# Cracking Hydrogen Makes More 'Cents' Than Fracking Natural Gas



## PhantomPholly (Aug 20, 2008)

According to this article, a commercial-scale hydrogen cracking plant requires 58Kwh to create 10 cubic meters of hydrogen (or about 350 cubic feet). It takes 121 cubic feet of natural gas to equal the energy of 1 gallon of gasoline, and hydrogen only contains 70% of the energy of natural gas per cubic foot - so 10 cubic meters is roughly equal to 2 gallons of gas.

Based on other threads, it seems that it takes around 7.5Kwh of energy to supply the motive energy of a gallon of gas, so that 58Kwh is roughly equal to 8 gallons of gas (to make this math simple).

Thus, it takes roughly 8 gallons of gas worth of energy to make 2 gallons of energy stored as hydrogen, for a conversion efficiency of 25%.

So the obvious question is, why would anyone want to use that energy to convert water to hydrogen, capturing only 25% of it, when you can store all of it in batteries?


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## Duncan (Dec 8, 2008)

Hi Phantom,

_So the obvious question is, why would anyone want to use that energy to convert water to hydrogen, capturing only 25% of it, when you can store all of it in batteries? _

My take is that you would do that as an intermediate stage to producing a liquid fuel that could be used in IC engines (or fuel cells if they ever get cheap enough) to take advantage of the energy density for;
long distance travel, flight, 
and possibly storage - maybe

I think you would also use the hydrogen to manufacture some other stuff - fertilizer?? 

If you were making a liquid fuel you could have your solar plant in the desert somewhere and truck the stuff away

It would probably be cheaper to run a power line to your customers


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## RIPPERTON (Jan 26, 2010)

http://hydrogenwaterfuel.com/cart/index.php?act=viewProd&productId=35


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## Jason Lattimer (Dec 27, 2008)

You can pulse modulate electricity all you want but I am afraid you will not find a loop hole in the laws of physics.


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## jeremyjs (Sep 22, 2010)

It's also not just the "cracking" that's an obstacle. Hydrogen is generally a much more expensive fuel to compress and transport than NG and has a really crappy energy density. It requires an entirely new infrastructure to transport enough around to make any sort of difference. I love the concept of using hydrogen, but it's still got most of the same obstacles in front of it that were there 10+ years ago that make it impractical.


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## RIPPERTON (Jan 26, 2010)

Jason Lattimer said:


> You can pulse modulate electricity all you want but I am afraid you will not find a loop hole in the laws of physics.


I think you better tell Stanley Meyers that.


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## poprock (Apr 29, 2010)

Hasn't he been dead for 13 years? We'll wait until the resurrection then tell him


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## PhantomPholly (Aug 20, 2008)

Duncan said:


> Hi Phantom,
> 
> _So the obvious question is, why would anyone want to use that energy to convert water to hydrogen, capturing only 25% of it, when you can store all of it in batteries? _
> 
> ...


Well, that somewhat ignores two very real issues: a) Liquid Hydrogen is not nearly as dense as gasoline, nor does it contain as much energy per gallon; b) Turning that Hydrogen into a liquid form and then storing it for any amount of time will take even MORE energy than simply separating it from water.

In any event, my question was somewhat rhetorical. Hydrogen today is clearly not a fantastic substitute for gasoline in situations requiring the greatest possible energy-density, and it is inefficient compared to other solutions where energy density is not critical. Despite that, it seems to have an almost cult following. What is it about this red herring that gets people so devoted?


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## Ziggythewiz (May 16, 2010)

poprock1 said:


> Hasn't he been dead for 13 years? We'll wait until the resurrection then tell him


No! He still lives. Just like his engine.

I have a friend who knows a guy that runs his truck on just water, foreverz!

It's on youtube, check it out.


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## Duncan (Dec 8, 2008)

Hi Phantom

When I said - _producing a liquid fuel_ - I was thinking about using the hydrogen to react with something else to produce methanol or some other "liquid at room temperature" fuel 
a "designer gasoline" if you will

liquifying the hydrogen is not a good strategy!


_Despite that, it seems to have an almost cult following. What is it about this red herring that gets people so devoted? _

I don't know - some of it is the oily boys wanting to keep a fuel they can control - but there are a lot of people that seem to be nuts about it


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