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This the basic idea behind hydrogen fuel cell cars too, only with a fuel cell instead of an engine. The goal is 100% zero emissions with 100% the functionality

by _hypx 3y ago

This the basic idea behind hydrogen fuel cell cars too, only with a fuel cell instead of an engine. The goal is 100% zero emissions with 100% the functionality of existing cars. It is also why existing BEVs are almost certainly a fad. After all, why will innovation suddenly stop in transportation, and fundamental ideas like low weight and fast refueling suddenly became irrelevant? All signs point to BEVs being an idea from the mid-2000s, and for whatever reason had become stuck in our brain.

Turskarama 3y ago
The killer feature of BEVs is that you never actually have to take them somewhere to charge if you're charging them at home. It's only on long trips that you need to stop. If you're doing hundreds of km multiple days per week then Hydrogen might make sense, but I'd say that's a vanishingly small percentage of the population. Given that Hydrogen is also _always_ going to cost more than direct electricity, I don't think it's ever going to be mainstream.
- _hypx 3y ago
  And if you don't have a home with a garage to charge your car? How do apartment dwellers charge their car? And the rest of your post is bullshit. You want a centralized system that can meet all refueling needs by itself. And as we make hydrogen from excess green electricity, it will drop to nearly nothing in terms of cost. Anti-hydrogen rhetoric is a repeat of anti-wind and anti-solar rhetoric of the past.
  - Turskarama 3y ago
    The cost of generating the hydrogen is only one part of it. We need the electricity grid anyway, and bolstering it is already a necessary part of a 100% green grid. If we want to use Hydrogen for vehicles then that means constructing an entire second distribution system. Even if you use trucks, we will need to build thousands of trucks with Hydrogen tanks (which are much harder to make than regular pressure vessels, by the way) in order to distribute it. All this, and you think adding chargers to apartment complexes is too hard?
    - _hypx 3y ago
      We will need hydrogen anyways too. Not unless you think all of industry doesn't need to exist. Hydrogen can be delivered via pipeline just like natural gas. It is actually cheaper to move hydrogen around than electricity this way.
      - Turskarama 3y ago
        Except this can largely be handled by building industry which requires Hydrogen near to where the Hydrogen is generated. It can be done in large central facilities and requires _minimal_ movement of the Hydrogen itself. It's really not the same thing as a distribution system that needs to go essentially everywhere.
        _hypx 3y ago
        Except you wouldn't build it like that. Even "on the spot" production will still significant hydrogen storage and distribution. It's not like you can place a giant tank right next to each piece of machinery. This are still going to be miles of piping. And it is cheaper to move hydrogen than electricity. People have an inverted understanding of the problem.
        Turskarama 3y ago
        Miles of piping is still less than hundreds of miles of piping. > And it is cheaper to move hydrogen than electricity Citation needed. Probably true across oceans, overland I'm doubtful.
        _hypx 3y ago
        https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2589004221014668 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S258900422... It is far cheaper to move fuel via pipelines than electrical wires. Your entire argument is just based on BEV propaganda. It is going to be systematically cheaper to go with hydrogen infrastructure than an all-electricity solution.
  - LeoPanthera 3y ago
    > And if you don't have a home with a garage to charge your car? How do apartment dwellers charge their car? Hacker News is obsessed with "but sometimes". If an idea is obviously better, and improves life for the majority of people but sometimes brings new issues, then throw the whole thing out. It's a weird kind of technology conservatism that I am truly surprised to see here on HN, but I do keep seeing it, about all kinds of things.
LeoPanthera 3y ago
This is mad. Only BEVs can be refueled at home, and that is the absolute killer feature. People are obsessed with public chargers but most EV drivers never use them, or at least, only very rarely, on unusually long trips. I can't put more hydrogen, or gasoline, into a vehicle without getting it from somewhere else.
- _hypx 3y ago
  That is wrong. You can make hydrogen at home. You only need water and electricity. People are simply imagining advantages of BEVs. That said, there is not much need for home hydrogen production. It is better to have a more centralized refueling system. It is why gas stations replaces gas can deliveries.
  - Turskarama 3y ago
    You can make hydrogen at home, what you cannot do is compress it and put it into your car without tens off thousands of dollars worth of equipment. Oh and if anything goes wrong it's an explosion hazard.
    - _hypx 3y ago
      Wrong again. With modern advancements, you can conceive of electromagnetic system that can do this at low cost and with no complex mechanisms. This is just another anti-hydrogen propaganda argument, and is based on willful ignorance of what is technologically possible. The fundamental issue isn't technology, but lack of need; Home refueling is just unnecessary once you have refueling stations everywhere.
      - LeoPanthera 3y ago
        > anti-hydrogen propaganda Have you seen your own comment history? Boy, I had no idea that hydrogen propaganda was a thing. I know you wouldn't admit it if you were but I wonder if anyone gets paid for doing this. I know the oil industry has been dumping enormous amount of money into trying to paint BEVs as Bad and Wrong, but it's another thing to see someone put so much time into it.

by _hypx 3y ago

Turskarama 3y ago

The killer feature of BEVs is that you never actually have to take them somewhere to charge if you're charging them at home. It's only on long trips that you need to stop. If you're doing hundreds of km multiple days per week then Hydrogen might make sense, but I'd say that's a vanishingly small percentage of the population. Given that Hydrogen is also _always_ going to cost more than direct electricity, I don't think it's ever going to be mainstream.

_hypx 3y ago
And if you don't have a home with a garage to charge your car? How do apartment dwellers charge their car? And the rest of your post is bullshit. You want a centralized system that can meet all refueling needs by itself. And as we make hydrogen from excess green electricity, it will drop to nearly nothing in terms of cost. Anti-hydrogen rhetoric is a repeat of anti-wind and anti-solar rhetoric of the past.
- Turskarama 3y ago
  The cost of generating the hydrogen is only one part of it. We need the electricity grid anyway, and bolstering it is already a necessary part of a 100% green grid. If we want to use Hydrogen for vehicles then that means constructing an entire second distribution system. Even if you use trucks, we will need to build thousands of trucks with Hydrogen tanks (which are much harder to make than regular pressure vessels, by the way) in order to distribute it. All this, and you think adding chargers to apartment complexes is too hard?
  - _hypx 3y ago
    We will need hydrogen anyways too. Not unless you think all of industry doesn't need to exist. Hydrogen can be delivered via pipeline just like natural gas. It is actually cheaper to move hydrogen around than electricity this way.
    - Turskarama 3y ago
      Except this can largely be handled by building industry which requires Hydrogen near to where the Hydrogen is generated. It can be done in large central facilities and requires _minimal_ movement of the Hydrogen itself. It's really not the same thing as a distribution system that needs to go essentially everywhere.
      - _hypx 3y ago
        Except you wouldn't build it like that. Even "on the spot" production will still significant hydrogen storage and distribution. It's not like you can place a giant tank right next to each piece of machinery. This are still going to be miles of piping. And it is cheaper to move hydrogen than electricity. People have an inverted understanding of the problem.
        Turskarama 3y ago
        Miles of piping is still less than hundreds of miles of piping. > And it is cheaper to move hydrogen than electricity Citation needed. Probably true across oceans, overland I'm doubtful.
        _hypx 3y ago
        https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2589004221014668 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S258900422... It is far cheaper to move fuel via pipelines than electrical wires. Your entire argument is just based on BEV propaganda. It is going to be systematically cheaper to go with hydrogen infrastructure than an all-electricity solution.
- LeoPanthera 3y ago
  > And if you don't have a home with a garage to charge your car? How do apartment dwellers charge their car? Hacker News is obsessed with "but sometimes". If an idea is obviously better, and improves life for the majority of people but sometimes brings new issues, then throw the whole thing out. It's a weird kind of technology conservatism that I am truly surprised to see here on HN, but I do keep seeing it, about all kinds of things.

LeoPanthera 3y ago

This is mad. Only BEVs can be refueled at home, and that is the absolute killer feature. People are obsessed with public chargers but most EV drivers never use them, or at least, only very rarely, on unusually long trips. I can't put more hydrogen, or gasoline, into a vehicle without getting it from somewhere else.

_hypx 3y ago
That is wrong. You can make hydrogen at home. You only need water and electricity. People are simply imagining advantages of BEVs. That said, there is not much need for home hydrogen production. It is better to have a more centralized refueling system. It is why gas stations replaces gas can deliveries.
- Turskarama 3y ago
  You can make hydrogen at home, what you cannot do is compress it and put it into your car without tens off thousands of dollars worth of equipment. Oh and if anything goes wrong it's an explosion hazard.
  - _hypx 3y ago
    Wrong again. With modern advancements, you can conceive of electromagnetic system that can do this at low cost and with no complex mechanisms. This is just another anti-hydrogen propaganda argument, and is based on willful ignorance of what is technologically possible. The fundamental issue isn't technology, but lack of need; Home refueling is just unnecessary once you have refueling stations everywhere.
    - LeoPanthera 3y ago
      > anti-hydrogen propaganda Have you seen your own comment history? Boy, I had no idea that hydrogen propaganda was a thing. I know you wouldn't admit it if you were but I wonder if anyone gets paid for doing this. I know the oil industry has been dumping enormous amount of money into trying to paint BEVs as Bad and Wrong, but it's another thing to see someone put so much time into it.