Why is the move twoards a hydrogen economy and fuel cell vehicle development so slow?

Question

A number of years ago I was researching the move towards a hygrogen economy and reviewed case studies of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles all over the world. I am no longer working in this area and wondered what was happening - I always imagined that there would at least be some private car trials (as opposed to bus trials), if not fully working cars on the market.

Answer 1

The main reason that there will never be a "hydrogen economy" is that even if fuel cells become economically viable, hydrogen will remain the worst possible medium for energy storage.  It has an extremely low energy density and is nearly impossible to store and transport.

Answer 2

The way I see it too many oil jobs will be lost too soon and our economy will suffer.  The idea is great and only the backyard mechanics will modify their cars.  It will soon be like moonshine where only the brave will get there.

Answer 3

Hydrogen technology is promising, but still a little way away from being sufficient in terms of the consumer. Once hydrogen becomes commercially viable, the infastrucure must be established. Fueling sations must be set-up, people must be convinced it is the best fuel and so on. All of this must happen at about the same time so no one goes broke or goes without fuel. This would be more difficult compared to other fuels like ethanol because it requires totally differnet technologies and methods. It may be a while.

Answer 4

There are four reasons as to why we are not yet to a hydrogen economy.

1) Lack of investment

2) Technological hurdles

3) Lack of infrastructure

4) More attractive and viable alternatives for consumers

You could make the argument that all of these are inter-related and to some extent, cause/effect.

As hydrocarbons have only recently become fairly cost-prohibitive for casual use, there has been little market demand.  As a result, there has been little investment to solve some of the significant technological hurdles we face.  Some of the hurdles include:

1) how to efficiently and effectively produce hydrogen using better methods than currently used to produce electricity/energy (generally hydrocarbon-based)

2) how to store hydrogen in a safe, efficient, and effective manner - especially as it relates to automobiles... imagine a train hitting a fuel cell vehicle and the resulting explosion leveling several blocks.

3) how to fund totally new infrastructure. hydrogen can't be transmitted efficiently over the same lines used for natural gas.  As a result, new conveyance, storage, and refueling infrastructure would need to be built.

4) how to fund this process so hydrogen doesn't cost the consumer four times what the comperable hydrocarbon currently does.

Until these issues are resolved, there won't be a clear way forward toward a hydrogen economy.

Answer 5

Obviously the oil companies have a vested interest in making sure this technology does not take off very quickly. The infrastructure to support these vehicles is not there – where do you go to fill up with hydrogen? If you open a hydrogen filling station, how many customers will you get? It’s a real chicken and egg situation. You also have to look seriously at the real impact of a hydrogen economy. Most hydrogen is produced by electrolysis of water, which takes electricity generated by nuclear or fossil fuel burning power stations – the pollution problem just moves further back down the supply chain. The hydrogen has to be stored and moved around efficiently and safely. The great hope is that burning hydrogen only produces clean water vapour, but as any global warming expert will tell you, water vapour is also a powerful green house gas. We would just be swapping one problem for another. Companies like BMW producing hydrogen powered cars are doing no more for the environment other than paying lip service to the carbon debate. Much worse is Boeing producing hydrogen powered aircraft that manufacture their highly effective, green house producing water vapour, at altitude just where you don’t want it.

Answer 6

first, its only slow in the U.S., its moving much faster in Germany, Japan, and Iceland.

The reason is that the oil industry views it as a threat, and are trying to stave off their eminent extinction.

Answer 7

There are several problems with hydrogen fueled cars.  One of the biggest ones is where to get the hydrogen fuel.  Currently we get most of our hydrogen from fossil fuels (mainly natural gas), and the process emits as much CO2 as directly burning the natural gas as fuel, and is less efficient.

If we found a good source of hydrogen (which is possible), the problem is then the lack of transportation and storage infrastructure.  You need a way to get the hydrogen to some sort of refueling station, and building such infrastructure would cost billions of dollars.

In the meantime, electric vehicle technology is develping rapidly, and can easily solve these problems.  By increasing our use of renewable energy we can make EVs as green as we want, and the infrastructure (power grid) is already in place.

Answer 8

Ha ha, you guys are so paranoid. The oil companies know fully well how much oil is left on the planet and they are Energy Companies above all else. They will not be left sitting on their hands when the last drop of oil is sucked from the Earth.

As for why Fuel cells are not in use and the hydrogen highway has a blocked off on ramp it is because even the giants in the automotive industries, Daimler and General Motors, can not make fuels cells work economically. They have both spent Billions of dollars into research and they are not much closer to an answer. The H2 atom is everywhere but it loves to attach itself to other atoms, like oxygen to make water. Detaching it is energy expensive. Honda uses solar power to make electricity to separate the atoms. A better use of the solar electricity is to power the car with it. duh.

Industrial hydrogen is made from natural gas but one of the byproducts is CO2, the green house gas we are trying to avoid with alternate fuels.