com/features/a41103863/hydrogen-cars-fcev/

Tags:
#GreenHydrogen #BlueHydrogen #ClimateCrisis #fossilefuel #greenwashing #Tesla #Toyota #Mirai #electrolysis

@Hypx Now who is being the fanboy?

Yes, I do love my #Tesla M3 LR. Yes, it is a viable car for both daily commuting and longer road trips. No it is not the perfect car, but neither was the Nissan Versa it replaced. No, I don't agree with everything Elon Musk does, but neither do I agree with everything [Carlos Ghosn](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlos_Ghosn#Arrest_in_Tokyo,_subsequent_Nissan_investigation_and_escape_to_Lebanon) the former CEO of Nissan did.

I am here to tell you that almost all the #FUD coming out about #EV is completely unfounded. My M3 is better than my old Versa in just about every way you could imagine. Some thing are different, but those differences are far from deal breaking. Don't let the luddites tell you #BEV technology is not a viable transportation option or that it cannot be widely adopted. I am here to tell you that it works, and [I am not alone](https://www.theverge.com/2023/5/26/23738581/tesla-model-y-ev-record-world-bestselling-car-electric).

@Hypx I look forward to this bright and glorious future! I will be at the front of the line for the first viable super capacitor car, but I will be shocked if I can buy one by 2033.

However usually when people talk alternatives to BEVs that might hit the market in the next 10 years, they are hinting at #FCEV technology. While I'd love to be proven wrong, I just don't think hydrogen is going to be a better ICE alternative. The engineering challenges of storing molecular hydrogen are too bulky and expensive, and the fuel itself is - almost by definition - going to be more expensive per mile that hydrocarbons.

Do you have some other technology in mind?

@Hypx Again, High-end is not representative of the general market. My M3 LR which I drive 280 miles between Sacramento and the Central Coast on a full charge has a battery only 60% that size. My car is still heavier that a comparable ICE sedan, but not to such an extent that it is "way too heavy." It weighs less than the F250 Superduity that I'm borrowing to help us move, and no one has any complaints about it being too heavy.

@mjmbca
School: "Hello Mr. Blair, you child was involved in a fight during her Phys Ed class today. We would like to talk to you about arraigning an IEP for them to meet the states Phys Ed requirements."

You: "Why is my son having problems in his Phys Ed class? What is the problem?"

School: "I'm sorry that information is classified."

@mjmbca "If my kid is having trouble at school, then I want to get a call from the school." Now tell me how a school administrator make the phone call that is your kid having trouble at school because they have come out. Maybe school culture has changed in the last 30 years, but I suspect that coming out is still a stressful experience that does not receive universal support. How does a school staff explain that your kid is having trouble at school without being able to explain the reason?

@Hypx I just don't think that a multimillion-dollar sports car with a production run of 33 is a useful example of where the #EV industry is headed. That massively oversized 102kWh battery is there only to ensure enough current to saturate all three motors. vehicles with more reasonable performance expectations will not need batteries that large.

@Leeisme He is on the record that Buying Twitter was a bad deal. In fact, once he got the internal data he tried very hard to back out, but the courts forced the deal through. That said, I'm surprised he has not been more consistent in running it. There was a clear plan to strip the operation down shift the political bias right and expand on the core user base to sell ancillary services a la Alphabet and Meta.

Right now it feels like 𝕏 is the winter beater of Elon Musk portfolio that never gets an oil change or new breaks and will die of neglect because it is not worth investing any more money into it.

Actually, Quote posts are a feature I have.

@Leeisme Office towers have a central core with stairways and windows on the outside with a lot of area in between.

Take a typical 15,000 sq ft floor (150' X 100 ft) it should hold enough area for 12 reasonable 2-bedroom apartments, but if every apartment must adjoin the central stairwell and have 20 ft of exterior wall you can really only fit 6 per floor. Now we are renting out 2,500 sq ft apartments that are not affordable housing.

Now let us put the central stairway down the hall and we get 8. If each unit only needs 10 ft of exterior wall we are back to having reasonable sized affordable housing.

@Leeisme @failedLyndonLaRouchite These all seem in service of converting office space to residential space. I know a lot of people who are frustrated by empty office towers surrounded by people without affordable housing.

Who was the surgeon? I have some friends stuck in the underdark of #BaldursGate3 that could really use the help