Trudeau's embrace of hydrogen is another pipe dream of our leftist government

I suspect Trudeau has never heard of entropy and has no idea what it means

Compared to electric vehicles (EV’s), hydrogen powered vehicles are grossly inefficient.

The chart is a great tool to get the point across, but it was created by “Energy Minute”, another group pushing the “climate change” narrative and conveniently leaving off the chart the energy losses that precede so-called “renewable energy” pretending that it is a free good. In reality, solar and wind operate at a tiny fraction of their rated capacity and the gap between the number of gigawatts they are rated to generate and what actually makes it onto the grid is on the order of 80-90%.

Almost as a footnote, the chart points out that internal combustion engines typically deliver only 10% to 20% of the energy in the fuel to the wheels of the car. While that is in the ballpark of a correct estimate, it ignores the reality that the oil and gas hasn’t lost any of its energy before being pumped into car engines or electrical generating stations and, in the case of car engines, loses almost nothing in transmission while electrical transmission suffers losses of about 8% to 15%

It is impossible to make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear and likewise impossible to make an argument consistent with the laws of physics that energy from “renewables” is more efficient that energy from hydrocarbons, but it is relatively easy to determine that hydrogen can’t cut it as an energy source. The largest losses aren’t on the chart and they are the costs of creating the hydrogen itself since despite its abundancy as an element of many compounds (particularly water and natural gas) it is not a stable element in nature and the source of hydrogen for power is typically electrolysis of water or fractionation of a hydrocarbon like methane.

Entropy is a property of energy conversion that is inescapable. If you change the the form of energy there will be losses to undesirable uses and the work performed on the objective of the conversion will always be less than the energy contained in the original source. Only nuclear energy is free from significant energy losses on conversion but the inability to control the application of the nuclear power is responsible for the fear of its misuse. The size and scale of a nuclear power plants are a reflection of the need to control the power generated, not increase its efficiency in use.

Hydrogen costs from electrolysis average about $3 to $6.55 per kilogram ($3,000 to $6,555 per tonne) if the source of power for the electrolysis is “renewables” like wind and solar, and less if fossil fuels are used which defeats the purpose if the objective is the alarmist desire for reduced use of fossil fuels.

Hydrogen as a fuel to generate electricity can produce about 33,000 KwH per tonne but the energy required for the electrolysis consumes 33% of the benefit (67% efficiency) so the net gain is 33,000 x .67 = 22,000 KwH per tonne. Electricity from hydrogen has a cost of between $0.14 and $0.27 per KwH when adjusted for the entropy of conversion (i.e. the efficiency).

It takes 7.43 cubic feet of natural gas to produce one KwH of electricity and with gas now about $3 per thousand cubic feet the cost of power from natural gas is approximately 3 cents leaving aside royalties and taxes to make the comparison one based on physics rather than tax policies. Electricity from hydrogen becomes competitive with natural gas only when natural gas prices rise about seven fold from today’s level or the costs of electrolysis to produce hydrogren drop about 90%. The Trudeau government is sure to enact policies to tip the scales in favour of hydrogen even though that will squander resources.