Hydrogen isn’t considered an energy source, it’s more of a way to store energy. Currently, electrolysis to produce hydrogen from water is very inefficient, but using nano-materials a company called QSI Quantumsphere has boosted efficiency to 85%. You still need enough energy to make up the difference but if you used solar or some other […]
Written on Monday, July 7th, 2008 by jackieortega :: 0 comments to this post
Hydrogen isn’t considered an energy source, it’s more of a way to store energy. Currently, electrolysis to produce hydrogen from water is very inefficient, but using nano-materials a company called QSI Quantumsphere has boosted efficiency to 85%. You still need enough energy to make up the difference but if you used solar or some other source for the electricity, you could produce the hydrogen as you need it, for combustion or to use in a fuel cell.
It’s risky to carry a tank of hydrogen in your car, it can be reduced to a liquid or even a solid metallic form, but that requires still more energy. The only by-product from using hydrogen is water so it won’t reduce oxygen levels.
Using corn to make fuel is stupid and inefficient, the US Department of Energy is testing the use of switchgrass to make ethanol and it appears it’s far more efficient. Corn ethanol returns 25% more energy than it takes to produce it and requires good farmland to produce. Switchgrass not only uses marginal land that isn’t now used for farming at all, but it returns 540% more energy than it takes to grow it. It also has a permanent root system that stores 94% of the CO2 produced from making it and burning it as a fuel, with fewer greenhouse gas emissions than corn ethanol.
Either of these are very promising new ways to fuel cars in the future, with less or even no pollutants.
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