News & Articles on Hydrogen
Hydrogen is not a renewable resource. It is an energy carrier. As such, I don’t normally write about hydrogen. However, others do and I’ve chosen to add this page to highlight the articles on hydrogen I think are important. For many years hydrogen has been seen as a panacea by those who are not energy aware, and those who use hydrogen as a cover for continuing to burn fossil fuels. It is very inefficient to convert electricity to hydrogen and then to convert the hydrogen back into electricity. It’s much more efficient to use electricity directly to power an electric vehicle than to convert electricity to hydrogen and back again in a fuel cell. Hydrogen is only useful in the energy transition if it is created by renewable energy such as by wind or solar and used for purposes that require it. Nearly all hydrogen produced in 2024 was made from fossil fuels. Thus, it makes no sense to burn fossil fuels to make hydrogen and then use hydrogen to drive a car for example.
Toyota’s Hydrogen Future Is Crumbling As Owners File Lawsuits, Call For Buybacks
By
External Source
Frozen pumps. Skyrocketing fuel costs. Plummeting resale values. Here’s why owners who bought into Toyota’s hydrogen dream feel “cheated and misled.”
Will hydrogen overtake batteries in the race for zero-emission cars?
By
Jasper Jolly
Batteries’ domination is likely to be extended as the money pouring into research and infrastructure addresses questions of range and charging times. Compared with that flood of investment, hydrogen is a trickle. Hydrogen’s advocates now face the question of whether they can build profitable businesses in longer-distance, heavy-duty road transport. They need an answer soon on where they will source enough green, cheap hydrogen – and whether the gas would be better used elsewhere.
The Devolution Of Hydrogen For Energy Over 25 Years Is A Fascinating Tale
By
Michael Barnard
About 25 years ago, hydrogen was the solution of choice for climate-aware technocrats and politicians, and with good reason. At the time, there really wasn’t much choice in terms of low-carbon energy carriers. Batteries were good enough for laptops and phones, but clearly no one was going to be running transportation, heating or grid storage with them. And besides, you could make hydrogen with electricity, something first done in 1800, and a staple of kids’ science classes as early as grade 4. Easy to make, high energy density and you didn’t even have to burn the stuff. You could use fuel cells, and again, those were really old technology with the first one constructed in 1842, and fuel cells used in Gemini spacecraft as far back as 1962. What’s not to love?
Hydrogen For Energy Types Are Getting More And More Angry
By
Michael Barnard
Over the past year or so, as the hydrogen for energy hype bubble has started to leak badly, a clear indicator of the end times for hydrogen energy proponents has started to emerge, anger and hostility. Why is this a clear indicator? Let’s cast our minds back eight years. Sometime before then I’d created the above continuum of climate change denial positions, from utter and mind-boggling refusal to accept reality all the way to the tiny category of people who thought it would be worse than it is going to be. As I noted at the time, Climate Change Deniers Are Getting Angrier & Here’s Why. As I observed, it was all about cognitive dissonance.
California’s Hydrogen Stations Being Fixed More Hours Than Pumping At 15% Capex Per Year
By
Michael Barnard
So, to sum up, hydrogen refueling stations in the biggest public data set, covering 55 stations over six years with millions of kilograms of hydrogen having been delivered, show that hydrogen stations are out of service 20% more time than they are pumping hydrogen and that annual maintenance costs are 15% of capex, not 4%. Do I expect the ICCT, Daimler, hydrogen refueling vendors and the US DOE to now start using 15%? No, I expect them to recreate the study I’ve just done using California’s data and more real data on capital expenditures, and come up with a number that is much more realistic than 4%. Personally, I’m comfortable with 15% and will be using it and recommending to groups I engage with that they use it.
Ballard Averaging $55 Million Annual Losses While Pushing Hydrogen Rock Uphill With Grants
By
Michael Barnard
There are three long running supporting cast members in stagings of the sad farce that is trials of hydrogen for fleets, FuelCell Energy, Plug Power and Ballard Power Systems. All of their market capitalizations peaked roughly 99% above their current stock valuations in 2000. They’ve all participated in innumerable hydrogen fleet trials, yet none of the trials has resulted in hundreds or thousands of vehicles operating on hydrogen. Quite the opposite, most have resulted in hydrogen being abandoned entirely.
More Hydrogen Fleets That Reached The End Of The Tragicomedy Including Iceland
By
Michael Barnard
One thing that the chorus is bad at is even acknowledging, never mind keeping track of, acts 4, 5 and 6, where the governmental taps are shut, leading to the fleet operators scrapping the hydrogen vehicles and getting battery electric vehicles instead, something that they should have started with.
Ontario’s Hydrogen Approach Will Be A B-School Case Study In Failure
By
Michael Barnard
Not to be left behind as the world is spun in circles by hydrogen hype, Ontario published a hydrogen strategy in 2022. Recently it announced the first approved significant project, one that involves truckloads of hydrogen leaving Niagara Falls to be burned in a gas generator over 100 kilometers away. Multiple layers of energetic and economic nonsense are involved in this.
Hydrogen Is Just Another Hole for Natural Gas to Fill
By
External Source
As the grand ambitions for that last endeavor have begun to show signs of waning, the industry has once again pivoted, this time to embrace its potential as part of America’s climate future. When the Biden administration announced this year that its build-out of facilities for hydrogen—a fuel that could help reduce emissions from heavy industry—would have a starring role for natural gas, it was hardly a surprise: The industry appears to have worked hard to ensure its place.
The Odyssey Of The Hydrogen Fleet: A Tragicomedy In Six Acts
By
Michael Barnard
But that doesn’t mean that there isn’t a legacy left behind. In the case of nuclear energy, it’s people like Michael Shellenberger, a man whose commitment to nuclear energy is so absolute that he’s become a climate change denier and anti-renewables campaigner because renewables are so obviously a better wedge against global warming. He made his career in California around the same time as hydrogen for transportation sunk its hooks into the state deeply. Sometimes it’s better to be a follower than a leader, and while California’s heart was in the right place, it’s head was stuck in a place devoid of oxygen.
