2 ms·

> The price argument. Hydrogen will generally be more expensive than gasoline; his argument about current prices is like making an argument about gasoline befor

> The price argument. Hydrogen will generally be more expensive than gasoline; his argument about current prices is like making an argument about gasoline before it was a widely used industrial product. Hydrogen is a widely used industrial product. The comparison is totally sound. The hydrocarbons for gasoline are readily drilled out of the ground. Hydrogen needs to be manufactured either from these hydrocarbons (which is pointless for fuel, you can just use the hydrocarbons directly) or via electricity (which is far more expensive). A mass market for carbon could not reduce the price below that of its inputs. Even if we had abundant cheap electricity it's unclear that hydrogen would really be economical against all alternatives. > People like electric cars just fine, and the batteries they use are 100x less efficient in energy density. He's comparing fuels, you're comparing batteries to fuels, which doesn't make sense. > Fuel cells; yes, these are very hard to do for a consumer product. They are amazingly cool though, and they should still be invested in. So the six billion dollars of investment mentioned aren't enough? > Zubrin is a neocon type who works in the defense industry. This habit of putting people into ideological boxes inhibits your ability to make rational assessments. > For all we know this could have been commissioned by some oil company types, or maybe he's just being cussed. You must have overread the part where he argues for ethanol fuel as a means to break up OPEC. > I don't disagree with the over all message though. You'd have to change a lot of major infrastructure to make hydrogen work for a portable energy source. That's not the message though. The message is "it doesn't work, period" and "it is a hoax". I'm not in the position to say that his calculations are right or wrong, but given the lack of progress on hydrogen as a fuel, it's probably not far off the truth.

scottlocklin 7y ago
I agree with Zubrin that the hydrogen economy is rather silly and said so. I disagree with virtually all of his reasons and calculations as to why, and many of them are extremely deceptive. It's almost like he doesn't think anyone else knows anything about chemistry. >>Hydrogen is a widely used industrial product. ... twenty million metric tons of hydrogen a year made from natural gas versus a couple billion of gasoline made from oil; not comparable at all for the suggested economic uses of hydrogen as a fuel. If hydrogen were used, it would be produced in a different way. Otherwise people could just burn the natural gas. People invested more than 6 billion in fracking. Fuel cells are promising, and of course I compare fuel cells and the proposed hydrogen economy to batteries; they're used to store energy. I loathe war mongering neocons, and Zubrin absolutely is one and as such has discredited himself as any kind of policy wonk who expects to be listened to by serious people. That said, some of his martian speculations are amusing, and I might even have an amusing conversation if I were in the same room with him, where the more prominent ones (Bill Kristol) I would be in danger of clubbing to death like a baby seal.

scottlocklin 7y ago

I agree with Zubrin that the hydrogen economy is rather silly and said so. I disagree with virtually all of his reasons and calculations as to why, and many of them are extremely deceptive. It's almost like he doesn't think anyone else knows anything about chemistry. >>Hydrogen is a widely used industrial product. ... twenty million metric tons of hydrogen a year made from natural gas versus a couple billion of gasoline made from oil; not comparable at all for the suggested economic uses of hydrogen as a fuel. If hydrogen were used, it would be produced in a different way. Otherwise people could just burn the natural gas. People invested more than 6 billion in fracking. Fuel cells are promising, and of course I compare fuel cells and the proposed hydrogen economy to batteries; they're used to store energy. I loathe war mongering neocons, and Zubrin absolutely is one and as such has discredited himself as any kind of policy wonk who expects to be listened to by serious people. That said, some of his martian speculations are amusing, and I might even have an amusing conversation if I were in the same room with him, where the more prominent ones (Bill Kristol) I would be in danger of clubbing to death like a baby seal.