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Peak oil will be "solved" by humanity moving away from oil. It is not solved by drilling for more oil, even though it allows for a temporary reprieve. My perso

by _hypx 4y ago

Peak oil will be "solved" by humanity moving away from oil. It is not solved by drilling for more oil, even though it allows for a temporary reprieve. My personal opinion will be that shortages on battery related materials will be solved by going to hydrogen cars. Replace a finite resource with a practically infinite one.

JumpCrisscross 4y ago
> personal opinion will be that shortages on battery related materials will be solved by going to hydrogen cars Fuel cells often use platinum (anode) and nickel (cathode).
- _hypx 4y ago
  Those are not necessary. Solid oxide fuel cells use neither. In the long run, PEM fuel cells likely will use neither too, or very little (on the order of grams per fuel cell).
  - pfdietz 4y ago
    SOFCs use zirconium or cerium as well as nickel conductors. To be efficient, they need to be the topping cycle of a combustion turbine, so they also need strong turbine blade alloys, which involve nickel.
    - _hypx 4y ago
      None of these materials are really that limited. Not even nickel at the scale you’re imagining them to be. Remember, we’re looking at grams of such things, and they can easy be swapped out with some other material. Also, you do not need a combustion turbine at all. You can envision fuel cells with near 100% efficiency in the long run.
      - pfdietz 4y ago
        If these materials aren't limited, neither are the ones for batteries, so why do you imagine these supposed limitations will be solved by going to hydrogen cars?
        _hypx 4y ago
        Again, we are talking about grams of such materials per fuel cell. All of which are readily substitutable. Meanwhile, all of the materials for batteries are in the kilograms, up to hundreds of kilograms for larger vehicles. Many of which cannot be substituted that easily. Ultimately, you will realize that the leap from batteries to fuel cells is not that difficult. It’s smaller than the leap from ICE to batteries after all. So if there is an alternative way of making an EV that uses much less resources, it will be adopted.
- ben_w 4y ago
  Which is unimportant, because unlike the oil we don’t set fire to the platinum and nickel.
  - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
    > unlike the oil we don’t set fire to the platinum and nickel The comparison is to batteries. We don’t burn the cobalt or lithium either.
    - ben_w 4y ago
      Sorry, I missed that. Still waking up.
narrator 4y ago
Hydrogen will be necessary for air travel too.
- neltnerb 4y ago
  If you're assuming hydrogen is green, you may as well assume you can simply make jet-fuel equivalent biochemicals. Right now most of the hydrogen comes from natural gas, so that's not so helpful. But fertilizers that might make biochemicals come from hydrogen that comes from natural gas. And like hydrogen, with lots of infrastructure costs, shipping biological feedstocks and fertilizers around also causes emissions and lowers energy returns. I would not bet on hydrogen for air travel, unless you mean lighter than air craft then maybe with careful design. For planes there's enough existing bio-based options that are simply liquids and much easier to handle. Batteries probably make more sense than liquid fuel in a car if you're assuming the liquid fuel comes from renewables. If that's the case you might as well use the starting energy (electricity) and use it directly rather than converting to liquids and then back again.
  - _hypx 4y ago
    Neither biofuels nor batteries will ever make sense for airplanes. In the former, it is because it is basically an inefficient way of turning carbon dioxide into fuel. If we need liquids for airplanes, it will almost certainly be some kind of e-fuel or synfuel. In the latter, it is because the energy is well over an order of magnitude too low. It's pretty much impossible for something that resembles a conventional battery to work. Not even the theoretical limits of conventional batteries will make for a worthwhile plane. So battery planes will pretty much always been short-ranged aircraft that can't replace jetliners. As a result, the future of air travel is guaranteed to either be some kind of e-fuels/synfuels, or hydrogen itself. There are no credible alternatives unless you're imagine nuclear powered planes.
    - pfdietz 4y ago
      > There are no credible alternatives unless you're imagine nuclear powered planes. Do you consider power beamed by laser from space to not be credible, even into the unlimited future?

by _hypx 4y ago

JumpCrisscross 4y ago

> personal opinion will be that shortages on battery related materials will be solved by going to hydrogen cars Fuel cells often use platinum (anode) and nickel (cathode).

_hypx 4y ago
Those are not necessary. Solid oxide fuel cells use neither. In the long run, PEM fuel cells likely will use neither too, or very little (on the order of grams per fuel cell).
- pfdietz 4y ago
  SOFCs use zirconium or cerium as well as nickel conductors. To be efficient, they need to be the topping cycle of a combustion turbine, so they also need strong turbine blade alloys, which involve nickel.
  - _hypx 4y ago
    None of these materials are really that limited. Not even nickel at the scale you’re imagining them to be. Remember, we’re looking at grams of such things, and they can easy be swapped out with some other material. Also, you do not need a combustion turbine at all. You can envision fuel cells with near 100% efficiency in the long run.
    - pfdietz 4y ago
      If these materials aren't limited, neither are the ones for batteries, so why do you imagine these supposed limitations will be solved by going to hydrogen cars?
      - _hypx 4y ago
        Again, we are talking about grams of such materials per fuel cell. All of which are readily substitutable. Meanwhile, all of the materials for batteries are in the kilograms, up to hundreds of kilograms for larger vehicles. Many of which cannot be substituted that easily. Ultimately, you will realize that the leap from batteries to fuel cells is not that difficult. It’s smaller than the leap from ICE to batteries after all. So if there is an alternative way of making an EV that uses much less resources, it will be adopted.
ben_w 4y ago
Which is unimportant, because unlike the oil we don’t set fire to the platinum and nickel.
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  > unlike the oil we don’t set fire to the platinum and nickel The comparison is to batteries. We don’t burn the cobalt or lithium either.
  - ben_w 4y ago
    Sorry, I missed that. Still waking up.

narrator 4y ago

Hydrogen will be necessary for air travel too.

neltnerb 4y ago
If you're assuming hydrogen is green, you may as well assume you can simply make jet-fuel equivalent biochemicals. Right now most of the hydrogen comes from natural gas, so that's not so helpful. But fertilizers that might make biochemicals come from hydrogen that comes from natural gas. And like hydrogen, with lots of infrastructure costs, shipping biological feedstocks and fertilizers around also causes emissions and lowers energy returns. I would not bet on hydrogen for air travel, unless you mean lighter than air craft then maybe with careful design. For planes there's enough existing bio-based options that are simply liquids and much easier to handle. Batteries probably make more sense than liquid fuel in a car if you're assuming the liquid fuel comes from renewables. If that's the case you might as well use the starting energy (electricity) and use it directly rather than converting to liquids and then back again.
- _hypx 4y ago
  Neither biofuels nor batteries will ever make sense for airplanes. In the former, it is because it is basically an inefficient way of turning carbon dioxide into fuel. If we need liquids for airplanes, it will almost certainly be some kind of e-fuel or synfuel. In the latter, it is because the energy is well over an order of magnitude too low. It's pretty much impossible for something that resembles a conventional battery to work. Not even the theoretical limits of conventional batteries will make for a worthwhile plane. So battery planes will pretty much always been short-ranged aircraft that can't replace jetliners. As a result, the future of air travel is guaranteed to either be some kind of e-fuels/synfuels, or hydrogen itself. There are no credible alternatives unless you're imagine nuclear powered planes.
  - pfdietz 4y ago
    > There are no credible alternatives unless you're imagine nuclear powered planes. Do you consider power beamed by laser from space to not be credible, even into the unlimited future?