A Coke can that has been dissolved in sodium hydroxide, revealing its internal plastic liner (photo credit- YouTube) TL&DR: destroying reduced metals/metalloids like aluminum and silicon is a really, really dumb way to make hydrogen. It is energetic vandalism, and generates unnecessary toxic emissions to generate a low value product. A shorter, more perfunctory version […]
Category: Hydrogen
Green Hydrogen as a Fuel is a Zombie Meme Idea
TL&DR summary: hydrogen as a fuel is a zombie idea. Thermodynamics and the properties of the molecule ensure that it will never be alive in economic terms. Hydrogen’s dirty present hasn’t meaningfully changed over the last 20 years, and hydrogen as a fuel isn’t a real decarbonization idea. However, while it will never be alive, […]
Green Steel = Green Iron
Image credit: Google Gemini What is “green steel”? Simple. It’s a misnomer. Iron in nature is rarely found alone. We mine its oxides as iron ores. These oxides need to be chemically reduced (gaining electrons = reduction) to take the Fe+2 and Fe+3 ions in the iron oxides, to Fe metal. And the oxygen needs […]
Will Green Hydrogen Save the Cement Industry?
Image credit: Google Gemini TL&DR summary: hydrogen can be used in cement production as a natural gas replacement, but that doesn’t solve the entire CO2 emissions of cement production. There are other problems like the lack of hydrogen flame radiance, but the deal killer is the cost per tonne of CO2 emissions averted. Hydrogen may […]
Can You Put Hydrogen in Natural Gas Pipelines? Ya, but…
Ya-but the rabbit, courtesy of Google Gemini TL&DR Summary: sure, you can re-use an existing gas pipeline to carry some quantity of hydrogen at some pressure, and do so safely. How much pressure and under what circumstances and operating conditions, and how much energy can be delivered via that repurposed pipe, and whether or not […]
Ammonia- “Ship of Fuels”? or Fuel of Fools?
image credit: Microsoft Create TL&DR: ammonia is a toxic and corrosive gas, and using it as a fuel aboard ships fails the 1st principle of safety in design. It is an insane idea, and those pushing this toxic idea should give their heads a serious shaking. I am a chemical engineer with many decades of […]
Where Does Green Hydrogen Fit?
Image credit: Google Gemini If you know my writing even a little, you’ll know where I stand on this issue. It’s as simple as my meme, but my many articles (especially this one) explain why, in detail. Those articles come with analysis and references and the comments of many experts in the field as an […]
How Green is Green Hydrogen on a Lifecycle Basis?
Image source: Google Gemini. Gemini won’t draw people, i.e. sketchy looking men in business suits, so I asked it to draw “a robot similar to Bender from Futurama”, and that did the trick. Worried about copyright? Suggest you talk to Google. TL&DR summary: a recent paper published by Dutch researchers in the journal Nature Energy […]
The Case Against Hydrogen Trucks
This article is a companion to my recent article about why I think battery electric trucks are the future of freight: Electric Trucks- the Future of Freight TL&DR: hydrogen trucks are largely just a retreat position for people who previously thought hydrogen cars were going to be a thing. They won’t be. There is no […]
E-Methane: Exergy Destroyer, On Steroids
TL&DR: grinding up electricity to make heating fuel is just a way to waste energy and capital, by destroying exergy (the potential to do thermodynamic work). It’s obviously worse than just making hydrogen. It is wasteful, and wasteful means expensive. It also means higher emissions than if you did something sensible, like feeding a heatpump. […]