Hydrogen had a breakout year. Why are some VCs still skeptical?
Hydrogen had a breakout year. Why are some VCs still skeptical?
Hydrogen startups are on pace to raise more VC funding in 2023 than in the prior two years combined, according to PitchBook's 2024 Industrial Technology Outlook.
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Because it's still just fossil fuels with an extra step in the middle. Electrolysis doesn't generate more hydrogen energy than input, so water is still a net loss source. So you're still getting it from drilling. So not really solving the actual problem at all. And by the time you do figure out an energy positive source that isn't destructive, battery density will make it irrelevant anyways.
"94 million tonnes of grey hydrogen are produced globally using fossil fuels as of 2022, primarily natural gas, and are therefore a significant source of greenhouse gas emissions."
Hydrogen has always been a scam put forth by the oil companies. It's pretending to be green and revolutionary while being the exact same thing as before.
That's just gaslighting by the BEV fanatics. In reality, hydrogen and its derivatives are the only way of powering the majority of transportation. Everything else you hear is total bullshit.
I have an EV that I charge in my garage. You will never get me back in a car where I have to go fill it somewhere. It doesn't matter how good the tech is, the personal convenience of hydrogen is less than BEV, which is all anyone actually cares about.
So you will never charge at a public station ever again? You will never travel long distances for the rest of your life?
Seriously, fuck off with this obvious lie. In reality, this is a made-up argument by BEV arguments. Of course you will charge publicly at some point in the future. And since driving happens far away from your house most of the time, it is the more convenient solution. Not to mention people who don’t have a garage to begin with.
Fuck off with the obvious nit picking. You got me. I use super chargers like 1% of the time. I'll definitely switch to less convenient hydrogen when it comes out thanks to your amazing ability to argue the least relevant bit of my point. Why wouldn't I want to stand out in the freezing cold a few times a week filling my car with highly explosive gas instead of plugging it in like my phone at home?
Then you admit you can tolerate public charging. So you have no argument to make.
And here's the more shocking fact: Home refueling is possible. In fact, it has always been possible. Things like lawnmowers or leafblowers have traditionally been refueled at home. You always could have some kind of fuel delivery service. But it never took off. Why? Because the gas station was the better idea and everyone agreed with it.
Same is true with hydrogen. In fact, you can envision some kind of home electrolysis system and such concepts exist too. But very few people wanted it. Proving that this need is a fictional one. No one wanted it until BEV fanatic suddenly decided that they wanted it.
Do you think this is high school debate club? I can do all this complicated shit that nobody in reality will actually do and that proves you right? Nobody is going to choose hydrogen over BEV, nobody is going to build out a hydrogen distribution network because BEV will bankrupt any company that tries and nobody is going to install some stupid hydrogen generating crap when they can more efficiently put that energy directly into a battery. It doesn't matter how clean or better you think hydrogen is, IT'S NOT AS CONVENIENT!
You're too deep in your BEV fanaticism then. Of course millions of people will choose hydrogen over BEVs. Simply because they have no choice. In the long run, this is going to be the solution nearly everyone adopts. It is basically a one-to-one replacement for conventional cars.
I'm sure you have something to back up "they'll have no choice", because right now it seems like hydrogen is getting left in the dust. Even the champions of hydrogen, Toyota, have relented and are building a fleet of BEVs. Spoiler alert: they're not going to build out two separate assembly lines, no matter how much they want hydrogen to win.
Again, you are too deep in your BEV fanaticism to realize obvious facts. In reality, this is a dead end. Car companies are only doing it for the subsidies and because governments demand it. Once this era passes, BEVs will fade away into obscurity or at best a niche. We already seeing signs of this, as BEVs sales have slowed (hidden by huge discounts and fleet sales BTW).
At some point, there will have to be a real attempt at zero emissions transportation. One that works for everyone. That inevitably leads to hydrogen cars. If not, then derivative ideas like e-fuels.
This won't happen all at once, nor will we suddenly pivot from one idea to the other. Hydrogen cars will steadily grow in popularity until anti-hydrogen denial becomes unsustainable and eventually people will embrace the concept.
It won't happen at all, because you can't seem to make any arguments beside "It's cleaner" and "You're a BEV fanatic". If that's seriously the arguments for hydrogen, it's doomed.
The truth is that you're arguing that a theoretical technology is going to win out over the one with tens of billions of dollars of current invetment and millions of vehicles already operating. All this while providing no actual benefit to the end consumer over BEV.
As an EV owner, I would actually love to get a hydrogen car, home charging is just not as convenient especially for someone like me who travels long every day and unless you are in the main city, quick refills will always be better. Have an ioniq 5, the EV depreciation also pretty much sucks.
That being said EVs have come a long way, great improvements over the years and they continue to improve, charging is not the only issue, battery weight (I can literraly feel how heavy ioniq 5 is while driving compared to my old gas car), depreciation, degradation and etc.
FCEVs are basically BEVs, but without the giant battery weighing it down. It should be pretty obvious that FCEVs are a good idea to any BEV fan. Sadly, too many of them have drank the kool-aid and are opposed to further innovation beyond their own car.
But fuel cells still rely on raw materials and I imagine they are more energy intensive to produce and more expensive as a technology to develop and produce than the already established ICE technology which has been around for decades.
This is why I am personally rooting for hydrogen on ICE to be honest - besides the unmatched emotion an ICE can give you obviously haha.
A fuel cell is staggeringly small compared to the alternative. For instance, the fuel cell stack in the Mirai only weighs around 50kg. As a result, this is likely to be the cheapest and least resource intensive powertrain in the long-run.
ICE will have advantages in terms of design maturity and a having century of optimization. It will probably always be more desirable in sports cars. But eventually, even ICE cars will probably lose to FCEVs.
it seems like despite the fuel cell itself being relatively small, I just googled the weight of Toyota's hydrogen corolla racing prototype, which weighs 4210 lbs, while the toyota mirai weighs around 4400 lbs, Google bard also says Toyota is aiming to make it's hydrogen combustion corolla weigh less than 3,700 lbs as development continues.
Super interesting, I honestly think ICE development is being pushed to even more advanced levels, I think with the right infrastructure, they can certainly compete and if they take off I don't see fuel cells being favored over them.
It's crazy how despite how old the ICE technology is, these companies can still find ways to keep improving it, despite the engine being much heavier, the overall car weight is actually less than the Mirai which itself is a great feat. I'm personally optimistic about Hydrogen combustion for sure.
Also it seems like the weight on the Mirai could also be due to the battery it has as a backup after the fuel cell itself, and then electric motors, if you look at the whole package it does get heavier.
BEVs need spare battery capacity too. Plus electric motors. The main issue is that the Mirai is based off of the Toyota Crown, which is already pretty heavy. If they really wanted too, they could've shaved off a huge amount of weight.
Please do share facts...
You need something that can fully replace fossil fuels. This includes all core factors, such as maximum range, refueling times, and yes, even energy density. After all, it makes no sense to replace fossil fuels with something inferior. As a result, any basic analysis will lead you to some kind of fuel derived from hydrogen. Nothing else we have can meet all of the necessary criteria. As a result, it pretty much has to be hydrogen or something derived from it.
PS: Biofuels don't count, because there is no way to scale up production to the needed levels.
But why not use localised fusion power, or orbital solar power if we're talking non-realised solutions?
Hydrogen is highly hyped by the oil industry to be their new product line after peak oil, but it doesn't solve most of the major issues of fossil fuels, introduces more problems that we haven't yet solved, and the industry hasn't yet developed feasible ways to utilise hydrogen that actually lowers fossil fuel consumption.
It's a cool idea, less proven than most.
As I said, this is all gaslighting. Green hydrogen is already a developed technology. We've already know how to make it. The anti-hydrogen rhetoric is just bullshit. If anything, the critics are working for the oil industry, since they are repeat arguments nearly identical to what the fossil fuel industry said about wind, solar, electrification, etc.
Without data, you're the one attempting to gaslight. Please provide sources, or wait until we meet in a hydrogen car to be smug.
Without proof to back up your claims, you're indistinguishable from someone misunderstanding facts, or even someone lying. With sources, you become trustworthy, seems like well worth the effort to provide them.
I see hydrogen cars drive by nearly every day. It’s you who is totally out of touch with reality. Next you’ll be telling me smartphones are impossible, or that OLED TVs will never happen. Or whatever “it’s impossible” bullshit for something that already exists.
Um, those are facts. That quote was pulled directly from Wikipedia. It's got numerous sources if you'd like those too. It also lists the tiny percent derived from electrolysis too. So what part of "most hydrogen is a byproduct of fossil fuels and doesn't remove our dependence on them or the climate destruction they caused" was gaslighting? Because again, those are just facts.
Which was written by BEV fanatics. Still gaslighting. Sources are also just bullshit from BEV fanatics. None of it is real. It's just all made-up crap. Even the grid will be partially powered by hydrogen due to the need for long-duration energy storage. So even BEVs will need hydrogen to reach zero emissions. That's just how ludicrous the corporate propaganda has gotten. It literally denies its own basis for existence, because the BEV industry simply cannot let hydrogen take off on any level. They know, deep down, that it is the primary disruptive threat to the BEV, and it will kill off the BEV if it ever gained marketshare.