The Hydrogen Economy

Good discussion on the Hydrogen Economy over at Kuro5hin The author starts off by examining the pros and cons of Hydrogen. They then wind up with this analysis: bq. The advantages of the hydrogen economy, i.e. solving the environmental issues with fossil fuels and independence of dwindling oil reserves and the volatile nations that sell most of it, can be achieved much cheaper with an energy economy based on biomass based or synthetic diesel. Another major advantage of this is that no major infrastructure investments are needed for the storage and transportation of the fuel, as the current energy infrastructure is well equipped to handle it. As Bio/synthetic diesel production ramps up it can be blended with petroleum diesel, providing a smooth transition away from fossil fuels. Similarly, in the future when fuel cells equipped with (internal or external) reformers become more competitive than diesel engines, the transition to fuel cells is smooth because they can use the same fuel. There are reader comments at the end of this -- these are also worth checking out. Good stuff!