Quote:
Originally Posted by jadnashuanh
Chicken/egg problem. People won't buy FC powered cars if they can't get fuel, except where government arm twisting has gone on, hydrogen fuel stations are very few and far between. You can't ship liquid hydrogen very far economically, so you need a local source, and who is going to invest to install them so more cars/trucks will be able to use them?
Hydrogen may 'burn' clean (releasing an electron, heat, and water as a byproduct), but it still takes a lot of energy to break away from whatever it is combined with (maybe the largest source is water), but then, once you have it, it must be compressed, and that takes a fair amount of energy, too. Maybe the best use of hydrogen is fusion, but doing that so that it is reliable and a net source of energy is still a ways away (look at the research being done at Lawrence Livermore and elsewhere).
Fuel cells are getting more efficient at what they do and more reliable, but it all comes back to where are you going to get your energy from. Hydrogen refueling stations are still a ways away from being as common as a plug, or a gas station and until then, except in very limited markets where you have access to the required fuel, nobody's going to buy one.
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TY for sharing your thoughts.
I think you note several challenges that need to be overcome. No question in that regard. I think, however, that every one of those challenges is being considered by someone as an opportunity, not an impediment.
I'm sure getting a ship to the Moon was at one point was fraught with things that needed to be overcome, very hard to solve problems. Ditto commercial flight or even mass appeal automobiles. And yet, we've sent a men to the Moon, millions of folks fly around the planet annually, and cars are ubiquitous and almost as important to daily life in many places as air, food and water.
All the best.