4 ms·

Hydrogen is notorious for it's ability to leak out of containers. I doubt it's a great choice for long term energy storage.

b112 4y ago
This is false. h2 storage is a solved problem, people store, transport, and use h2 all the time.
- senectus1 4y ago
  true, but its not a particular efficient way to store it. We'll get there. its early days
iconosynclast 4y ago
It's just a matter of scale. make your tank 4 times as big and the surface area for leakage only grows by a factor of 2. also there is already a natural gas grid that can take a lot of hydrogen without modification. Again this really only ever makes sense if you have an absurd energy surplus as a sort of last resort way to use energy that would otherwise go unused. In terms of actually being a desirable power system it seems like a complete nightmare to deal with unless you need to go really far out on the gravimetric energy density front with very low power density all while having a fraction of the efficiency of battery electric
- mike-the-mikado 4y ago
  I think your maths is off. For the same shape, surface area = volume ^ (2/3)
  - iconosynclast 4y ago
    ah yes sorry got mixed up a bit there. a doubling in linear size leads to a quadrupling in surface area and an 8 fold increase in volume and then I somehow got confused from there m) nevertheless increasing size improves the situation
    - heavenlyblue 4y ago
      How does that improve the situation? One spark and it all goes boom. It’s not the relative size of the leaks to the volume of storage that matters, it’s the fact that even a small leak will go boom very easily.
      - olivermuty 4y ago
        Nah, in this context they are talking about hydrogen having so small molecules that it escapes from all containers you put it in. Increasing size of container decreases relative leak per volume (due to previously explained math). Problems of the booming nature is a different topic.

b112 4y ago

This is false. h2 storage is a solved problem, people store, transport, and use h2 all the time.

senectus1 4y ago
true, but its not a particular efficient way to store it. We'll get there. its early days

iconosynclast 4y ago

It's just a matter of scale. make your tank 4 times as big and the surface area for leakage only grows by a factor of 2. also there is already a natural gas grid that can take a lot of hydrogen without modification. Again this really only ever makes sense if you have an absurd energy surplus as a sort of last resort way to use energy that would otherwise go unused. In terms of actually being a desirable power system it seems like a complete nightmare to deal with unless you need to go really far out on the gravimetric energy density front with very low power density all while having a fraction of the efficiency of battery electric

mike-the-mikado 4y ago
I think your maths is off. For the same shape, surface area = volume ^ (2/3)
- iconosynclast 4y ago
  ah yes sorry got mixed up a bit there. a doubling in linear size leads to a quadrupling in surface area and an 8 fold increase in volume and then I somehow got confused from there m) nevertheless increasing size improves the situation
  - heavenlyblue 4y ago
    How does that improve the situation? One spark and it all goes boom. It’s not the relative size of the leaks to the volume of storage that matters, it’s the fact that even a small leak will go boom very easily.
    - olivermuty 4y ago
      Nah, in this context they are talking about hydrogen having so small molecules that it escapes from all containers you put it in. Increasing size of container decreases relative leak per volume (due to previously explained math). Problems of the booming nature is a different topic.