4 ms·

Norway and Sweden have tones of renewable energy, but relatively little intermittent energy. If the economics of H2 ever work, it'll only ever work in a grid th

Norway and Sweden have tones of renewable energy, but relatively little intermittent energy. If the economics of H2 ever work, it'll only ever work in a grid that's driven by intermittent energy sources (wind and solar). A hydro-driven grid does not need storage. Hell, if you have enough hydro, it can even be your storage. Not all of Europe has the geography to be able to cover their needs with just hydro.

Moldoteck 9mo ago
H2 economics work if you have constant oversupply. If your electrolyzer works only 50% of the time and storing is expensive, transporting is expensive and roundtrip efficiency is abysmal, it'll still cost a ton. Higher chances to use just cheaper gas generation because even LNG is cheaper than H2 saga.
- eigenspace 9mo ago
  Not a constant oversupply because then you'd never need the hydrogen in the first place. H2 economics (if they ever work) will work in a place where there's a seasonal gradient in energy production that's over too long a time horizon for batteries.
  - Moldoteck 9mo ago
    Per lazard, currently, merely 25% green H2 peakers would provide power for as expensive as worst nuclear project in US- Vogtle. So a mere 1/4 mix is as bad as a terribly mismanaged construction project. H2 economics for electricity are non existent. It will be used fo other sectors maybe, like fertilizers
    - eigenspace 9mo ago
      Look, I don't really want to be in the position of defending H2 here as I'm not particularly confident or optimistic about it, but I'm not really currently seeing a better alternative for seasonal energy shifting. If Germany was willing to build new nuclear power plants I'd be potentially in favour, but it's not going to to happen, so H2 will likely be the way, and it won't be cheap. That said, I also invite you to go look at cost estimates for batteries from just 5 years ago and compare them to today, or solar / wind cost estimates from 15 years ago. Those technologies have experienced significant reductions in cost due to scale and industrial learning. IMO the biggest problem with H2 is that similar sorts of learning / scaling processes simply won't even start until the grid evolves to a point where the seasonal demand shifting is actually required, but by then it's essentially too late. And there's not really any hope of governments kickstarting the learning process with artificial demand because people will make all sorts convincing arguments for why it's a stupid waste. So I guess we'll see what happens. Perhaps stuff like fertilizer and steel will help the technology matures before the grid needs it, or perhaps battery technology will surprise us again, or someone will figure out how to make flow batteries work or whatever. I'm not particularly confident in any of these technologies, but we'll just have to wait and see what happens I guess. Something *does* need to be done about storage though, even with all the complementary wind-solar and giant Lithium or Sodium battery installations, and all the HVDC you could want.
- lambdaone 9mo ago
  H2 economics don't work at all, and H2 is largely a fig-leaf for the fossil fuel industry. If you were to have an environment in which H2 would actually make economic sense, non-H2 storage and distribution systems would be even cheaper, and they can be added incrementally rather than needing a big bang, preventing investing in H2 from taking off in the first place.

Moldoteck 9mo ago

H2 economics work if you have constant oversupply. If your electrolyzer works only 50% of the time and storing is expensive, transporting is expensive and roundtrip efficiency is abysmal, it'll still cost a ton. Higher chances to use just cheaper gas generation because even LNG is cheaper than H2 saga.

eigenspace 9mo ago
Not a constant oversupply because then you'd never need the hydrogen in the first place. H2 economics (if they ever work) will work in a place where there's a seasonal gradient in energy production that's over too long a time horizon for batteries.
- Moldoteck 9mo ago
  Per lazard, currently, merely 25% green H2 peakers would provide power for as expensive as worst nuclear project in US- Vogtle. So a mere 1/4 mix is as bad as a terribly mismanaged construction project. H2 economics for electricity are non existent. It will be used fo other sectors maybe, like fertilizers
  - eigenspace 9mo ago
    Look, I don't really want to be in the position of defending H2 here as I'm not particularly confident or optimistic about it, but I'm not really currently seeing a better alternative for seasonal energy shifting. If Germany was willing to build new nuclear power plants I'd be potentially in favour, but it's not going to to happen, so H2 will likely be the way, and it won't be cheap. That said, I also invite you to go look at cost estimates for batteries from just 5 years ago and compare them to today, or solar / wind cost estimates from 15 years ago. Those technologies have experienced significant reductions in cost due to scale and industrial learning. IMO the biggest problem with H2 is that similar sorts of learning / scaling processes simply won't even start until the grid evolves to a point where the seasonal demand shifting is actually required, but by then it's essentially too late. And there's not really any hope of governments kickstarting the learning process with artificial demand because people will make all sorts convincing arguments for why it's a stupid waste. So I guess we'll see what happens. Perhaps stuff like fertilizer and steel will help the technology matures before the grid needs it, or perhaps battery technology will surprise us again, or someone will figure out how to make flow batteries work or whatever. I'm not particularly confident in any of these technologies, but we'll just have to wait and see what happens I guess. Something *does* need to be done about storage though, even with all the complementary wind-solar and giant Lithium or Sodium battery installations, and all the HVDC you could want.
lambdaone 9mo ago
H2 economics don't work at all, and H2 is largely a fig-leaf for the fossil fuel industry. If you were to have an environment in which H2 would actually make economic sense, non-H2 storage and distribution systems would be even cheaper, and they can be added incrementally rather than needing a big bang, preventing investing in H2 from taking off in the first place.