Promoting
the Recognition of the Importance of Hydrogen Technologies.
Developing
hydrogen technologies will enable renewable and traditional energy
resources to be used to make major reductions in total atmospheric
CO2 emissions.
Hydrogen
NOW! is the name of our renewed campaign which we hope you will join
to get the development of hydrogen technology recognised by the UK government
as an essential key to the large scale development of renewable energy
supplies. Hydrogen technologies will also improve the efficiency of
using traditional energy sources and so yield more energy for the same
amount of CO2 emission to the atmosphere.
Hydrogen NOW! online Journal will be a regular feature and each issue
will carry articles supporting the urgency of the campaign to reduce
CO2 emissions and to get the importance of hydrogen technologies recognised.
Each issue
will be archived with an ongoing index in the current issue. This will
form a useful indexed reference to the development of ideas and supporting
research. This magazine archive style approach will be a record of our
warnings and hopefully establish the credibility of Hydrogen NOW!. It
is hoped that the articles published will not be regarded as pessimistic
predictions of doom but rather as an ongoing reminder that we must get
on with reducing CO2 emissions to the atmosphere.
In
the next few months a series of articles will be published in
Hydrogen NOW! that will present the latest research findings on
how we may have very little time left to control CO2. The world's
climate is in a dangerous situation and we must do every thing
we can NOW to get CO2 emissions falling before the middle of this
century. On present trends of rising CO2 emissions we could cross
a thresh hold for runaway global warming round about the year
2050.
We
are already stuck with some global warming, it can only get worse
in the future unless we act more quickly and on a more ambitious
scale. At present we are doing too little, don't let it become
too little too late.
World
governments are not moving fast enough in reducing CO2 emissions
because their approach is based on an assumption that global warming
and it's associated effects are a linear phenomenon. They appear
to assume that global warming is going to progress steadily and
predictably and there is time for things to be done in traditional
ways and preserve the established interests and needs of business
by gradual change. They assume that taking time will only result
in a bit more warming and a bit more damage that will be offset
by preserving existing asset values. Things may not turn out like
this as you will see in article 1 and we could all end up a lot
worse off as a result.
Despite
the mounting evidence of global warming and climate change there
continues to be a lack of political urgency about reducing CO2
emissions. The UK government continues to relegate the importance
of hydrogen to beyond 2025 and does not adequately support the
development of alternative sources of energy.
Why are hydrogen technologies so important?
Hydrogen
technologies will enable variable renewable sources of electricity
such as wind power to be independent of the National ( electricity
) Grid with it's need to schedule supplies. This is because hydrogen
made by electrolysing water can be stored and has added value
as a vehicle fuel.
Using
hydrogen delivered by pipeline as a gas or by ocean barge tanker
as a liquid would facilitate the large scale transfer of energy
to the UK from areas of low cost hydro-electricity and other CO2
free methods of generating electricity around the world such as
photo-voltaic installations in Southern Europe or North Africa.
Hydrogen
technology is the key to the development of fuelcells running
on natural gas for domestic combined heat and power systems and
for the distributed generation of electricity. Hydrogen technologies
can replace inefficient traditional combustion technologies which
waste up to 2 / 3 of the fuel used.
Hydrogen
could even make nuclear power plants in remote secure areas economically
viable. Nuclear power has the mirror image of the variable output
problem that renewable energy resources suffer from. Nuclear power
needs a steady constant 24 hours a day demand and so hydrogen
production would be a natural application for nuclear power.
To
summarise, hydrogen technologies will make the following possible:
1)
Renewable energy supplies will have access to the higher value
vehicle fuel market and so be less dependent on the National (
electricity ) Grid
2)
Large quantities of energy could be economically and efficiently
moved around the world
3)
The energy recovery from natural gas could be improved by up to
50%
4)
Small scale domestic combined heat and power and distributed electricity
generation will become viable.
5)
World energy supplies can be liberated from the monopoly ownership
of fossil fuels
6)
Energy supply systems can be reduced in scale to suit local demand
7)
There will be no environmental limitations on the amount of energy
that can be used, this will be very important for justifying energy
intensive recycling of materials.
Only
by increasing the efficiency of energy use and by switching to
non-carbon fuels will significant reductions in CO2 emissions
be achieved. Hydrogen and renewables must be developed together.
If we delay the development of hydrogen technologies then we also
delay the expansion of renewable energy technologies that are
needed to cut CO2 emissions. The two areas of technology are very
complimentary and mutually supportive.
For details of hydrogen and renewable energy and our policy for
integrating renewable energy systems into the UK energy supply
please see the hydrogen and renewables sections of this site.
For
Hydrogen NOW! Journal click here
