Does water vapour cause more of a greenhouse effect than CO2? If so, how does hydrogen power help the Glblwrmg

Question

since the product of hydrogen fuel cells is water.

Answer 1

Hydrogen is not an energy source.  It is a way of TEMPORARILY storing energy that is produced by other energy sources like coal fired electric plants or gasoline engines.  

The truth has come out lately regarding hydrogen powered cars.  The don't get better mileage than traditionally powered economy cars--they simply cost a lot more and require much more maintenance.

While hydrogen doesn't produce any carbon dioxide when it oxidizes, whatever seperated the hydrogen from the oxygen probably did.

Answer 2

The release of water vapor is not a prolem because the natural "water cycle" is quite powerful and keeps water in balance between the Earth and the air.

The "carbon cycle" is much more fragile.

Look at this graph.

http://scrippsco2.ucsd.edu/graphics_gall...

The little squiggles are nature doing its' thing. CO2 falls a bit during summer when plants are active, and rises during the winter. The huge increase is us, burning fossil fuels.  The natural carbon cycle buried carbon in fossil fuels over a very long time, little bit by little bit. We dig them up and burn them, real fast.  That's a problem.

Mt Zion is correct that, by themselves hydrogen cars solve nothing.  They need to be used as part of a system, where nuclear, solar, or wind power is used to make hydrogen.

Answer 3

Yes it does.. MANY, MANY times more.  However, the amount released from hydrogen power generation will be so insignificant it will be a non-factor.

Answer 4

Water causes most of the greenhouse effect but only a very small part of global warming. The reason is that the amount of water in the near surface atmosphere is controlled primarily by the temperature of the oceans, which is quite stable. Adding water vapor to the atmosphere near the surface just causes a bit more rain. Carbon dioxide has no such control.

Carbon Dioxide causes almost 90% of global warming and using hydrogen can reduce the amount of carbon dioxide released, depending upon how it is generated.

I answered a very similar question earlier that explains the difference between the greenhouse effect and global warming. Here is that answer:

This is a very tricky question to answer in a way that will leave you with an accurate picture of what is happening as evidenced by the answers so far, which are all correct or at least partly correct but that are answering slightly different very closely related questions.

There are two separate issues:

1) What are the greenhouse gases?

2) What are the greenhouse gases that are responsible for the recent global warming?

Just looking at the gasses that are responsible for the greenhouse effect in general the rankings are:

Water vapor, which causes about 36–70%;

Carbon dioxide (CO2), which causes 9–26%;

Methane (CH4), which causes 4–9%; and

Ozone, which causes 3–7%

There are a number of other greenhouse gases that while not making much contribution to the total greenhouse effect do make an important contribution to global warming.

If you look at which of these gases are causing global warming then the ranking is:

Carbon dioxide (CO2), which causes 87%;

Aerosols, which causes -64% (negative because they reduce warming)

Methane (CH4), which causes 23%;

Halocarbons, which causes 21%

Ozone (near the surface), which causes 18%

N2O, which causes 10%

Water vapor (stratospheric), which causes 5%

So here is the answer, water vapor is the primary greenhouse gas but carbon dioxide is the primary cause of global warming.