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Not mentioning this means that the average person who reads the news (including the typical politician and HN reader) has the mistaken notion that fossil fuels

Not mentioning this means that the average person who reads the news (including the typical politician and HN reader) has the mistaken notion that fossil fuels are essential for making fertilizer. But it's true - currently this is how fertilizer is made. Maybe there will be a large scale source of hydrogen in the future, but currently it comes from fossil fuels. You don't need to worry about politicians getting incorrect knowledge from the news, they get that knowledge directly from industry.

Robotbeat 5y ago
> Maybe there will be a large scale source of hydrogen in the future, but currently it comes from fossil fuels. No, see, this is again the misunderstanding I’m talking about. Ammonia is made with hydrogen, period. The “large scale source of hydrogen” exists today. It is steam reforming of natural gas, and before that it was electrolysis of water.
- Johnny555 5y ago
  This is the misunderstanding I'm talking about: "steam reforming of natural gas", is the same as "fossil fuels". If you're going to rely on some future development where the hydrogen doesn't come from fossil fuels, then you can also declare that gasoline and diesel are not fossil fuels since non-fossil fuel sources exist for both.
  - Robotbeat 5y ago
    I mean, there’s lots of green hydrogen production in California right now. Clean electric synthesis of hydrocarbons is most certainly possible but a lot more expensive, complex, and inefficient, and I’m not aware of any place you can just buy it, unlike green hydrogen in places like California. Hydrogen electrolysis used to be the dominant method of making ammonia hydrogen. Hydrogen electrolysis is simple enough there’s a Kiwi Co tutorial on how to do it with household items: https://www.kiwico.com/diy/stem/quick-easy-experiments/splitting-water https://www.kiwico.com/diy/stem/quick-easy-experiments/split... Hydrogen allows you to skip steps in the typical ammonia plant. Synthesized gasoline is just a huge cost increase, almost an order of magnitude larger than that for clean ammonia.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]

Robotbeat 5y ago

> Maybe there will be a large scale source of hydrogen in the future, but currently it comes from fossil fuels. No, see, this is again the misunderstanding I’m talking about. Ammonia is made with hydrogen, period. The “large scale source of hydrogen” exists today. It is steam reforming of natural gas, and before that it was electrolysis of water.

Johnny555 5y ago
This is the misunderstanding I'm talking about: "steam reforming of natural gas", is the same as "fossil fuels". If you're going to rely on some future development where the hydrogen doesn't come from fossil fuels, then you can also declare that gasoline and diesel are not fossil fuels since non-fossil fuel sources exist for both.
- Robotbeat 5y ago
  I mean, there’s lots of green hydrogen production in California right now. Clean electric synthesis of hydrocarbons is most certainly possible but a lot more expensive, complex, and inefficient, and I’m not aware of any place you can just buy it, unlike green hydrogen in places like California. Hydrogen electrolysis used to be the dominant method of making ammonia hydrogen. Hydrogen electrolysis is simple enough there’s a Kiwi Co tutorial on how to do it with household items: https://www.kiwico.com/diy/stem/quick-easy-experiments/splitting-water https://www.kiwico.com/diy/stem/quick-easy-experiments/split... Hydrogen allows you to skip steps in the typical ammonia plant. Synthesized gasoline is just a huge cost increase, almost an order of magnitude larger than that for clean ammonia.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]