the Hydrogen Economy
The hydrogen economy a potential system to replace a carbon based energy system. There are advantages to such a change:
- reduced overall carbon emissions.
- electricity is generated on demand.
- the use of hydrogen gas as a fuel is feasible - 1 kg of hydrogen contains the same energy as 2.5 kg of natural gas or 2.7 lk of petrol and can produce 120MJ of heat when burnt.
- internal combustion engines can reengineered to use hydrogen as a fuel.
But there issues with a change to a hydrogen based economy.
One claim is that a lot of energy is wasted and only 25% of the initial amount of energy is available for practical use (physorg, 2006).
However, the amount of electricity lost from the transmission lines between the user and the power stations is also significant. Then charging the batteries of an electric vehicle will also include some wastage.
There have been vehicles on our roads for a long time that use hydrogen for their fuel. Prior to the switch to natural gas, the UK used town gas - a mixture of hydrogen and carbon dioxide. Some cars and buses were adapted to use town gas as fuel.
(physorg, 2006) - www.physorg.com/news85074285.html