Fuel cells aren't as efficient as BEVs. Cleaning depends on how hydrogen is produced. A large amount of hydrogen is required to generate only a small amount of energy. As a result, cars would need huge tanks filled with hydrogen or would have a very short range between fuel stops.
This makes it necessary to build an extensive network of hydrogen fuel stations. The industry has been promoting hydrogen as a reliable next-generation fuel for powering cars, heating homes, and generating electricity. In fact, it may be worse for the climate than previously thought. Almost all jurisdictions that have objectively considered how to achieve zero emissions in all end uses have realized that the characteristics of hydrogen are necessary for all of these sectors to have zero emissions.
The hydrogen study showed that “the possibility of continuing to use fossil fuels with something additional added as a possible climate solution does not fully take into account emissions or make realistic assumptions about future costs,” he said in an email. A fuel cell generates electricity based on the natural attraction between hydrogen and oxygen molecules. It seems that there is still a long way to go before hydrogen fuel cell vehicles replace the internal combustion engine, if they ever do. Jack Brouwer is director of the National Fuel Cell Research Center at the University of California, Irvine.
Although today less than 0.1% of the world's production dedicated to hydrogen comes from the electrolysis of water, with the decrease in the costs of renewable electricity, in particular solar photovoltaic and wind energy, there is a growing interest in electrolytic hydrogen. And the same problems that create barriers to storage arise in distribution, since it is extremely dangerous and inefficient to distribute hydrogen on trucks that are headed to gas stations. In Europe, natural gas distribution companies plan to distribute a mixture of hydrogen and natural gas in the future, which does not make sense either, since, even if hydrogen were produced through electrolysis, the benefit from the point of view of the greenhouse effect would be minimal and would represent a significant risk of hydrogen leakage through pipes and joints that were designed to be hermetic to methane, but are not guaranteed to be hermetic To hydrogen. A decade ago, it seemed that there were two potential contenders to replace fossil fuel in personal transport: electricity and hydrogen.
The fuel cell process to convert hydrogen back into electricity is only 60% efficient, after which the same 5% is lost when driving the vehicle's engine as in a BEV. National Grid referred to its net zero emissions plan, which states that hydrogen will play an important role in the coming decades and that the production of hydrogen from renewable energy was the key. Correction: for my part, tens, if not hundreds of thousands, of people are using hydrogen right now to burn it as fuel in their cars in almost every country in the world. And while the natural gas industry has proposed capturing that carbon dioxide by creating what it promotes as emission-free, “blue hydrogen”, even that fuel, continues to emit more throughout its supply chain than simply burning natural gas, according to an article published Thursday in the journal Energy Science & Engineering by researchers from Cornell and Stanford universities.
While many experts agree that hydrogen could eventually play a role in storing energy or powering certain types of transportation, such as planes or long-distance trucks, in cases where the switch to battery-powered electric power may be a challenge, there is a growing consensus that a broader hydrogen economy that depends on natural gas could be harmful to the climate. .
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