The Hydrogen Economy – Are we there yet???

Ahhh! The time when we are independent of foreign oil. Car and truck exhausts will produce nothing but clean, pure water. When your Honda Accord gets low on fuel, you fill up with hydrogen at the local “gas” station – hydrogen that is made from water and electricity.

This is the pipe dream that a lot of us are waiting for, to come true. Politicians have been talking about it, engineers have been restlessly working on it – and our president has opened up a budget (small, but existent) for it. But the question is “When are we going to get there?”

Keeping a long story short, ladies and gentlemen – the answer is “Not for a while”. Current technolog, which is being shown at car shows, is a long way away from the point where it will be used in cars, which would drive and last like our gasoline powered cars. Furthermore the infrastructure for hydrogen delivery has some hurdles of its own to overcome. Governor Schwarznegger of California plans to have hydrogen refueling stations, every 20 miles on major interstates, by the end of 2010 – but unfortunately this is going to be an exercise in proving that “clean” hydrogen production is very expensive.

Let us fast-forward a couple decades: The hydrogen-economy is now here - this is what we will see: Hydrogen will be the energy carrier – it will replace the batteries and gasoline we use today. The energy to create the hydrogen will come from some other source – it could be a combination of wind, solar and hydro, as geography permits – but, in the US, it will more than likely be nuclear. This translates into more nuclear plants and finding ways to safely deal with nuclear wastes.

In the interim what do we do to help? Our best bet now, as we inch towards this transition is conservation. We have to conserve our natural resources by minimizing wastes and using energy efficient transportation. The gasoline-electric hybrid cars, available in the market are today, are an excellent tool to use.

However, surely and certainly we will wean away from our dependency on the dinosaur. A child born today will have a hydrogen-powered automobile for her first car.