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I was curious how much fossil fuel lobbyists are pushing hydrogen (they keep assuming electricity is free but somehow not competitive with hydrogen). It’s incr

by bertil 3y ago

I was curious how much fossil fuel lobbyists are pushing hydrogen (they keep assuming electricity is free but somehow not competitive with hydrogen). It’s increasingly starting to look like they anticipate having plants synthesize methane in remote areas (maybe near methane wells) and possibly have higher productivity from those setups than people would anticipate if they looked closely at the hydrolysis performance.

defrost 3y ago
Hydrogen is also being looked at hard by those who mine 800 million tonnes per annum of iron ore to meet the world steel demand. That's a lot of annual fuel use. See (for example): https://fortescue.com/what-we-do/green-energy-research/green-hydrogen https://fortescue.com/what-we-do/green-energy-research/green... where you're looking at serious physical engineers dealing with moving Mt Fuji magnitude problems of scale with billions in the budget. Contrary wise, see also: https://www.riotinto.com/news/releases/2021/Rio-Tinto-Teams-Up-with-Caterpillar-for-Zero-Emissions-Autonomous-Trucks https://www.riotinto.com/news/releases/2021/Rio-Tinto-Teams-... https://www.riotinto.com/news/releases/2022/Rio-Tinto-purchases-first-battery-electric-trains-for-the-Pilbara https://www.riotinto.com/news/releases/2022/Rio-Tinto-purcha... these being some of the largest, longest, heaviest trains globally.
- bertil 3y ago
  I do not doubt that those trains will be powered by electricity (solar or wind: no one will object to either near a mine or along tracks). Similarly, if they need hydrogen as a reduction agent, they will produce it locally — i.e., not ask anyone trying to capture CO2 in the air or buy from it far away. No one is moving smelting facilities, so they’ll setup solar panels and wind farms around those. That’s why the argument of making those far away, in place known for nothing but sand and oil fields always felt disingenuous.
  - defrost 3y ago
    > no one will object to either near a mine or along tracks > in place known for nothing but sand and oil fields Errr, just as a reality check, almost all mines impact people in some form or another, often indigenous people who never adopted advanced western lifestyles that they are directly impacted by with mines, pipelines, climate effects, etc. FWiW I'm making that statement as someone with decades as an exploration geophysicist, backend developer of https://www.spglobal.com/marketintelligence/en/campaigns/metals-mining https://www.spglobal.com/marketintelligence/en/campaigns/met... and someone who has negotiated on environmental impact statements with traditional landowners. In the US the proposed $64 billion half century supply Resolution Copper mine will impact people: https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/ceraweek-rio-tinto-keeps-working-build-indigenous-support-resolution-mine-2023-03-07 https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/ceraweek-rio-tin... despite being somewhere that many on HN would describe as "empty", "barren", "uninhabited", etc. Rio Tinto has stretched it's credibility with traditional owners in recent years: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/aug/03/rio-tintos-alleged-underpayment-of-traditional-owners-of-wa-mine-area-sparks-calls-for-widespread-review https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/aug/03/rio-t... https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/may/24/a-year-on-from-the-juukan-gorge-destruction-aboriginal-sacred-sites-remain-unprotected https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/may/24/a-yea...
    - bertil 3y ago
      The mines and the tracks absolutely do. Setting up energy generation to power it on site, rather than drag more energy transport that cuts through more of the local ecosystem, doesn’t.
      - defrost 3y ago
        > Setting up energy generation to power it on site .. doesn’t Rethink that carefully - how many acres for an open pit mine? Now, how many acres for solar panels, etc. to generate power to dig that mine? If someone objects to landuse for the mine, then solar power is going to at least double the amount of land used. I'm remaining neutral here on the ethics - but don't kid yourself that there's magically no additional land clearing from onsite solar.
LorenPechtel 3y ago
It seems to me that these guys are taking the SpaceX approach--don't look for what's best, look for what's the cheapest way to get the job done. That's why almost all orbital rockets have used hydrolox for at least the upper stage but SpaceX uses kerolox. Hydrolox has substantially better performance but brings with it a whole bunch of handling headaches. SpaceX uses a lot more fuel to deliver the same mass to orbit--but fuel is a tiny percentage of the total cost of a space launch. The penalty for not using hydrolox when you're going beyond low orbit grows even greater--but SpaceX is figuring that with Starship they can ship up fuel separately and still get more throw weight per dollar. Even now, note how a fully recovered Falcon Heavy launch is cheaper than an expended Falcon 9 launch even though it uses 3x the fuel.

by bertil 3y ago

defrost 3y ago

Hydrogen is also being looked at hard by those who mine 800 million tonnes per annum of iron ore to meet the world steel demand. That's a lot of annual fuel use. See (for example): https://fortescue.com/what-we-do/green-energy-research/green-hydrogen https://fortescue.com/what-we-do/green-energy-research/green... where you're looking at serious physical engineers dealing with moving Mt Fuji magnitude problems of scale with billions in the budget. Contrary wise, see also: https://www.riotinto.com/news/releases/2021/Rio-Tinto-Teams-Up-with-Caterpillar-for-Zero-Emissions-Autonomous-Trucks https://www.riotinto.com/news/releases/2021/Rio-Tinto-Teams-... https://www.riotinto.com/news/releases/2022/Rio-Tinto-purchases-first-battery-electric-trains-for-the-Pilbara https://www.riotinto.com/news/releases/2022/Rio-Tinto-purcha... these being some of the largest, longest, heaviest trains globally.

bertil 3y ago
I do not doubt that those trains will be powered by electricity (solar or wind: no one will object to either near a mine or along tracks). Similarly, if they need hydrogen as a reduction agent, they will produce it locally — i.e., not ask anyone trying to capture CO2 in the air or buy from it far away. No one is moving smelting facilities, so they’ll setup solar panels and wind farms around those. That’s why the argument of making those far away, in place known for nothing but sand and oil fields always felt disingenuous.
- defrost 3y ago
  > no one will object to either near a mine or along tracks > in place known for nothing but sand and oil fields Errr, just as a reality check, almost all mines impact people in some form or another, often indigenous people who never adopted advanced western lifestyles that they are directly impacted by with mines, pipelines, climate effects, etc. FWiW I'm making that statement as someone with decades as an exploration geophysicist, backend developer of https://www.spglobal.com/marketintelligence/en/campaigns/metals-mining https://www.spglobal.com/marketintelligence/en/campaigns/met... and someone who has negotiated on environmental impact statements with traditional landowners. In the US the proposed $64 billion half century supply Resolution Copper mine will impact people: https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/ceraweek-rio-tinto-keeps-working-build-indigenous-support-resolution-mine-2023-03-07 https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/ceraweek-rio-tin... despite being somewhere that many on HN would describe as "empty", "barren", "uninhabited", etc. Rio Tinto has stretched it's credibility with traditional owners in recent years: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/aug/03/rio-tintos-alleged-underpayment-of-traditional-owners-of-wa-mine-area-sparks-calls-for-widespread-review https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/aug/03/rio-t... https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/may/24/a-year-on-from-the-juukan-gorge-destruction-aboriginal-sacred-sites-remain-unprotected https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/may/24/a-yea...
  - bertil 3y ago
    The mines and the tracks absolutely do. Setting up energy generation to power it on site, rather than drag more energy transport that cuts through more of the local ecosystem, doesn’t.
    - defrost 3y ago
      > Setting up energy generation to power it on site .. doesn’t Rethink that carefully - how many acres for an open pit mine? Now, how many acres for solar panels, etc. to generate power to dig that mine? If someone objects to landuse for the mine, then solar power is going to at least double the amount of land used. I'm remaining neutral here on the ethics - but don't kid yourself that there's magically no additional land clearing from onsite solar.

LorenPechtel 3y ago

It seems to me that these guys are taking the SpaceX approach--don't look for what's best, look for what's the cheapest way to get the job done. That's why almost all orbital rockets have used hydrolox for at least the upper stage but SpaceX uses kerolox. Hydrolox has substantially better performance but brings with it a whole bunch of handling headaches. SpaceX uses a lot more fuel to deliver the same mass to orbit--but fuel is a tiny percentage of the total cost of a space launch. The penalty for not using hydrolox when you're going beyond low orbit grows even greater--but SpaceX is figuring that with Starship they can ship up fuel separately and still get more throw weight per dollar. Even now, note how a fully recovered Falcon Heavy launch is cheaper than an expended Falcon 9 launch even though it uses 3x the fuel.