Energy of Hydrogen

Archive for the ‘Hydrogen energy’ Category

There is no secret that electrical energy consumption increases from year to year. Nobuo Tanaka, Executive Director of the International Energy Agency, said that we would have 55% rise in world energy demand by 2030. The demand for energy is growing and the raw materials for the fossil fuel economy are diminishing. Past hopes for “the peaceful atom” turned out to be not as promising as they seemed, and the prospects of thermonuclear energy taming and its usage in the nearest future are still unclear. Thereby one sees more and more that alternative ways of energy production must be found.

Current energy economy has essential disadvantage: Most of the people who consume fossil fuels don’t live where fuels are. The fossil fuel economy puts people and nations under the influence of energy suppliers. This situation doesn’t make our world more sustainable. There is enormous economic motivation to try to exert control over the regions that supply the fuels.

The advantages of using hydrogen as an energy carrier is comprised in the following: the only byproducts of the hydrogen combustion are water and heat. Neither greenhouse gasses nor other particulates are produced by the use of hydrogen fuel cells. Sustainable production system can be achieved if hydrogen is produced by electrolysis.

Furthermore, hydrogen can be produced locally from numerous sources. Hydrogen gas can be produced from methane, gasoline, coal and etc. Each of these sources brings with it different amounts of pollution, technical challenges, and energy requirements. Hydrogen can be produced at large, centralized hydrogen production facilities that can take advantage of economies of scale and meet increased hydrogen demand. Further down the road, hydrogen can be produced onsite where it will be used.

Renewable energy such as wind, hydro, solar and tidal also can be used to produce the hydrogen from water. Renewable energy sources are often limited for commercial use due to their intermittent availability. Each of the natural energy resources depends directly on the natural phenomena that can not be managed or controlled by human. Sometimes the wind doesn’t blow or the sun doesn’t shine, so hydrogen can be the critical link used as a storage medium to supply power during these periods. Hydrogen can be used as a mobile source of power for transportation by being compressed and stored in small tanks for applications similar to gasoline or propane.

Further rapid development of modern power generation and transport industries will inevitably bring our civilization to environmental and energy crisis of unprecedented scale. Sooner or later, mineral resources of the planet will be exhausted. Depletion of existing fossil fuel reserves urges the industrial countries to put forth maximum efforts to  find alternative renewable sources of clean energy. Hydrogen energy is one of the most promising options for alternative power engineering. It can replace conventional fuel for transport and for thermal and electric energy production. Hydrogen, being practically inexhaustible source of energy, may save our world.

On the one hand hydrogen can be burnt down providing thermal energy and ordinary water as waste products. On the other hand obtaining electromotive force hydrogen can be used as one of oxidizing agents in the so-called fuel cells. Fuel Cell is an electrochemical device in which the energy of fuel and oxidant continuously supplied to electrodes is directly converted into electricity without low-efficient combustion process. As there is no heat/power conversion in these devices, their energy efficiency is much higher than that of traditional power units, and can reach 90%

Researchers and engineers are looking for ways to introduce hydrogen fuel and electrochemical generators on the basis of Fuel Cells in the most power-consuming industries including transport vehicles. Probably use of hydrogen as a principal source of power will create an absolutely new hydrogen economy. The results of this scientific and technological breakthrough can be compared to such revolutionary changes in the development of our civilization as those provided by electric power, internal combustion engine, chemistry and oil chemistry, information technologies and telecommunications. About 1000 companies, industrial groups, research labs pursue researches in different areas of hydrogen energy such as: Hydrogen Production, Hydrogen Storage, Hydrogen Delivery, Hydrogen Consumption.