WHY HYDROGEN?

Two major news stories recently about hydrogen.

• In September the White House launched a generational $7 billion hydrogen plan.
• Then this month the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNR) announced a momentous breakthrough in harnessing controlled nuclear fusion.

When I retired in 1999 I took on the gargantuan task to help save Humanity and Planet Earth.  Wrote several books on the subject.  Two of my early contributions were, one, in 1979 drafting the first hydrogen bill when I worked in the U.S. Senate.  And second, this was after spending two stints at LLNR working on the laser fusion program.  I keep telling people that I'm here just to plant seeds for the future.  Well, such good news more than 40 years later is fine enough for me.

Long ago I became enamored with hydrogen, for our Sun and all the stars generate energy by fusing this gas.  It is the most abundant element in the Universe.  Combust hydrogen in our atmosphere, and the products are energy and water.  If someone up there is trying to send a clue, certainly, our future must be the Hydrogen Economy.

Further: 

• Hydrogen has an atomic number of 1.
• Melting point of -434.5 F.
• Boiling point of -423.2 F. 

• 
  First produced by Robert Boyle in 1671 during an experiment with iron and acid.
• Discovered by Henry Cavendish in 1766.
• Has atomic weight of 1.00794.
• Large planets and Sun consist mainly of hydrogen.
• Our Sun and all stars produce energy by consuming hydrogen in a process called fusion.
• Scientist are trying to do the same through inertial confinement using lasers or magnetic confinement in a vessel.  There will certainly be issues of concern, such as, do we have enough tritium to sustain a future industry.? I suspect this requirement will be met.  Can we someday fuse hydrogen?  Don't know.

• 
  The gravity of smaller planets cause hydrogen to escape into space.  Earth has little gaseous hydrogen, but this molecule is tightly bound into water and hydrocarbons to be the third most abundant element on Earth.
• It is the most abundant element in the Universe, with 90% of atoms and 75% of the mass, mostly in the atomic state as plasma.
• However, because it is so light, while the most abundant element in our body, is only #3 in mass next to oxygen and carbon.

• 
  There are three natural isotopes:  protium, deuterium and tritium.  
• Protium, also known as hydrogen, has 1 proton, no neutrons and 1 electron, making it the only element without neutrons.
• Deuterium has one of each and tritium has 2 neutrons, which makes it radioactive.
• Is extremely flammable.
• Hydrogen compounds are called hydrides.

• 
  Hydrogen may be produced by heating metals with acids, like zinc with hydrochloric acid.
• Of course, electrolyzing water gives hydrogen and oxygen.

• 
  The media is flooded with a variety of promising processes in various states of research and development, such as the use of high frequency vibrations to enhance electrolysis.  To the right is this technique being advanced by researchers at Melbourne's RMIT University.

• 
  Magical solutions for hydrogen production flood the media, but the ultimate process will someday meet the test of economic competitiveness.

• 
  Hydrogen is used for processing fossil fuels and in the production of ammonia.  Someday, it will become valuable for use in fuel cells, and liquified for jet fuel.

• 
  Hydrogen is the only atom for which the Schrodinger equation has an exact solution, whatever that means.

Again, these unique qualities must be a clue about its potential importance for Humanity.

Thus, when I was asked to work for Senator Spark Matsunaga in 1979, one of my goals was to have him initiate a national hydrogen program.  How this happened, however, was nicely fortuitous.  I was spending time at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory on laser fusion that summer, so when I joined his office, I asked him to drop by the lab for a visit, for all kinds of interesting things were happening there.  He did so, and when he returned, he asked me to draft a bill for hydrogen.  I was a bit puzzled, for I thought he wanted me to focus on the isotopes for fusion.  But somehow when he talked to scientist at LLNR, something got in his mind about using solar energy to produce hydrogen.  That was the beginning of what became the Matsunaga Hydrogen Act.

• 
  While I drafted that legislation in 1979, it took a decade to actually pass as the Spark M. Matsunaga Hydrogen Research, Development, and Demonstration Act of 1990.
• Created was the U.S. Secretary of Energy's Hydrogen Technical Advisory Panel, to which I was named.  I chaired the group in the early 1990's.  We had regular national meetings across the country to gain input.  What was worrisome to me was that 95% of the contributors were too optimistic about the early prospects for commercialization.

• 
  This panel generated The Green Hydrogen Report, which guided Congressional funding for a decade.  Read my posting of earlier this year, which provides details on what really happened.  Here is one quote:

• This Panel was unique, in that it reported in parallel to the Secretary of Energy and the U.S. Congress.  There is no other federal panel capable of legally doing this.
• Thus, we annually officially filed the recommended hydrogen budget to Congress, while the Department of Energy did the same.  The budget was identical.
• Hydrogen is one of those subjects that was alway bipartisan.  Thus, there was no contention.

Other quotes from that earlier blog.

In afterthought, I later realized that the transition of hydrogen from dream to reality would be particularly lengthy.  It was too expensive in 2000, and today still too expensive to produce.  If hydrogen is this fuel for our future, though, why not find a way to get to the Hydrogen Economy faster?  So in 2006 I suggested a mechanism to bypass the traditional R&D to commercialization pathway.  From the first of my HuffPo's on the subject:

On March 21, 2006, at the annual luncheon of the NationalHydrogen Association (NHA) Conference in Long Beach, California, I received the Spark Matsunaga Memorial Hydrogen Award, usually given to an elected official. However, as I was the individual who U.S. Senator Spark Matsunaga assigned in 1980 to write the first draft of his hydrogen bill, I guess I was considered to be close enough to qualify. The second recipient, in 1992, was U.S. Senator Daniel Akaka, whose letter of congratulations was read by Jeff Serfass of NHA. Other awardees have included Congressmen and Senators, although Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger received this honor in 2004. Walking up to the podium, aside from the assorted obligatory thank you, I wondered what I was going to say. (Pardon me for mentioning all this, but a degree of credibility helps when one leaps beyond the edge of the envelope.) It then came to me in a moment of splendid inspiration, bursting forth from a third of a century of deliberation--MAKE HYDROGEN FREE.

Well, FREE Hydrogen went nowhere, so in three Huffington Post articles, I adjusted the plan:

What About Free Hydrogen? (Part 1)

What About Free Hydrogen? (Part 2)

The Free and Clean Hydrogen Age (Part 3)

That posting articulated on the future of air transportation.

• Electricity is less than 40% of the problem.  What about air transport, etc.?
• Some say the future of ground transport will be electric vehicles.  But batteries are expensive.  A fuel cell is more efficient than batteries.  In time hydrogen and fuel cells will overtake EVs.  In the transition, a direct methanol fuel cell will precede hydrogen.
• Progress on aviation self-sufficiency has been slow, if not non-existent.
• 
  The Matsunaga Hydrogen Act recommended that the Department of Defense and NASA develop the National Aerospace Plane, which will be powered by hydrogen.  Turns out that many billions were spent to start a program, but there was little obvious progress.  This effort became a Black (secret) Program, and I'm not sure what is happening today.
• Read my HuffPo on:

The Future of Sustainable Aviation

So here is my current thinking about hydrogen:

• The transition will take dedication and time and effort and money.  Here is an article to read:  Hydrogen May be a Climate Solution.  The driver will be global warming.

• 
  Breakthroughs will be necessary:
• Another metal to replace platinum in a fuel cell.
• A catalyst to convert biomass gases into methanol.
• An efficient direct methanol fuel cell.
• Using sunlight to more effectively generate hydrogen from water.
• Aviation applications of hydrogen needs a lot of work.
• Other technologies such as ocean thermal energy conversion must be utilized to produce hydrogen at sea.
• Commercialization of fusion needs to happen.

So why hydrogen?  Someday, this simple element will power our future society.  As our Sun and all our stars emit energy for billions of years, hydrogen will someday, too, be the lifeblood for Humanity, and in the process, eliminate the dangers of global warming. However, don't be impatient.  This will take time and wise planning.

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