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This isn't a good argument to be honest. Sure, it won't save the climate, this is a problem of energy generation. We will always need more than yesterday so we

This isn't a good argument to be honest. Sure, it won't save the climate, this is a problem of energy generation. We will always need more than yesterday so we need to look at how we can generate it. The main disadvantage of hydrogen is that it is very difficult to store. It is the smallest element and simply diffuses through almost everything. The efficiencies of energy conversion of hydrogen are quite good for that matter. But BEV (how the author calls them) have major disadvantages as well. Infrastructure needs are unfulfilled, the recycling is maintenance intensive, ... It is still more environmental friendly to drive that 10 year old used tincan than to buy a new electric car. Advantage here is that you don't have local polution, much cleaner city air etc. But neither hydrogen cars nor BEV will save the climate.

bluGill 4y ago
> Infrastructure needs are unfulfilled But infrastructure is currently being built out for that. There are very few places in the US (lower 48) that you can't drive a BEV to and back. For some of the remote ones you will need to plan your route around chargers, but you can get just about anywhere. For more dense areas you can just wait until your battery is getting low to start looking. It isn't like gas where you can wait until you are "running on fumes" before starting to look for a charger, but it isn't a big deal. Hydrogen is far behind - maybe it will be built, maybe it won't, I won't predict the future. What I can tell you is if you buy a hydrogen car today you will have to buy the place to fill it at the same time, and you have to assume you will never go out of range.
- raxxorraxor 4y ago
  Hydrogen also has a lot of problems that make it expensive for car use. But the real problem electric cars have to beat is battery and resource life cycle. You can charge your car now but think about how it would look like if even 30-40% of people would need to charge at the same places. Problem is there is very little incentive for anyone to invest in energy infrastructure. That is a problem affecting EVs, but also a problem that needs to be solved anyway.
tinco 4y ago
> It is still more environmental friendly to drive that 10 year old used tincan than to buy a new electric car. No it isn't, what do you base this on? Production of a new electric van takes a limited amount of CO2, and the CO2 saved while driving it compensates for that within a couple of years. I don't know how this rumor still persists.
- ihaveajob 4y ago
  I'm interested in this calculation. Do you know of some data to support it?
  - ZeroGravitas 4y ago
    Interactive web app that calculates this for various vehicles. https://www.carboncounter.com/#!/explore https://www.carboncounter.com/#!/explore Note the customisation options that let you choose a state for the electricity mix, miles driven per year and so on.
- VBprogrammer 4y ago
  It depends how much running around you do and how much CO2 the energy mix where you live generates. For someone doing a few thousand miles per year it could easily be the case that a new car would never pay off the additional CO2 emissions during it's manufacturer. Of course you can then make argument that they aren't doing enough mileage to justify having their own car in the first place.
- epistasis 4y ago
  I would go so far as to say it's a sunk cost fallacy to run the old carbon emitting car even one more mile. There is no savings to be had by waiting to convert to an EV, the total emissions are always going to be higher if you drive the polluting car rather than switching today.
  - jnwatson 4y ago
    That’s demonstrably false. Each EV is an immediate ~13k kg hit on CO2. Average ICE passenger car is .4 kg CO2 per mile. Even if you have a source of zero carbon energy to power the EV, that’s 32500 miles of driving an ICE before you break even on CO2.
defrost 4y ago
> The main disadvantage of hydrogen is that it is very difficult to store. > It is the smallest element and simply diffuses through almost everything. The people currently most serious about the immediate expansion of green hydrogen supplies (by a significant factor over current global production) are not looking at storing hydrogen for export | transport | storage, they're looking at ammonia - three hydrogen and a nitrogen. eg: [1] https://reneweconomy.com.au/forrest-promises-to-convert-first-ship-to-green-ammonia-within-a-year/ https://reneweconomy.com.au/forrest-promises-to-convert-firs...
- raxxorraxor 4y ago
  Yeah, I guess it will probably end in it being stored in some compound that can be directly used. Looks like a promising project.

bluGill 4y ago

> Infrastructure needs are unfulfilled But infrastructure is currently being built out for that. There are very few places in the US (lower 48) that you can't drive a BEV to and back. For some of the remote ones you will need to plan your route around chargers, but you can get just about anywhere. For more dense areas you can just wait until your battery is getting low to start looking. It isn't like gas where you can wait until you are "running on fumes" before starting to look for a charger, but it isn't a big deal. Hydrogen is far behind - maybe it will be built, maybe it won't, I won't predict the future. What I can tell you is if you buy a hydrogen car today you will have to buy the place to fill it at the same time, and you have to assume you will never go out of range.

raxxorraxor 4y ago
Hydrogen also has a lot of problems that make it expensive for car use. But the real problem electric cars have to beat is battery and resource life cycle. You can charge your car now but think about how it would look like if even 30-40% of people would need to charge at the same places. Problem is there is very little incentive for anyone to invest in energy infrastructure. That is a problem affecting EVs, but also a problem that needs to be solved anyway.

tinco 4y ago

> It is still more environmental friendly to drive that 10 year old used tincan than to buy a new electric car. No it isn't, what do you base this on? Production of a new electric van takes a limited amount of CO2, and the CO2 saved while driving it compensates for that within a couple of years. I don't know how this rumor still persists.

ihaveajob 4y ago
I'm interested in this calculation. Do you know of some data to support it?
- ZeroGravitas 4y ago
  Interactive web app that calculates this for various vehicles. https://www.carboncounter.com/#!/explore https://www.carboncounter.com/#!/explore Note the customisation options that let you choose a state for the electricity mix, miles driven per year and so on.
VBprogrammer 4y ago
It depends how much running around you do and how much CO2 the energy mix where you live generates. For someone doing a few thousand miles per year it could easily be the case that a new car would never pay off the additional CO2 emissions during it's manufacturer. Of course you can then make argument that they aren't doing enough mileage to justify having their own car in the first place.
epistasis 4y ago
I would go so far as to say it's a sunk cost fallacy to run the old carbon emitting car even one more mile. There is no savings to be had by waiting to convert to an EV, the total emissions are always going to be higher if you drive the polluting car rather than switching today.
- jnwatson 4y ago
  That’s demonstrably false. Each EV is an immediate ~13k kg hit on CO2. Average ICE passenger car is .4 kg CO2 per mile. Even if you have a source of zero carbon energy to power the EV, that’s 32500 miles of driving an ICE before you break even on CO2.

defrost 4y ago

> The main disadvantage of hydrogen is that it is very difficult to store. > It is the smallest element and simply diffuses through almost everything. The people currently most serious about the immediate expansion of green hydrogen supplies (by a significant factor over current global production) are not looking at storing hydrogen for export | transport | storage, they're looking at ammonia - three hydrogen and a nitrogen. eg: [1] https://reneweconomy.com.au/forrest-promises-to-convert-first-ship-to-green-ammonia-within-a-year/ https://reneweconomy.com.au/forrest-promises-to-convert-firs...

raxxorraxor 4y ago
Yeah, I guess it will probably end in it being stored in some compound that can be directly used. Looks like a promising project.