Europe's ludicrous hydrogen bet

[@DWPlanetA]

Do you think it's the right move to focus on hydrogen big time?

[@theunknownunknowns5168]

Norway have been taking out hydrogen refueling stations and replacing them with ev charging. California the only state in the US to try hydrogen refueling are getting rid of them. The environment and common sense need better b̶r̶i̶b̶e̶ lobbying skills.

[@Apollorion]

It just need medium attention. We should focus on natrium battery production (don't become dependent on lithium) & enlarging the capacity (both to transport & store) of the electricity grid.

[@albex8484]

Hydrogen is the best way to store energy at the moment. We'll need it for sure. There is more then enough energy(sun/wind/hydro), only storage is a problem. Hydrogen is like gas. The scheme's at 5:00 are also wrong. This is pressuming the grid can handle such loads. Imagine a whole street off EV's being charged at night.... no sun and no big powerlines.

[@DWPlanetA]

@@Apollorion Hey there! Thanks for sharing your view. We actually looked at lithium as a resource more in detail here 👉kzbin.info/www/bejne/nXK9h2SLqZt3etU and dove deeper into the challenges of the grid in this one 👉 kzbin.info/www/bejne/q16npHericiYitE Let us know what you think ✨

[@rasputozen]

NO

[@tommclean7410]

I like the champagne metaphor: expensive and only for special occasions. Michael Liebreich also has a good description: H2 is like a Swiss army knife but you only use a Swiss army knife when the tool you actually need is not available. His hydrogen ladder is handy too.

[@creedreaming]

Wait what?! A CDU-lead European Commission is prone to lobbying?! Never thought that was possible :o /s

[@_yonas]

Especially von der Leyen! Not like she was kicked out of German politics because of her lobby scandals! /s

[@dererik9070]

Und die sind sogar noch ok im Vergleich mit Friedrich Merz (Kanzlerkandidat in Deutschland)

[@Andreas-hh9yg]

CDU/CSU and FDP are for sure the most corrupt parties here in Germany. But they get elected in positions of power all the time by the voters. Embarrassing.

[@13Berzerker]

Nie mehr CDU !👎 Nico Semsrott : Brüssel sehen und sterben 👍 #NieWiederCDU

[@koljaleffek7290]

the mafia is silently giggeling in the corner.

[@LouisChen-wh4fi]

I am not European. I am actually an Australian. I also see a lot of parallels in this video. Fossil companies have a big say in energy strategy and often just end up serving its own interest. What a pity that bureaucrats just get pulled along for the ride.

[@DWPlanetA]

Hey Louis! We actually looked at Australia a while ago and also tackle the fossil fuel industry´s lobbying. Check it out and let us know what you think 👉kzbin.info/www/bejne/q3e5YYqXf7Gdm68

[@LouisChen-wh4fi]

​@@DWPlanetA Thank you. I've seen that previously and I should say, sadly as it may be, the Australian political system is quite different from European and hence Australia became such a climate change laggard......

[@martin_93]

yeah, Germany is sadly under huge influency by Russian KGB agents and also lobby connected with fossil fuel companys, like Linde and Gazprom. Working with Nordstream 2, after Putin anexed Crimea is prove, that they dont give a damm about anything else but money :(

[@nestserau]

Thinking that oil and gas companies can just be pushed aside for the energy transition is the biggest dilusion. They for one have the biggest infrastructure and capital to make it happen.

[@gzcwnk]

@@nestserau except a) they dont want it to happen and b) their infrastructure is mostly of no use, in fact it is a stranded asset. If we dont push them aside (if slowly and in a measured way) they wont let the transition occur willingly.

[@capoeirastronaut]

You miss the biggest factors: steel production, & cement. Together 7% of emissions. And they need hydrogen to decarbonise.

[@adblocker276]

Nobody accused DW of being unbiased.

[@alanjenkins1508]

Actually Iron and Steel are 7% on their own. Cement is about 3%.

[@yo2trader539]

The long-distance heavy duty trucks and buses that currently use diesel will probably shift to hydrogen too.

[@armanrashid5356]

They should produce their in house hydrogen from the green electricity.

[@annemariesmith5459]

It's going to happen. They know it. Hydrogen is happening world-wide.

[@philiptaylor7902]

This is a well presented and objective review of this subject. I like the quote about hydrogen being the “champagne” of renewables, great but not for every day.

[@DWPlanetA]

Hey Philip! Glad to hear that you liked the video. We post videos like this one every Friday. Subscribe to be notified ✨

[@kylejohnson6775]

Exactly. It's super useful for certain thing, like fertilizer and steel making, but it absolute cannot replace methane as an electricity producer, because it's fundamentally a useful chemical and an energy storage medium. Not a fuel to replace oil or methane (natural gas). If you're burning hydrogen for pretty much anything, it's a giant waste and not practical.

[@nestserau]

Objective? They don’t even mention nuclear power is the best way to produce lots of cheap and climate-neutral hydrogen. Definitely the most skewed DW video I’ve watched.

[@philiptaylor7902]

@@nestserau Hi Nestserau, you might want to think that statement through. Nuclear is a very expensive way of making electricity. We already see times when there is so much renewables generated that grids have to pay to dispose of it or pay to turn off the wind/solar sites. This is the electricity that it would make sense to use for hydrogen hydrolysis.

[@nestserau]

@@philiptaylor7902 Nuclear is cheaper than wind. Only solar is even more cheap.

[@richdobbs6595]

The realistic use of green hydrogen is for cases where it is directly useful - ammonia fertilizer production, desulfurization in oil refining, and non-coal based steel production. If you can't do it there, no point in considering it for transportation and heating usage.

[@annemariesmith5459]

Hyting in Germany for heating. It's going to happen.

[@richdobbs6595]

@@annemariesmith5459 Why? Batteries with heat pumps are more efficient for renewal energy.

[@OptimalOwl]

@@richdobbs6595 Batteries are ruinously expensive to use for large scale power storage, perhaps even more so than H2 gas. Storing large amounts of electricity is something you should do as little of as you possibly can, because 70+% of the energy you're trying to store usually gets wasted in the process. I think that's one (of many) excellent reasons to favour reliable forms of power generation, where we can adjust production on a moment-to-moment basis to meet consumption - i.e. fossil power, nuclear power and hydro power. That way, we can mostly skip the extravagantly wasteful extra step of storing and retrieving the electricity we've generated.

[@richdobbs6595]

@@OptimalOwl I sort of agree. Compared to late 20th century costs of grid electricity, batteries are really expensive. But compared to running a generator for an off grid homestead, batteries are cheap enough currently, so that folks don't pay for running power lines and paying connection charges. OTOH, industrial processes have been customized by us engineers to rely on cheap, 24x7 power in a situation where everything is so cheap that you have to run 24x7 to be able to pay for your capital. If climate change is real and governments start implementing capture of externalities, than folks will revisit a lot of current assumptions. Batteries will be part of the mix, but so will storage tanks, as well as processes that are run in a batch mode to make use of cheap energy.

[@OptimalOwl]

@@richdobbs6595 > "If climate change is real [...]" Real, but a lesser order of problem than the loss of cost-effective energy. > "[...] and governments start implementing capture of externalities" According to most of the models of climate and economy, the climate sin taxes we already have are much higher than Pigouvian optimum levels. And, honestly, I'm not sure that internalizing externalities is even the best way to go here. Since energy is something that we all need, and since usually there are no reasonable alternatives to emitting CO2, I think it makes more sense to limit ourselves to disincentivizing climate sins that are reasonably preventable. In very poor countries that are just barely capable of having energy at all, we should probably just let them use whatever they're capable of having. Some of them will die from brown coal smoke, but probably fewer than would die from animal dung burnt inside their homes and from a lack of water treatment and medicine. And in time, cheap energy may perhaps enable them to develop economically and aspire to greater and cleaner things. In medium-poor countries, we might tax brown coal specifically, to make them switch to cleaner fossil power (or whatever else makes sense in their economic context.) And in the wealthiest countries, though fossil power remains the most reasonable alternative for most transport applications, we can probably usually afford to use nuclear- and hydro power for electricity.

[@zapfanzapfan]

Hydrogen is important for fertilizer and explosives (today the ammonia used is made with natural gas), steel is another use (replacing coke made from coal). Using it for cars or home heating is just a waste of time. EVs, home batteries, heat pumps and thermal storage is much more efficient.

[@Jakob_DK]

Yes, and saying hydrogen should not be used for industrial purposes because EV are better than hydrogen cars is very strange.

[@MrToradragon]

Use of hydrogen in steel making can be problematic as it can cause the final product to be too brittle. IMHO It would be better to replace coke with charcoal, given already small energy consumption pert kg of steel it could be economically viable.

[@zapfanzapfan]

@@MrToradragon The switch from charcoal to coke more than 200 years ago was what really set off the industrial revolution. There is not enough forest to go back.

[@Angel24Marin]

​@@MrToradragon hydrogen is only used in the reduction phase of the ore to iron. Then it is remelted with other methods (arc furnace). Any remaining hydrogen outgas then. The same happens with the traditional method. Get reduced with coke and then is melted again. And in this phase is when carbon gets added. It's easier to remove the hydrogen due to his tendency to outgas than to fine-tune the carbon content.

[@gregorymalchuk272]

EVs, home batteries, and heat pumps don't make sense when your renewable electricity costs 57 euro cents per kWh.

[@donnairn3419]

Hydrogen production uses too much electricity to be used as an energy source. Fertiliser or steel production may be sensible

[@capri4682]

And possibly aviation as well

[@piotrwojdelko1150]

Poland wants to build power plant but I'm not sure about long term startegy .They discovered Uranium in Poland and even deviced a program how to neutralize it .Poland is hesitating too long.Poland has been planning in for few dacades and our economy is based on carbon from Mozambique .We have never had power plants .I would prefer Hydrogen power plant

[@VayporWayve]

when ITER actually functions with net gain, we will not have an issue getting the energy needed to manufacture hydrogen.

[@denisk886]

@@capri4682 highly flamable hydrogen into airplane? cmon renewable fuels are better option to airplanes without need to change anything on them ...for example Neste finnish company

[@SmilingNinja]

Yup! 50 kWh to generate a kg of hydrogen through electrolysis which will only give you 33 kWh. If the electricity source isn't clean, it'll also make hydrogen a dirty fuel indirectly.

[@kierank01]

Hydrogen is the last piece of the puzzle We need to max out the electricity infrastructure, and create electric hydrogen only on demand, where current fossil hydrogen is manufactured/used Hydrogen transportation is one of the most ridiculous idea ever

[@auspiciouslywild]

It might make sense in transportation for some very niche cases. Like longer range ferries that travel between two fixed destinations, if hydrogen can be made economically on-site at one of those locations. Medium range airplanes might also be a possibility. But I’m also very sceptical. It’s not a good fuel. If you could efficiently capture some carbon and combine it with the hydrogen to make methane, or even a liquid hydrocarbon, that’d be better for fuel storage. Or combine with nitrogen to make ammonia. Easy to store but rather toxic so not ideal

[@bovo698]

That's what I thought, Hydrogen should be produced for surplus green energy to be used when this energy is not available. At night for solar panels for example. So use H2 only as a battery. For this we wouldn't need to transport it anywhere

[@Axolotroll]

While this obviously has shortcomings that were definitely witnessed in like 1937, hydrogen could still be moved around by just filling a large gas bag with it and putting propellers on it.

[@zen1647]

Australia hopes to export green Hydrogen to EU. That's a worthwhile transport scenario.

[@aenorist2431]

There are at least a dozen better energy storage systems that do not have abysmal rates of return. Heat storage in sand, rock, water or salt. Battery storage, both grid stabilizing lithium and load shifting flow batteries. Hydrogen wastes so much of the input energy, it cannot seriously be called energy storage. Its an energy wastage process.

[@Menelvagorothar]

So, Hydrogen is hugely important, but there are a lot of false dilemmas in the debates. With a grid full of renewables, we will need seasonal and long-duration energy storage within our electric grids. Battery systems are turning out to be very good for leveling out the day-to-day fluctuations, however the winter-summer cycle has to be solved too in order to fully decarbonize. Most energy storage technology reviews I found cite just two possible technologies to achieve this: hydrogen and compressed air energy storage systems. The problem with hydrogen is its long duration storage, which is currently a topic of scientific reaserch, salt rock caverns and lined rock caverns being the main proposed solutions - both would allow to store hydrogen for long periods efficiently. The curent cryogenic refrigeration methods require just too much energy and make the whole process highy inefficient. Plus research is being led for the increase of efficicency of electrolisers, plus gas turbines soley used for hydrogen are being developed. Hydrogen is of course very inefficent for having a very widespread use (like for cars or heating), but is essential in order to achieve long-duration energy storage. Without that, Europe will have to continue to burn natural gas in the winters and full decarbonization will not be achieved. Also, hydrogen could be used to replace fossil fuels in some energy intensive industries that require very high temperatures, such that heat pumps just cannot provide - that's mostly concrete and steel manufacturing. All those resons are very good arguments to pour huge financial resources into hydrogen research, especially in order to achieve its efficient long duration storage in massive underground tanks or caverns, and to advance the efficency of electrolysers, fuel cells and hydrogen turbines.

[@anotherelvis]

So hydrogen research is fine, but there is no need to build pipelines?

[@FabioCapela]

Pumped hydro is better than hydrogen for energy storage, and there are more than enough places where it can be built to cover all of Europe's seasonal energy shifting needs. Integrating the power grids also help a lot. If it's cloudy in Spain but sunny in Italy you could just shift renewable energy from Italy to Spain. Brazil and China are two examples of very large interconnected grids where extra power generation can cover for a power deficit hundreds, or even thousands, of kilometers away, and if two developing countries could build it Europe certainly can too. You can also just build excess renewable generation. The seasonal issue with renewables isn't that generation stops, but rather that it gets reduced and/or consumption increases. If you build enough renewable generation to cover the worst case scenario you don't need seasonal storage, just intra-day load shifting, and even if you don't reach that any excess generation already cuts the storage requirements. And with solar panels and wind turbines steadily falling in price, building excess capacity is becoming increasingly feasible.

[@gregorymalchuk272]

Nuclear is the only viable way to decarbonize electricity. It is safer than any other source and has the lowest lifecycle carbon impact of any energy source.

[@tonglu3699]

It’s like watching a bunch of management consultants trying to manage the manhattan project.

[@andreafasolini8087]

interesting. Apart from criticizing the commission initiatve and targets, what is the alternative then?

[@philipperapaccioli2868]

If only 0,2% of hydrogen currently being consumed in Europe is green hydrogen, that is because it is far more expensive to produce than grey hydrogen. Large industrial and energy groups and the EU are hiding behind green hydrogen so that no efforts are made to transition away from cheap fossil fuels. No one will use green hydrogen unless they are forced to. We currently do not tax kerosene for commercial aviation even for domestic or European flights. We do not tax heavy oil used in international commercial shipping. We have always favored the cheapest energy source (Russian gas, coal for electrical production) regardless of the environmental impact. Airlines are telling us, keep flying, tomorrow we'll be green, we will be flying on green hydrogen. Yet Boeing is not even studying the possibility of building a hydrogen plane and Airbus is only pretending to. The energy density of highly compressed, liquid cooled hydrogen is simply too low. According to IATA, ''Liquid hydrogen fuel has a lower volumetric density than kerosene. It is estimated that to complete a given mission, despite the aircraft requiring a lower mass of fuel, the space that this fuel would occupy would be around 4 times larger than that of kerosene''. Hydrogen also requires heavy pressurized tanks, and needs to be cooled to -280 degrees. Aviation was borne with kerosene, and will disappear when oil runs out. Car companies are telling us to keep buying combustion engines promising that soon enough they will be burning clean e-fuels, when these are very expensive to manufacture, so will only be used in Formula 1. So in 2030, we are to believe that our nice multi-national companies will have transitioned to expensive green hydrogen, but in the meantime, they'll keep using plenty of cheap fossil fuels if you don't mind. But it's a promise, at some point they will definitely transition to expensive green hydrogen, because capitalists care more about the environment than they care about their profits....

[@FabioCapela]

When thinking about hydrogen weight you need to think also about the weight of the hydrogen tank. A tank capable of storing hydrogen at the high compression rates needed for it to be useful as a vehicle fuel is very heavy, much more than a regular fuel tank holding the same energy of just about any liquid fuel, and the difference is large enough to not only nullify the advantage hydrogen should have in gravimetric energy density but even to make it lose, and by far, to fossil fuels. As for the cooling, that is only if you are storing liquid hydrogen. Essentially you can choose if you want to store hydrogen at temperatures close to absolute zero or at pressures that require extremely heavy tanks that would explode like a bomb if they were ever damaged; it's one or the other, you don't need both.

[@philipperapaccioli2868]

@@orionbetelgeuse1937 Aviation was born with kerosene and will die with kerosene. No other energy source is dense and light enough to replace it. e-fuels are and will remain very expensive. Ground transportation can largely be electrified. Shipping can transition to green hydrogen when oil runs out. Steel production can transition from coal to green hydrogen if there is the political will as green hydrogen will be far more expensive. Heating and cooling can be electrified. Fertilizers can be made from green hydrogen when oil and gas start to run out. Chemical industry can transition to green hydrogen, plant based chemicals provided we reduce our consumption of meat.

[@philipperapaccioli2868]

@@orionbetelgeuse1937 Yes German WWII synthetic fuels were made from coal. Very environmentally friendly. The production of agricultural methanol and ethanol are heavily subsidized and leads farmers to import agricultural waste from South America and Asia to make even more agricultural methane and ethanol. You can not feed a warming planet and produce agricultural methanol and ethanol in significant quantities at the same time. Two thirds of the world's electricity is currently made from gas and coal (including a fair share of German electricity). Iron ore reduction for steel making requires the use of large amounts of coal. If the world ever starts producing significant amounts of expensive green hydrogen, made from hydrolysis of water using solar and wind to produce the electricity, that green hydrogen should be used to replace coal in iron ore reduction for steel making, powering ships across the seas, and as a substitute for coal and gas as a source of always on electrical production. When gas runs out this century, green hydrogen will be needed to manufacture fertilizers. Giving a good conscience to holiday travelers flying thousands of miles or Porsche buyers is not a priority. And right now, non existent green hydrogen is being used by industry to give people a good conscience so that they change nothing in their consumption habits: flying, driving, heating with fossil fuels, and mass consumption.

[@philipperapaccioli2868]

​@@orionbetelgeuse1937 You obviously have a good understanding of the chemistry involved, but do not seem to have or pretend not to have a good understanding of the economics behind agricultural methane production in Germany. It is massively subsidized as the electricity that farmers produce from the methane is bought at 19 cents per kilowatt which is roughly five times the average sport price for electricity prior to the Ukraine war, The subsidy system had to be curtailed in 2011 because of the excesses it generated: - farmers were massively using imported corn. In new installations, this has been caped to ONLY 60% of the material feed, - 14% of farm land in Germany was being used for energy production. Since the subsidy regime has been reduced, agricultural methane production has stagnated in Germany. So in theory, agricultural methane is great, it could use as you state agricultural waste, but in practice it only works when heavily subsidized, and when it massively uses corn and other primary food stuffs. Despite all of that, agricultural methane accounts for only about 1% of German gas consumption, despite utilizing 14% of agricultural lands. The transport sector in Germany, cars, planes and trucks, account for roughly 40% of primary energy consumption. Agricultural methane accounts at most for 0,5% of primary energy supply in Germany. So yes, e-fuels are a green smokescreen to encourage people to keep flying, keep driving ice cars and keep consuming with abandon.

[@reggie69.]

Aviation won't die with kerosene how else will the rich travel around in their private jets smaller planes will survive which like in the old days of aviation they would only carry the rich we already have electric private jets since 2022 Without technological advancements hydrogen aviation is going to be myth there are other fuels they can use to Reduce their carbon emissions buy 80% but they're still producing carbon but potential strategy that could work is used aviation biofuel and simply raising the price for everybody you could potentially have one of the few places where carbon capture would work and be profitable even if carbon capture doesn't improve as a technology If they can reduce the emissions by 80% using aviation biofuel and triple prices to 800- 2000 cross continent flights would be more expensive of course that is only the price for intercontinental flights But net zero in this aspect could be possible even with the current high cost of carbon capture and I'm specifically talking about the machines that suck carbon out of the air that currently exist now So maybe (biofuels + carbon capture + much higher prices) And it could still exist We aren't really making fast progress towards this future as globally only 0.2 percent of planes flying around run on Aviation biofuels obviously because it costs a lot of money but the fact that planes are even running and it's not speculative it actually is happening right now means that aviation biofuels could be a potentially the only thing that aviation to survive

[@apollo7807]

We need a propper hydrogen infrastructure for ships and plains. Though there shouldnt be big hopes on implementing it in cars or home heating. Great Video

[@erikottema2620]

In the Netherlands, we already have converted most of our gas grid to support hydrogen transport by applying coatings in the pipes

[@Alexafinarul]

That was an awful initiative.

[@erikottema2620]

@@Alexafinarul elaborate

[@Alexafinarul]

@@erikottema2620 That was a totally unnecessary investment, having in view that hydrogen will most likely never be transported on a large scale similar to natural gas.

[@gregorymalchuk272]

​@@AlexafinarulCommunist central planning tends to do crazy, uneconomic things.

[@jaymacpherson8167]

Thanks DW for pointing out the limited applications of hydrogen.

[@jaymacpherson8167]

@Nimble-Au The introduction explicitly mentions the applications for automobile use, home heating, and electrical power. The story is aimed at use of hydrogen by the general public. Should they have mentioned hydrogen utility in industrial applications? Certainly. However, “limited applications” are not what the story is about. It’s about the widespread application of hydrogen as a power source for the many activities that humans, particularly individuals in day to day use of power, engage in. I believe that inherently excludes narrower applications, such as for industry. Maybe you’ve missed the media rage about hydrogen being the answer for all fossil fuel applications.

[@unconventionalideas5683]

Here in the US, it looks like hydrogen is largely being ignored in most parts. It seems like people are open to the idea, but that they are skeptical that it will work quickly enough. It seems like most people are looking at other things first.

[@FlameofDemocracy]

Plug Power and Air Products are global leaders.

[@larryc1616]

No hydrogen cars and no hydrogen infrastructure

[@TurboAutist-sg7lo]

Why have i not heard about this as a citizen of the european union! This ineffectivness of government spending makes me so mad

[@Petch85]

H2 was also a big idea with lots of potential when I started in University in 2006, together with Nano technology. Thus very little has happened over the last 20 years. Maybe it could be used as a battery when we are producing an excess amount of solar and wind power, when pumping water back up in hydro dams are not available, and then using it where it would be difficult to use electricity, like in planes, where energy density (specific energy) is important. What I don't understand is why oil companies, that are specialists in drilling, do not create geothermal heating and electric powerplants. There are lots of places on earth where the base load could be created with geothermal and then adding wind and solar on top of that. And you can always boost the effect of a heat pump if you can drill a few deep holes. This could be used to heat and cool buildings around the world. And who is better at drilling deep holes than the oil industry?

[@nescius2]

Let me explain this riddle to you.. how many times you can sell a hole? and now compare it to selling its content (being gas)

[@Petch85]

@@nescius2 you can drill a hole everywhere and you can bill every kWh.

[@FabioCapela]

I doubt hydrogen planes will ever become competitive; hydrogen has extremely low volumetric energy density, so it needs to be stored under very high pressures to be useful as a fuel, and those extremely high pressure fuel tanks are not just very heavy but also a pain to fit within an airplane without killing its useful passenger and cargo space. They couldn't go into the wings, for example, which is where current large airplanes store their fuel. For short flights we already have good enough batteries to cover those, it's mainly a matter of building the planes and certifying them (and China is already doing it; if the rest of the world doesn't step up their efforts it will be the whole "China dominating EVs" thing again, this time with local aviation). For long flights the most effective decarbonization strategy would likely be either synthetic fuels or biofuels, which while expensive compared with fossil fuels can be made carbon neutral and don't bring the design issues that hydrogen storage causes. And if, or when, we manage to double the energy density of the best batteries available nowadays, those would be good enough for long flights too. It should take some time yet, but it's within the realm of possibility.

[@Petch85]

@@FabioCapela Specific energy of hydrogen is 142 MJ/kg it is only ~43.1 MJ/kg for jet fuel, thus in a perfect world you only need 1/3 of the fuel making the plane lighter. I don't know if it is best to burn the hydrogen or use it to make electricity in a fuel cell. A fuel cell can have an efficiency of 60% while burning only has 30%. I assume burning jet fuel also is about 30%. Thus you might have a factor of 2 there too. Thus you might end op only needing 1/6 of the weight in fuel when using hydrogen. The energy density of jet fuel is ~34.7 MJ/L for hydrogen it deepens on the pressure but ~5.5 MJ/L should be possible (~700 bar). Thus a little over 6 time the volume. But if you need 1/6 of the fuel then it would take up about the same amount of space but only weigh 1/6. Thus I don't think it is impossible, it honestly looks very doable. On the other hand the specific energy for lithium ion battery probably won't beat ~950 kJ/kg, That is 150 times that of hydrogen, and a battery does not get much lighter when empty. To be fair a fuel cell do also take up some mass, and battery power can probably be 90% efficient. (vs hydrogen's 60%) But even at 50-100 times heavier it still sesames like hydrogen is the better fuel. And lithium ion battery at 2.5 MJ/L looks even worse than hydrogen, even when taking into account the better efficiency. But you can probably find videos on hydrogen planes on youtube that also talks about this. Airbus has a project called ZEROe, they look to use liquid hydrogen and also have one concept using a fuel cell. But that is the future. As you said, right now there are already lithium ion battery powered planes for short flights.

[@FabioCapela]

@@Petch85 You forgot to consider the fuel tank. A cylinder for storing 5Kg of hydrogen at 700 bar, similar to those used in hydrogen cars, weight around 100Kg; you need, thus, a tank that weights about 20x more than the hydrogen contained inside. And if you go for liquid hydrogen it's not any better, you then need a tank and cooling system capable of keeping the hydrogen under -240°C/-400°F (as liquid hydrogen simply doesn't exist above that), which would be quite heavy too. Taking the fuel tank into account, the weight of the fuel plus the tank containing it is lower for jet fuel than for hydrogen. This also further hinders hydrogen when it comes to volumetric energy density, as high pressure hydrogen tanks need to be cylindrical in shape, resulting in dead space around it, whereas liquid fuel tanks and batteries can be made in almost any shape you need. Also, you are way off in your lithium battery energy density. CATL is already testing a battery with an energy density of 500Wh/Kg (1.8MJ/Kg) in real airliner prototypes, and that's not even a solid state battery, so there's room to improve; besides, the battery not only is already the electricity "tank", it can also be made into part of the structure, further cutting weight. And given how cheaper to operate electric airplanes would be compared with hydrogen or even jet fuel ones, as soon as electric is viable (and certified) for a certain range, it will likely kill all competition for that range.

[@angelic8632002]

One tool in a large toolbox. Like with many technologies.

[@georgemathieson6097]

if only those infrastructure efforts were focused entirely on renewables for BEVs 😔

[@petesig93]

Hydrogen - the Great Distraction 🙄

[@quiquello12]

I feel like doesn't represent the whole picture of Hydrogen vs electricity, first and foremost because it is not Hydrogen vs electricity; it is Hydrogen AND electricity: Electricity is easily transported but very inefficiently stored. Hydrogen is easily stored (relatively, pressurizing it is still a pain) but not very efficiently transported. Things that are fixed to the ground or can have a connective line are better off using electricity (heaters, trains, industry, etc.) Things that cannot be connected to ground and need to store energy on themselves are better off using hydrogen (cars, trucks and planes). This last statement is solely dependent on how easy it is to produce and recycle batteries. If we consider the entire lifecycle (manufacturing, usage and recycling of it) of an EV against a regular combustion car it is probably a match, since a ton more energy has to be put into the manufacturing and the recycling of it. A hydrogen car would have the advantage of same manufacturing and recycling cost of a regular combustion car with no emissions during its useful lifespan. Hopefully in a couple years time we'll achieve the solid state battery with non-hazardous, easily recyclable metals. That could make electric transportation on a mass scale possible. Up until then I won't support the EV transition.

[@auspiciouslywild]

I think you’re using the wrong words.. hydrogen isn’t *efficiently* stored. As in energy efficiency. You lose a huge portion of the energy in electrolysis, compression and in the fuel cell. It can be stored with very high gravimetric energy density. That’s a nice benefit. But the *volumetric* energy density is actually very bad. That’s why BEVs have more interior space, and often a drunk, when compared to hydrogen cars. BEVs are already use less resources than combustion cars within 2-5 years of operation. Recycling batteries is much more efficient than mining virgin materials, so when that’s a significant factor (in 20 years or so) BEVs will be a *lot* less resource intensive than combustion cars. Hydrogen cars use some very expensive and resource intensive materials in their fuel cells. There’s on-going research to improve that. And they also need some batteries anyway for regenerative breaking. It feels to me like making EV batteries less resource intensive is far ahead of improvements that make hydrogen cars viable. LFP batteries are already common, and Sodium-ion batteries are starting to enter the market. I guarantee you within 10 years, small BEVs for people that don’t need long range will be very cheap and use relatively few precious resources.

[@pin65371]

Also hydrogen is still needed for manufacturing. Electrifying everything doesnt work when you need high heat.

[@brushlessmotoring]

Battery swapping gets you both for transportation, efficient storage on the ground as backup or for renewable curtailment storage and energy trading, and quickly swapped into a class 8 during an inspection stop. Regular passenger cars spend most of their time parked, add a slow charger to parking.

[@FabioCapela]

@@pin65371 All low and medium temperature processes can be done using electric heating, as well as a number of high temperature processes, and research is underway to figure ways to convert the rest of the high temperature heating processes to electric with some promising results already. By the time we have enough renewable capacity to spare for making green hydrogen, we will likely have pure electric high temperature heating that should be cheaper than using hydrogen. And any other kind of hydrogen is utterly and completely useless for decarbonizing industrial heating. If you are converting natural gas or coal into hydrogen for use in heating, using the raw material directly actually emits less CO2 for the same amount of heat than first converting it to H2 and then using that for heat.

[@gerhardwesp3995]

Please elaborate on how modern grid-scale battery is 'inefficient' in storing electricity.

[@plasmacannon1198]

I am an engineer and work in industry and have analysed a lot of hydrogen projects. It’s the single most dumbest thing you can do. It will have its niche, but nowhere near what the EU thinks

[@Andreas-yt9wv]

It's weird, that they are praising it as the solution, because it is relatively obvious to engineers... To liquify ~ 700 bars, problems with embrittlement of pipes pumps and tanks, composite tanks produce CO2, low energy density ~ 7x the volume needed compared to diesel >700 bars< , demands huge investments into infrastructure, big power losses throughout the production chain, limits to use due to limits of fuel cell capacity to cope with shocks and vibration.... However used, the bill will be higher compared to battery storage.

[@hkad6252]

Do you have a better solution for steel, fertilizer, concrete and other applications that currently use methane? Feel free to start a company with whatever you think is a better idea.

[@pawel8365]

Truly excellent video - I am a researcher working with hydrogen and carbon capture, and I'm stunned at the sleep-walking attitude there is towards hydrogen. Hydrogen used as feedstock really sucks, it has a very low solubility with liquid, needs high pressures and is expensive to handle (explosive + leaks from standard gas cylinders). It is extremely worrying the EU Horizon projects have a huge love affair for hydrogen with very little scientific critique (or at the very least, it's ignored). I am scolded for being "negative", but sure dump money into this, and then go back to oil in 10 years. Russia and China will be delighted.

[@incognitotorpedo42]

Hydrogen as a feedstock in chemical processes that need it (e.g. Haber-Bosch) is a fine use for it. Hydrogen as an energy storage medium is a huge mistake.

[@ZrJiri]

Wasn't there some research going on that showed that "blue hydrogen" actually in reality produces enough emissions that, combined with the efficiency loss of the process, it's worse than just straight burning of natural gas without any capture? Dunno if I misremember this or not. EDIT: I was thinking of "How green is blue hydrogen", Howarth & Jacobson

[@ILSCDF]

Then why did you post this comment if you're so unsure? Surely you aren't expecting someone to reply with a genuine answer, are you?

[@ZrJiri]

@@ILSCDF Because someone might know what I'm talking about and provide better details? Yes, I actually expect people to respond with relevant information rather than childish stupidity. My faith in humanity tends to overestimate reality sometimes.

[@damianm-nordhorn116]

Maybe. But it might be grey hydrogen your talking about.

[@ZrJiri]

@@damianm-nordhorn116 Nah, for gray hydrogen it's just a physical fact that the emissions are worse. The problem with blue hydrogen is that all natural gas infrastructure involves certain amount of emissions and methane leaks as an unavoidable consequence of imperfect technology. And since converting to hydrogen requires much more methane for the same energy output at the point of use, it means more mining and more methane leaks than just using the methane directly. Not to mention the fact that sequestration technology is not there yet.

[@ZrJiri]

Found it. The paper's name is "How green is blue hydrogen?". Or just google "blue hydrogen fugitive emissions".

[@markuslang1869]

Hydrogen is a must. Solar is a must. Wind on- and offshore is a must. Big batteries, heat pumps, electric cars, generally electrifying everything is a must. All pieces fit together. Nobody will drive with hydrogen, efuels are idiotic other than in planes. It will be alot of work.

[@utube521]

270% efficient 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

[@JHawkins-jf6bs]

If hydrogen gas escapes it has a GWP which is 80 times greater than CO2 due to reactions with methane in the upper atmosphere. Professor Steven Chu, who was previously a U.S. Secretary of Energy to Barack Obama, in a recent lecture to the Royal Academy of Engineering in the UK stated that it was best to carry out H2 electrolysis very near to the point of use, with electricity taken from the national grid. No leaks should be tolerated?

[@mv80401]

Your report states the key arguments very well. I'd emphasize that both business and the research community go to where the funds are - but only until they dry up. Academics and engineers love to exercise their minds, regardless of commercial viability. And the fossil fuel industry identified H2 as a fully paid way to protect their polluting core business.

[@madcow3417]

Hydrogen is energy storage, like a battery. Its energy density is great, but every other thing about it is worse than existing battery technologies.

[@zen1647]

H2 is a bit of a combination as it can be used for storage and for transmission. And of course it has to be green. Many people here in Australia are hoping to export green hydrogen all the way to Europe.

[@kaasmeester5903]

Hydrogen allows for long term storage at vast scales. It can (and is) stored in geological formations, to be used for seasonal power balancing. Especially important in the colder regions up north. They could also be used locally to store surplus power from solar and wind farms. They are not as efficient as batteries (40-50% round trip) but they are way cheaper, and use far fewer precious resources. Using batteries as seasonal storage is simply not viable, the only other alternative we have is pumped hydro, of which the round trip efficiency isn’t great either, plus we lack the geology in Europe to make that happen at a sufficiently large scale.

[@incognitotorpedo42]

The energy density of hydrogen is not that great when you count the containment vessel required to hold it, or when you consider the volumetric energy density, which is not that great. In the Toyota Mirai, the containment vessel is 17 times the mass of the hydrogen! The real world energy density of hydrogen sucks.

[@gregorymalchuk272]

Refueling time of hydrogen is great too. EVs are a cargo cult and don't actually work on a large scale due to refueling time. The obsession with decarbonizing transportation is confusing, when you haven't even been able to kick brown coal out of power generation.

[@madcow3417]

@@gregorymalchuk272 You are correct about refueling time. Between that and energy density, an EV road trip is impractical. For daily commuting I use an EV. I charge it directly from an off-grid solar setup. I also agree that coal on the grid is a huge problem. I don't think it's practical to solve these problems one-at-a-time. Fix the grid while encouraging EVs and explore hydrogen or other alternatives.

[@koljaleffek7290]

i still think h2 is a great opportunity. for example to be used as energy storage when renewable energy produces more than currently used. and from there it can be used for transportation in lkw, ship, etc. instead of beeing shipped.

[@Julian_Wang-pai]

What about 'mineral' Hydrogen - extracted from underground..?

[@fayebird1808]

I find it telling that there was no a mention about France's discovery of white Hydrogen in the Eastern provinces last year.This is potentially a cheap source of Hydrogen . Flowing like natural gas out of the rockbed.

[@lorenkuhn3806]

You mean fossil fuel?

[@Julian_Wang-pai]

@@lorenkuhn3806 : no, accumulations from a chemical process involving serpentinization of iron-rich minerals: they react with oxygen from disassociated water molecules leaving hydrogen to accumulate underground. As such this requires these rocks (normally extremely deep below ground level) to be 'drawn' to the surface, usually in particular plate/continent tectonics contacts that are opening up/spreading apart such as the East African Rift Belt (check it out - very interesting story)

[@makemineapint]

Hopefully there will be enough to decarbonise high emission industrial processes and (possibly) produce synthetic fuels for aircraft, but given all the issue regarding storage and transmission I don't think it's going to be worth it for most transport and domestic heating uses.

[@Julian_Wang-pai]

@@lorenkuhn3806: I guess but H²O beats CO² hands down on this existential matter, if you can understand my slightly arry chemical nomenclature 🙂

[@__Wanderer]

I think using H2 in houses/ cars isn't possible at all... If anything the industry has made this a green "failure" so that there is more reliance on fossil fuels. Where it however COULD help is in energy storage for electricity production. It could be stored in large quantities next to solar / wind parks and used as an energy buffer / battery when there is less wind / sunshine...

[@tHebUm18]

9:29 Climate Town YT channel had a good video on how carbon capture is a massive lie. Something like 27 pilot projects were done at US power plants, most gave up after feasibility studies said it wouldn't work and the couple that didn't spent billions and basically proved that it wouldn't work because there's no good way to sequester it.

[@tilenjeraj2684]

This is not a carbon capture project. It’s EU way to be self sufficient.

[@tHebUm18]

@@tilenjeraj2684 Did you watch the video? Blue hydrogen is carbon capture--a technique that has been proven will not work and is just the fossil fuel industry's latest lies to deceive gov'ts and keep the profiteering off our demise.

[@brushlessmotoring]

@@tilenjeraj2684 The EU has sunshine, wind, mountains and rain (hydro), plenty of self sufficient renewables opportunity, if they make hydrogen the carrier of that energy, rather than wires, they will need 3 to 4 times as much renewable buildout, but you never see a green hydrogen electrolyzer projects talk about how it's going to create additional renewable generation to power the green hydrogen creation, this is the "additionality" rule in the US Inflation Reduction Act that the Oil and Gas companies are lobbying so hard against, they don't want to actually build renewables - I don't know why, money is money, why do you have make it through pollution, why can't shell build a solar farm and power DC fast EV charging with it, why put hydrogen in the middle and waste so much of that limited energy?

[@DWPlanetA]

Hey there. Some years ago we also published this video "Can carbon capture ACTUALLY work?" 👉 kzbin.info/www/bejne/gHnWXpiNfcdkbMk

[@KevinAdams26]

Yet another reason why Ursula should be nowhere near the Presidency.

[@harmaanrajmadon7010]

Well done, @dwplanetA. I've always maintained that hydrogen was nothing more than a red herring by the fossil fuel industry. This issue needs to be highlighted more

[@DWPlanetA]

Thanks for your feedback. We posted several videos about hydrogen, check them out: 👉 kzbin.info/www/bejne/d3i3m36Afdpsb8U 👉 kzbin.info/www/bejne/aoWlpnlrh5lli8U 👉 kzbin.info/www/bejne/bXzOc3hmfcyBgLM And if you like our videos, subscribe to our channel, we post new ones every Friday ✨

[@gregorymalchuk272]

Hydrogen enabled fast refueling which is necessary for a transportation fleet.

[@jaredhamilton8694]

@@gregorymalchuk272Arguably, battery swapping can do the same thing, as can replacing trucking with freight rail, or overnight charging during layovers if your batteries are good enough to last the whole day. Hydrogen’s actual main use case is decarbonizing chemical processes like cement, steel, and fertilizer production, where electrification is less viable with current technology.

[@gregorymalchuk272]

@@jaredhamilton8694 Well, as far as I know, the last large battery swapping scheme ended 110 years ago on some city size delivery vehicles. Manufacturers are building proprietary batteries integrated into the hull of the vehicle which are almost impossible to replace.

[@N0N0111]

@DWPlanetA Just an idea to follow up this video, is to make a video that list/show the progress on all hydrogen power plants in Europe. That will paint the picture clear if it is really a huge a bet or a future they actively are trying to build.

[@adrienforbu5165]

My (humble) opinion : Why not delaying the use of renewable energy to produce hydrogen ? I mean the first step of the energy transition is to decarbonize the electrical grid (it's the easiest) so those renewable should be used to do that (instead of producing hydrogene).

[@nestserau]

It’s not possible with renewables alone because of their volatile nature. That’s why a balancer is required be it a nuclear plant, a natural gas power plant, etc.

[@nathanbanks2354]

Learning to produce hydrogen through electrolysis is valuable even if we only use it for making fertilizer in the long run. Today, it's much cheaper to get hydrogen from natural gas. If we invest in technology and get the price close to parity, a little government tax incentives would be enough to nudge the industry into a green hydrogen. The world already consumes vast amounts of ammonia; I'd be more interested in switching this to green hydrogen than switching to hydrogen cars or trucks.

[@Jakob_DK]

Because we have times like today with wind and sun but the electricity price is 0 Euro/MWh in France, Germany, Benelux. To further on the grid, there is both a benefit of using the free power and more solar, wind power and storage will be built with higher electricity demand.

[@nestserau]

@@Jakob_DK You are incorrect. Current price is 15 cent per kWh in the Netherlands for this hour. In the evening it will go up.

[@Jakob_DK]

@@nestserau Time 12-13: price -2.12 Eur/MWh Time 13-14: price -10.66 Eur/MWh Time 14-15: price - 23 Eur/MWh Let us use the cheaper energy

[@tonyflynn6308]

not to mention the driving factor of global climate change for those who believe in the science.

[@willeisinga2089]

I live in Groningen Nederland. EU. I have Rooftop Solar, 6000 kWh a year. Rent a house with Rooftop Solar Power 6000 kWh. That is 12.000 kWh Solar Power every year. I have close in boiler in the kitchen. 129 euro. Warm water powered by the Roof. I have bathroom Boiler 189 euro. DIY. Smart Induction Cooking, Airfryer, Microwave, Watercooker. Powered by Rooftop Solar. For Central Heating a LG Therma V Monoblock 60 degrees Heatpump. DIY. For 12 Years Now. No hydrogen. DIY Cheap and Easy.👍👍👍

[@johnnny777]

And what do you do in winter when the sun is not shining?

[@willeisinga2089]

@@johnnny777 what do you do in the winter? I have Greenchoice Solar Wind contract. All automatic. Summer and Winter. Works Perfect no Gas. Since 2012. That is 12 Years Now. DIY. Cheap and Easy.

[@Jakob_DK]

You read the meter one time a year? Summer production you get back in the winter? There is no magic storage in the grid. Part of the storage could be hydrogen. Here in Denmark we read the electricity meter every hour. Production is sold to the grid at current NordPool rate. The price is now, Saturday at noon, negative. It you deliver 1 kWh you pay 0,1 Euro

[@Jakob_DK]

@@johnnny777 One thing is government regulation done less good. Another is physics of energy storage.

[@willeisinga2089]

@@Jakob_DK Everything is possible. In Nederland 3 million Houses Rooftop Solar. 2 Million Heatpumps installed. Inductioncooking, Airfryer Microwave Watercooker. Close in boiler bathroom Boiler. No Gas. Contract with Greenchoice Solar Wind or ANWB variable contract per hour. Cheap EV from China, charge Point at home. Ride on the Power of the rooftop Solar. And I have the system 12 Years since 2012. Makes me 3000 a Year. I let a House same system. Again 3000 euro. Is a Profit of 6000 euro a year. Over a period of 12 year 72.000 euro. No problem Works perfect Automatically.

[@YippingFox]

In the end, each turbine you see being still in the wind and not in maintenance could power hydrogen or a battery. Another issue is just that none of the grids were build for this much energy...There simply is no use in moving hydrogen itself. Produce it then use it or store it to use later.

[@foolwise4703]

You are not discussing the key selling point though: We can store the stuff for a long winter and make it from excess electricity.

[@SillieWous]

Not really batteries are a cheaper (but still expensive) alternative. The losses for making, storing, and reconverting it are much larger.

[@danguee1]

Have you looked into the inefficiencies of such a system? And the carbon footprint of the infrastructure involved. I'm guessing probably not....

[@foolwise4703]

@@danguee1 I am doing reasearch in the wider field professionally, so yea, you could say i looked into it. Efficiencies can be around 20-30 %. Not high, but the hole point is that electricity at peak hours becomes basically free, so it doesn't matter. Also, we do not have ANY viable alternative for energy storage on this scale. So long as that is the case, what is there to discuss?

[@SillieWous]

@@foolwise4703 And why exactly are batteries not a viable alternative? Pumped hydro is also a good alternative in some situations.

[@foolwise4703]

@@SillieWous Because batteries are not scalable enough for seasonal storage. As a quick example, it would require nearly the full worldwide production of lithium for one year to produce a battery farm large enough to cover just Germanies current electricity demand of a single day (!!!). Consider what would be required if we want to heat with electricity also and set up a storage for winter. Just not happening. In contrast, we can store any synthesized gas in huge quantities with little problems in washed out salt formations, as we have been doing it with fossil gas. Hydro is super and always #1 to do. But there are only so many lakes and building underground lakes is as expensive as it sounds.

[@pierreheidebroek689]

Can DW make a documentary on idled ( not dispatching Electricity) Solar/ wind farms ( while sun is shining / win blowing) simply because wholesale electricity price close to zero or negative ( for a raft of reasons) . That’s a lot of “ wasted” renewables energy which could sent to a PEM electrolyser at the wind/solar farm site to produce hydrogen ( as a battery fuel or to be transported elsewhere )

[@thegreatdane3627]

yeah, hydrogen could be used for long term storage of the excess electricity produced by wind and solar during the summer.

[@DWPlanetA]

Hey there! 🌞 We have this video you might want to check out: "This is what's REALLY holding back wind and solar" 👉 kzbin.info/www/bejne/q16npHericiYitE

[@xexas3000]

The best idea is to move everything to electric AND THEN, if there is a surplus of it then make some hydrogen as back-up. And even so, a grid scale battery storage is way more cost effective than building all that H2 infrastructure. All those talks about H2 is just a way to keep fossil fuels in use a lot longer, because no way they will be using green hydrogen anythime soon, they will be using natural gas for the blue/grey h2! (most countries are not even close to 100% renewable electricity let alone have free capacity to make green h2).

[@nestserau]

The idea is to use nuclear energy to produce hydrogen. Everything to electric won’t cut it even in the most developed countries of the world, that’s why we can currently observe some countries implementing EV charging schedules.

[@tmnvanderberg]

Batteries do NOT do seasonal storage (i.e. months). That's where hydrogen is considered one of the better options.

[@GuidoHaverkort]

The fact that pretty much all fossil fuel companies are lobbying for hydrogen tells you enough. I'm not saying it's all bad, it definitely has use especially in industry, but hydrogen for everything come on that's idiotic

[@franciscocruz3088]

Well, the transportation problem can be fixed if the hydrogen production is decentralized. This means to place the elecrolysers where the consumption is. For exemple a gas station or a power station.

[@user-ie4tt1xp7j]

Hydrogen may be a part of the solution, but not the solution itself. Yes, it definitely has some good use cases. But Europe should invest more in biomass RnD: alcohols, biogas, and biodiesel. Plus, common chemical elements batteries, like Sodium-ion ones. I still don't understand why it wasn't done a long time ago, despite the obvious understanding of how dependent Europe is on oil and gas.

[@cardozodiego13]

Energy independence is something Europe needs to achieve as soon as possible. Right now I believe hydrogen is a good way to store big amounts of potential energy without the use of giga-batteries. Optimizing the production and reducing the energy waste would be my main focus right now.

[@brushlessmotoring]

Hydrogen is not a path to energy independence, it's a path to continued reliance on foreign natural gas, the Canada hydrogen to EU announcement was spectacularly dumb, but also showed the thinking of the EU is not around energy self reliance, they need put the same eminent domain muscle they put to oil and gas infrastructure to renewables too, stop letting nimby's kill wind projects because it 'spoils the view'.

[@FabioCapela]

You can't really reduce the energy wasted in making and using hydrogen. It's a physics limit, similar to how you can't make combustion engines much more efficient than the ones we have today. To put it another way, any time you use hydrogen for energy storage you are throwing away roughly two thirds of the energy, and future breakthroughs are very unlikely to change that meaningfully. If the energy has economic value many other ways of storing energy - like pumped hydro, compressed air, or big batteries - make more sense than hydrogen. Hydrogen only makes sense for storage if renewables get to the point where the energy for making the hydrogen becomes essentially free.

[@larryc1616]

There is no feasible way to make affordable green hydrogen and to store it. No hydrogen infrastructure at all anywhere.

[@nickcook2714]

@DWPlanetA Your arguments are spot on. 3M tonnes of green hydrogen wouldn't even replace ⅓ of Europe's current grey hydrogen use "The European Union (EU) consumes around 9.7 million tonnes of grey hydrogen each year, which is mostly used in the production of chemicals and fertilizers" There are only two significant and absolutely necessary applications for hydrogen, where it is used for its chemical properties or where it's used for its physical properties. For the small number of applications where it is indispensable as a energy carrier there is another option we could use, which is basically wait until we've done all the easy stuff, because cleaning up these niche applications make such a small contribution to overall CO2 emissions reduction, over the next couple of decades at least, we can forget about them for now. Most of the applications where they say hydrogen is needed to replace natural gas, especially if considering blue hydrogen, can probably be decarbonised more effectively by approaching the problem differently. There is one area that a lot of people think we will need hydrogen for, and that is seasonal plus, long duration energy storage. However, even for this, there are technologies could provide a substantially more efficient and more energy dense storage system than using hydrogen.

[@JakeShaft85]

I thought hydrogen was needed for big-scale energy storage. Is there any option to store energy for a month worth of power? Personally I don't believe in a "hydroge-economy" but it could play a bit part in transition and help with expansion of renewebles.

[@DWPlanetA]

Hey Jake! Yes, hydrogen can be stored long-term and could be used on demand. However, there are a few challenges as we also mention in the video, such as low efficiency, high costs and infrastructure challenges.

[@Masterrunescapeer]

Grid-scale, don't think you need a month of power? But otherwise, just normal batteries can do so and seem to be more cost-effective.

[@unconventionalideas5683]

Iron-Air batteries look like a far more promising option for that, as do Sodium-Ion batteries.

[@JakeShaft85]

@@Masterrunescapeer Exxaguration perhaps. Today in Sweden when the wind blows we have negative prices. Which means windturbines get turned of to stabilize the grid and save money. If you could store that energy and sell it when prices are higher would be a good idea. Prices can be low for months. Do a calculation on how many batteries you need to store that type of energy you realise it's not realistic. Swedena small country 10m people. In a decade we might use 1TWh a cold winterday. Batteries and terrawatts is not realistic.

[@JakeShaft85]

@@unconventionalideas5683 How much space would they take up to store enough energy to produce 5TWh? If a nation is going to rely on solar and wind you will need a storage capacity equivalent to several TWh of power. 1 steel factory in Sweden is planning to use 0,5TWh/day in 6-7 years. In winter sun doesn't shine and say 50% of the powerproduction is from wind and the wind doens't blow for a few days. The you need several TWh stored. In bigger countries even more. At that scale bateries doesn't look realistic to me.

[@lephtovermeet]

Thank you for mentioning hydrogen embrittlement. AFAIK this is still a huge mostly unsolved problem: basically everything that interacts with compressed hydrogen over a long enough time will absorb hydrogen, change material properties, and break down. Additionally even green hydrogen requires highly pure water, a resource that is not readily available. So while people geek out over the possibility of replacing fossile fuels with something that feels ans acts like a fossil fuel, in reality its hard to work with and transport, and the feedstock is not abundant. Unfortunately, battery tech still has a long way to get, especially at grid scale, so who knows what the future holds, but hydrogen is not a silver bullet.

[@Daniel-ot7hi]

Brazil is advancing in producing hydrogen from alcohol. It's a way of producing green hydrogen for a price comparable with gray hydrogen

[@FabioCapela]

It's far more effective, land-wise, to just have solar panels and use the electricity they generate to make green hydrogen. Plants - even sugar cane, the tropical plant Brazil uses for biofuels and that beats corn for this application hands down - are far less effective at storing usable energy than a solar panel is at generating it.

[@annemariesmith5459]

Japan and Germany as well. I think some people with a lot to lose are getting nervous.

[@Daniel-ot7hi]

@FabioCapela I see what you mean, but the thing is eletrolisis is way too expansive. In practical reality is way easier and cheaper to produce hydrogen from alcohol. Besides, it could be produced in local facilities, making logistics far more viable

[@Daniel-ot7hi]

@annemariesmith5459 didn't know about that, very interesting. I will look up for it. But what do you mean by someone getting nervous?

[@Alexafinarul]

​@@Daniel-ot7hiIt would be better to use that alcohol directly as a fuel. And it is much easier to store and transport and much less dangerous.

[@prg2457]

I am a battery researcher in the EU, and we don't consider H2 a sustainable solution; EU is already way beyond Asia, and what makes me nervous is how the EU is pushing on battery innovation, and production may end similar to H2, and it will make EU totally energy dependent on Asia which is actually present day.

[@kelzuya]

Hydrogen works great for things on fixed routes like trains, busses and cargo ships/ferries as once the destinations are piped it works fine. For cars that travel in ad-hoc directions to rural places etc. it is not great as getting the H there without pipes is inefficient.

[@_yonas]

For trains you are better of just electrifying the line.

[@Masterrunescapeer]

Trains doesn't make any sense as rail is electrified for most (probably all?) of Europe. Maybe in the US? Busses also seem to be doing fine with lithium batteries., same for cars (and where there's a petrol station now, there's an electricity connection). Ships/ferries seem the most likely to benefit from this approach.

[@brushlessmotoring]

Not if cost per mile is something you care about, a pre-purchased politician does not, they will be long gone with cash in an envelope before the taxpayer cost of their poor decision making is laid bare. Every single hydrogen bus and train project gets scrapped after a few years once the subsidies dry up and a commercial company has to foot the bill, especially infrastructure maintenance. Hydrogen for transport is the textbook definition of a boondoggle: noun work or activity that is wasteful or pointless but gives the appearance of having value. "writing off the cold fusion phenomenon as a boondoggle best buried in literature" verb waste money or time on unnecessary or questionable projects. "the only guarantees are higher taxes and bureaucratic boondoggling"

[@FabioCapela]

@@Masterrunescapeer The US, AFAIK, has one of the worst rates of rail electrification among all the developed nations, if not the single worst. It's why electric trucks now beat US trains in being low-carbon even when recharged using the US's carbon intensive electricity. Much of that seems to be due to US railways being private, meaning you need to convince the railway owner to invest in electrifying the rail, which is a big investment that would take a long time to pay off.

[@gregorymalchuk272]

We shouldn't even be trying to decarbonize transport if we can't even kick lignite out of power generation.

[@Ianmundo]

You only need hydrogen where you can’t get electricity, maybe works for some shipping but never makes sense for land-based use

[@tom.jacobs]

H2 is a solution where batteries are getting to big: (some) industry, (some) transport and to store electricity for longer. It is no alternative to windparks, solarfields or other ways to produce it. It is a costly (low efficient) and challenging (technical) way to use, and therefor a last resort storage. Saying H2 is the solution implies we have an abundance (double of our needs) of (green) electricity, and with a percentage that still lays far under 50% that is maybe something for the future, but certainly not something where we should put all our money right now on. On sunny/windy hours (where our current needs are below the output) we could produce it, but those are scarce and after sunset/wind the needs are bigger again: so then short term storage (eg battery) is more profitable.

[@Jakob_DK]

The electricity price today is 0 Euro/kWh in Germany, France, Belgium, Netherlands, Denmark That indicates to me we have electricity available at lower cost than other energy sources and a business opportunity might be available.

[@tom.jacobs]

@@Jakob_DK yeah [sunny weekend]; free electricity between 12-16h [excl tax]. The rest of the day you have to pay.. so short term storage could be business model [some batteries can/do trade, but the cost per kwh is still high - cost to buy, install and degradation in their limited lifetime - to be very profitable]. Making H2 is costing a lot electricity [33kW/kg], and with 0 on that it cuts the production cost, but installation to do so is expensive, and storage is costing extra kWh, making it anything but profitable for now. The fact that big companies [with scale and funding benefits] are holding back on investing in using this surplus, makes me wonder if there actually is a business model [the ones that are, not choosing H2 but battery]. Maybe making electricity (sun/wind) is very cheap/profitable and the 0 [sometimes even negative] is calculated into the plan. But for now a part of Europe has free charging of car, laundry and airco at home: it looks wasteful, but if we/industry adapt in usage that might be something temporarily?

[@BobSmith-dk8nw]

Yeah. At one point in time like 40 years ago they built a vehicle that could run on water. It used electrolysis to create Hydrogen from the water and then burned that. The Batteries that powered the electrolysis had to be charged separately. The thing was - it was vastly better to just use the batteries that powered the electrolysis to provide electric power to move the vehicle - but - you had to charge the batteries somehow. .

[@zdenekkindl2778]

Are you talking “perpetum mobile” here?

[@hardware64]

Hydrogen can be decentralized, electricity depends on the grid, which is a much more vulnerable solution, and an easy target in the event of an armed conflict. The solution is both.

[@Sharukurusu]

Grid scale battery or compressed air storage can be just a decentralized or moreso because they don’t require a source of water to split. Unless the energy hydrogen is being produced with is on site hydrogen is also grid dependent, and transporting it is more complicated; it is much easier to run power lines than pipelines or drive trucks.

[@zweidritteleinfach2087]

The reality is that for many decades to come, any commercial use of hydrogen for power will be economically uncompetitive with using natural gas or oil instead - and not by a small margin, but rather by an order of magnitude. You can massively subsidize hydrogen or force its use by law or through taxation, but in either case the destruction of wealth (either through higher taxes or higher prices) that will come along with relying on it is inescapable as it stems directly from its incredible economic inefficiency compared to fossil fuels.

[@Ikbeneengeit]

I'm glad you're calling the hydrogen gravy-train out for what it is: permission for fossil fuel majors to not change

[@user-if5ul6xn9r]

The recently achieved 2500km range for BEV is a statement on its own. Battery technology will only get better and the speed of its improvement will be incomparably higher than the already mature hydrogen technology.

[@unitedstatesoffugu]

12:45 after almost 10 mins of watching a video built around the narrative of the '10 million tons of green hydrogen' are impossible to produce by 2030, we are finally presented with the most crucial information concerning this: the EU commission is aware of that and therefore decreased the goal in the updated scenario to 3 million tons. Okay. Honestly, this kind of 'objective' journalism for younger audiences is not helpful at all. And if you open your investigative piece with 'We were binging Tiger King' - I am sorry, I think you're lacking a distinctive part of critical thinking. Yet this video was heavily playing with the impression of being critical. Though, I basically learned only two things: Gas-pipelines/infrastructure should be tested for Hydrogen use bco it's the smallest molecule. And the Commission set a target too ambitious to achieve and later adjusted that target. In almost 14 minutes of content... This is low-quality journalism in my eyes. Time consuming and missleading story-telling. And in general: You can go to any country or political entity, select random governments of their past and read their big announcements on how to reform the place. It will always be similar: Big words before, smaller ones later, after the reality-checks.

[@johncompassion9054]

Silver bullet: Invest most money in finding a better battery that does not require extracting rare earth minerals and do not take up a lot of space.

[@FabioCapela]

You know that China's LFP batteries, which are already almost as good in energy density as traditional batteries and better than them in just about everything else (including cost), use no nickel or cobalt, replacing those rare-ish minerals with the very common iron and phosphate, right? Over 60% of the batteries made in China are already of that type, with production quickly converting to them (as they are more cost-effective), and most Chinese EVs use them. (Incidentally, I would never buy an EV with a traditional NMC or NCA battery. LFP batteries tend to last some 3x more, so they mostly eliminate the potential issue of needing a very expensive battery replacement down the line.) The main issue with using those seems to be a political issue in that we would need to either buy them from China, or license China's tech for use elsewhere (and, thus, pay royalties to China on every such battery we made).

[@larryc1616]

Sodium ion battery is being first implemented in a Chinese ev this year.

[@death_parade]

India working on Sodium ion batteries. And yet we don't call it a silver bullet.

[@lamebubblesflysohigh]

It is ludicrous only if you think small and in absolutes... today when there is too much wind or not enough demand, wind turbines are switched off. Isn't that a waste? This unused capacity can be used to produce hydrogen. Same with solar. Spain has huge depopulated semi-desert areas where sun shines almost every day of the year. Great place for solar right? No... because there is no demand in that area.... but if we used it to make hydrogen it would suddenly become viable.

[@death_parade]

Deserts are not a good place for solar. Yes they are empty tracts of land and have sun on them, but they are also hot, which is bad for solar panel efficiency. But I do agree with you.

[@ww07ff]

UHVDC transmission lines makes much more sense than Hidrogen pipelines. Even Green Ammonia maybe makes more sense than H2.

[@fayebird1808]

Last October. France discovered a Geologic White Hydrogen source underground containing, "between 6 to 250 million metric tons of hydrogen" Why are you not discussing natural reservoirs of hydrogen?

[@brushlessmotoring]

Because it's just the next phase of distraction now the true cost and impracticality of green or fantasy of blue hydrogen has been revealed, it's yet more lobbying, obsfucation, distraction and delay from what we have right in front of us already: heat pumps, ev's, induction, "white" hydrogen does not exist at production scale and solves none of the transportation problems, even if the hydrogen was free out of the ground, it would still cost a fortune to capture, purify and transport, and would likely have fugitive emissions worse for global heating than methane. Try to stop falling for all these 'hydrogen buzz' articles you see everywhere, they never, ever, turn into anything real or useable, and methane is always subbed in instead, which was always the actual, real, unspoken plan. Hydrogen hype is an oil and gas play to keep methane in use and keep people on the fence about electrification, and it continues to be effective in both roles, ask anyone holding off on trying an EV because they are "waiting: for hydrogen cars.

[@FabioCapela]

Those are not believed to be even close to what would be needed to cover our energy needs. Also, the worst thing about hydrogen isn't making it, but transporting it. Thus, underground hydrogen reserves are a nice bit of free energy for whichever cities they are close to, but don't really solve the decarbonization needs.

[@fayebird1808]

It was my concern that it was not mentioned and discussed. There are miners in my Ontario looking for hydrogen with Investors money. Maybe they know something about profits? @@FabioCapela

[@matthewbriggs9414]

10(H2O) + 4(C2O) -> 2(C4H10) + 7(O2) Why volatile Hydrogen gas when Propane (cold climate) or Butane (warm climate) gas would be much more stable to handle and energy dense? The surplus oxygen can be sold as an industrial byproduct or released into the atmosphere and the production process could also accumulate carbon-capture credits.

[@SkepticalCaveman]

What a waste of money. Instead EU should invest in biogas (renewable methane) which is a drop in replacement for natural gas and even more in battery storage. Scandinavia already have experience making biogas from trash, and it's cheaper than hydrogen. Also gas cars can easily be converted into biogas cars, relatively cheap.

[@DWPlanetA]

Hey there! We also looked at fuel from biomass a while ago. Check out our video and let us know what you think 👉kzbin.info/www/bejne/jonYYmiEobSofdE

[@timwoodruff5728]

One of the worst takes in the comments hahaha

[@hkad6252]

This will regulate itself. If EVs and heat pumps are cheaper to run than using hydrogen then hydrogen will not penetrate the market.

[@andreadalpasso1515]

True, although state subsidies could distort the process

[@user-xp4of2vu4r]

I'm all in for the development of the big "H" however, until we have the proper techniques in place and proven, a waste of time and effort to move away from basic petroleum/gas fuels.

[@ayoCC]

An ambient investment of giving some university students like 400€ a month as stipends to focus on hydrogen, but those stipends could probably also go to something else, like battery tech

[@othmanehaffou4759]

We know that GH2 is not to be used for overall transports, but mostly for decarbonizing heavy industries / agricultural purposes. Thank for emphasizing that it is pretty much a waste of energy.

[@10-OSwords]

Well they left out red hydrogen which can be made from new nuclear reator desgins which we desperately need to invest in & the fact that hydrogen can be mined from the bottom of the ocean-yes mining is always bad but we're mining coal & lithium so it could displace those.

[@alanjenkins1508]

The EU should focus on battery storage. Huge amounts of it will be required to turn intermittent wind and solar into a reliable baseload.

[@Simon-dm8zv]

Yes.

[@raimez2]

Not Bert from Geology saying hidrogen rocks😭😭

[@sudeepmukherjee6987]

Absolutely!

[@armwrestlingprofessor]

I love the saying "hydrogen is like champaign, you use it for special occasions where water wouldn't suffice"

[@agrodrone2022]

They don't know wtf they are doing, damn them all!

[@lostintashkent]

So, what is your solution?

[@agrodrone2022]

@@lostintashkent go back to the euro 4 emission standard. Give tax brakes on every vehicle sold if car companies plant a number of trees in degradated area proportioned to the power of the engine. Push as much as possible biogas and bioethanol production. Cut every subsides on solar\wind ad make a massive plan for nuclear energy, cut public spending massively. Rebuild our oil\metal industry giving tax brakes e cut burocracy. And this just to start

[@write2nasreen]

Techno-commercial evaluation of Green Hydrogen is an important aspect. Replacing fossil fuel options with Green hydrogen is a dream that will never come true. It is definitely not cost-effective for light-duty vehicles. At the same time, the Green hydrogen can provide the delta demand because of rapid industrialization, urbanization, and so on. Where to produce Green Hydrogen and how to use it is an important aspect.

[@MrSaeedAta]

What do you think of ammonia as a hydrogen carrier? I work in the aerospace industry, and it seems like a far more sensible option than straight hydrogen.

[@tilenjeraj2684]

Problem with ammonia is high working temperatures. I think 🇯🇵 just made a prototype engine for 🚗. This is its biggest problem.

[@FabioCapela]

Ammonia is very toxic and volatile. Transporting large quantities of ammonia - such as what would be needed to power a ship - is dangerous; any accident with the fuel storage in an ammonia-powered ship could kill everyone on board, and poison sea life in a large area around where the accident happened. Otherwise, I do agree it's more sensible than storing or transporting raw H2. Though that isn't saying much, as almost any other alternative, such as biofuels, is better than H2 for transportation.

[@DWPlanetA]

We did a video on ammonia and shipping industry you can check out here 👉 kzbin.info/www/bejne/pl6aaq1uo8uZoa8. One of the issues is that there is almost no green ammonia produced today. 🥵

[@WannesBekaert-mv9jt]

All the while China is happily racing ahead in all types of electric solutions. It's another lost decade for European industry and the climate... It's not certain we will ever be able to catch up. Thanks fossil fuel industry!

[@-Rishikesh]

Building hydrogen pipes is the most stupidest thing. There would be so much wastage in the tubes. Just improve the transmission lines between countries or the points and make h2 decentralised and near the consumption. Oh wait then the fossil fuel companies cannot mix in their allegedly* blue hydrogen in, who knew…

[@javastream5015]

Russia has even longer pipelines for natural gas.

[@-Rishikesh]

@@javastream5015 Yes but H2 is completely different from natural gas. There are more chances for h2 to leak out of the tubes because it is so light..

[@javastream5015]

@@-Rishikesh Now the question is: How much more? What is the resistance when pumping CH4 and H2?

[@-Rishikesh]

Some of it is mentioned at 6:47 Essentialy every existing pipe network is entirely different. If new pipes are being laid then there is a argument to be made, but even then it's just too costly and more research has to be done to pull it off correctly. Which requires time. Time being a resource we currently lack..

[@ranixcz4087]

why nearly all politicians say hydrogin instead of hydrogen ?

[@brushlessmotoring]

Nicely done, concise, accessible, not preachy, not too deep a dive, but accurate, and covers the basics very well, a perfect primer to that uncle at thanksgiving saying he won't touch an EV, heat pump or induction hob because he is waiting for a hydrogen.

[@DWPlanetA]

Glad you enjoyed it! Make sure also to subscribe to our channel for new videos every Friday. ✨

[@sjf29]

Without Hydrogen, will be forced to give up global travel.

[@bartz0rt928]

I find it a bit weird that this outlet is so (rightfully) critical of hydrogen, but was much more positive about ammonia as a fuel.

[@uzemakistyle]

Did my thesis on using hydrogen in energy storage. And did quite a bit of research into the businesscase for hydrogen overall. What is also a big drawback off hydrogen is how fugitive the gas is, making leaks more common than with natural gas. Also the indirect global warming potential of hydrogen is pretty bad. Meaning that if around 5% escapes along the production/transport/use lifetime, it would've been better to stay with methane from a globalwarmingpotential perspective. Mind you, this is with green hydrogen. And with methane, along it's production to use leaks a few % (I thought it was around 3%).

[@12hubu65]

5:28 270% efficient?

[@BangaloreTrafficMadness]

Honestly it's one cog of the large solution. EVs renewables hydrogen nuclear instead of coal gas and oil

[@TimothyWhiteheadzm]

I still recall a Scientific American magazine in the 90s all about the coming 'hydrogen economy'. The funny part was that if you actually read the whole magazine you came away with the opinion that hydrogen was not the way to go and yet there it was, proclaiming that it would happen anyway (at the time it was the Bush administration pushing for it). Of course it never actually happened but because so much finding went towards research projects into it instead of into better alternatives it delayed the green energy revolution by decades (as was the intent of the oil companies pushing for it).

[@TheAllMightyGodofCod]

Except for a few very specific cases, why would you use hydrogen made from electricity, when you can simply use electricity? Specially at home, the idea of having an hydrogen fueled stove or boiler is absolutely ridiculous

[@fanton2416]

it's a very simple, school level physics and math here: just take a number of 10M tonne of H2 from the "Reality check section" and try to convert it to the equivalent Li-ion storage, would give you billions of tonnes of Linthium needed to store that amount of energy. Its also a huge industry and environmental impact, yet being ignored here by the DW editors and their invited "experts" that represent very biased point of you.

[@pascoesabido6644]

Important to also look at the hydrogen the EU plans to import. Producing green hydrogen needs a lot of water, yet the EU wants to import it from water scarce regions like Morocco and Namibia. It's also leading to lots of land grabbing and impacts on local communities and their environments. It's the same old story we've seen with oil and gas, but now we're pretending it's green.

[@PoweredbyRobots]

Hydrogen has a place in the energy transition but it's fast being supplanted by far cheaper tech like sodium, sand and iron batteries.

[@fredbloke3218]

Methane can be turned into hydrogen and black carbon which could be buried - but that would waste half its potential energy.

[@petermuller5275]

Always use science to base your solutions on, never follow lobby groups

[@user-tu8lu5ky4k]

Your approach to trading is truly impressive. Thank you for teaching me so much!

[@Souchirouu]

Both the US and China are investing big and really big into hydrogen. So is Japan who has made some very noteworthy advances into producing the stuff. The EU is a massive market and has some of the worlds largest ports such as Rotterdam and Antwerp which. So having their own hydrogen to sell could be very lucrative. Imagine if Germany restarted all 10+ nuclear reactors and used them to use true green hydrogen on mass. Japan is already doing this. It could also use much of the unused green energy produced during peak hours where demand is low or the grid can't handle any more. I am not sure what processes specifically would benefit from the most. Right now large freight trucks seem to most common as big batteries are heavy and slow to charge and would require radical different infrastructure. It would be a lot cheaper to use existing systems for oil and modify them. Trucks generally run diesel which is way more polluting than the more refined fuels that go into consumer cars. There is also the material problem that solar panels and batteries in its current form have. Hydrogen has the potential advantage of requiring significantly less rare earth materials. It is generally also easier to transport and use in locations where the grid might not be available or unable to provide the amount of power required which would be useful construction projects in more rural areas. That would of course require them actually get stuff done... maybe less wars and more honest work?

[@martythemartian99]

(first an admission: I know very little) I tend to think the best use for green hydrogen would be for shipping to replace that black tar used in many vessels, and possibly for rail freight when line electrification is not easy to do.