I think it would be a great idea if--- there were a lot of hydrogen
>available in the environment. However, since hydrogen is quite
>reactive, it is tied up in compounds. It takes at least as much energy
>to release it from those compounds (like water) as what is obtained from
>burning hydrogen.
>
>If we get hydrogen from electrolyzing water, we have to run those
>powerplants overtime to generate the hydrogen. A step backwards in my mind. >
>If hydrogen is to be a future energy source, we need development of
>green ways to produce it, and money and effort should be going there,
>instead of gimmicks like hydrogen-burning automobiles. Heck, it isn't
>that hard to convert any engine to burn hydrogen- a lot like converting
>it to burn natural gas or LP. Isn't worth doing until we have a good
>source of hydrogen.
Hydrogen, as you point out, isn't an energy source. It's an energy storage and transport medium. It's a pretty good one, in spite of having the ability to leak out of nearly anything. But the problem is that people confuse it with a miracle energy source, which it isn't.
I wouldn't discount hydrogen power entirely, because it does allow us to make electricity on a large scale basis so it's efficient, then store and transport that potential energy in the form of hydrogen so it's easily made portable.
But I would discount a lot of the things some of the hydrogen advocates have been claiming.
--scott