Peak Oil and why hydrogen won’t help us much (Long post)

[playerfl]

"I would really like to see my claims here refuted. The H2 economy is a really appealing thought. I just don't see where the energy is coming from. I'm fairly sure that the 1100 Twh for the UK really can't be shrunken very far, it's mostly physics."

there will be hydrogen projects and conservation efforts, but they will be bandaids. Either we got a whole new source of energy or we have a steadily declining standard of living.

[Il_Mostro]

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That's like saying, "it's really difficult to cure AIDS, so we should just give up." It makes no sense. That's not how science works.


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I wanted to get back to this for a second. Your parallell doesn't really work.
Instead, what I'm saying is more like:
Ok, we have 10 ways to find the cure for AIDS, out of those, 3 has been proved to need us to alter the laws of physics. So let's concentrate on the other 7.

I'm not saying I have proved that the hydrogen economy needs us to alter the laws of physics, but a lot of the problems with it is directly linked to the very nature on H2, and that we cannot solve.
Of course, again, if we can find a source of infinite electricity we are home safe. I just don't want to bet the future of the industrialized world on that hope.

[Il_Mostro]

I agree with you, to a point. I'm not enough of a physicist to assess zero-point energy (at least i think so, the little I have read about it talks about quantum-level phenomenon and such things and that's out of my league). However, I cannot see that solving our immidiate problems. Sure, 100 years from now, maybe we are all driving cars powered by H2 that is being generated from zero-point, or fusion. But getting there is by no means automatic, if it at all can be done. And even if it can be done, we still have to get there (to 2100) without crashing.