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From a consumer's perspective, the thing I like about electricity and batteries is that it is relatively easy to be entirely self-sufficient. You can install so
by m-i-l 6y ago
From a consumer's perspective, the thing I like about electricity and batteries is that it is relatively easy to be entirely self-sufficient. You can install solar panels and/or a wind turbine and be able to store their electricity in batteries without depending on anyone else. But you can't set up a hydrogen fuel cell factory in your back garden. That said, dependence on others is precisely what many incumbents in the industry want, so they may be pushing for such solutions for their benefit.
- bryanlarsen 6y ago> But you can't set up a hydrogen fuel cell factory in your back garden. Sure you can. Electrolysis is a middle school science experiment, and it's efficient to do at a small scale. In fact, it's often more efficient to do small scale electrolysis at fueling stations than to do it in a larger scale operation and ship it to the fueling stations. (Splitting it from natural gas is cheaper, but then it's no longer clean energy, so...)
- m-i-l 6y agoWell you can build a battery in your kitchen too with a potato, zinc nail and copper coin, but that's not going to be very practical for something like powering a car. What I meant was that, while you may be able to build a basic hydrogen fuel cell in your kitchen, if you want to safely generate, compress, cool, and store liquid hydrogen in the quantities required for something like a hydrogen fuel cell powered car, then you're going to need some expensive and bulky equipment, e.g. EUR60K-EUR90K (USD70K-USD105K) and 6-8m2 space for a system which just provides home heating not the additional piping etc. for car refuelling[0] (I'm not aware of any hydrogen production and storage facilities for car refilling which are currently commercially available for residential use, and wouldn't even be surprised if hydrogen refuelling systems ended up with some form of cryptographic protection mechanism to prevent refuelling from unsigned devices, e.g. home refuelling, for "safety reasons"). So for all intents and purposes, you're going to be dependent on a supplier for your fuel, which of course is what all the potential fuel supply companies want. [0] https://www.homepowersolutions.de/en/product https://www.homepowersolutions.de/en/product
- bryanlarsen 6y agoA solar & battery setup is also going to cost 5 figures, and is going to take more than 6-8m2 of space. Both are well within the means of a small farmer or a remote northern community. Hydrogen is stupid for a lot of other reasons, but dependence on central infrastructure isn't one of them IMO.
- jagannathtech 6y agoPractically nothing is absolutely self-sufficient... things break down, need parts