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Popswizz t1_iwq2mkq wrote

Reply to comment by [deleted] in Overhyping hydrogen as a fuel risks endangering net-zero goals by filosoful

Except it's not really, I was part of analysis on the subject and with current technology, even with free electricity (as this would be a mean to offset green energy uncontrolled output) there's no payback to pay for the machine before 10 years unless hydrogen is subsidized

And even then as you said you need a natural gas pipeline near that can accommodate high hydrogen % and natural gas heater in home that can as well which is a logistics nightmare

There's some very niche usage and the one you mention is one but it's far from a widespread technology we can use everywhere

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[deleted] t1_iwq95pj wrote

That's not really a niche usage, pretty much every home and cooker in Europe is powered by natural gas. It's not an economic suggestion by any means, it's a green one due to the speed it can be rolled out. It's far less of a logistical nightmare than replacing every boiler (of which a high percentage don't have the required hot water tanks, or the space to accommodate them) with heat pumps over the same time period. Do we even have enough heating engineers to change 200 million homes over in the few years it would take to replace methane with hydrogen at the distribution level?

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Popswizz t1_iwqq8at wrote

It's niche because not all pipeline are able to accommodate hydrogen in large quantity, because not all boiler can accommodate high percentage of hydrogen, because not all green energy powerplant is near enough a pipeline to link to it with their hydrogen production, so it's niche because logistical it's a nightmare not because it's not technically doable

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Tenrath t1_iwqdc4a wrote

I could be wrong, but I think there are also changes required at the consumption end to accommodate the change in gas. Same reasons why a propane boiler and natural gas boiler are not interchangeable without modification kits.

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[deleted] t1_iwqe6y7 wrote

There'd be small changes, yeah. I'm on the aircraft side of things, but assuming they're similar enough it'd be a component analogous to the flame holder that would be the main issue. There's a minimum hole size a flame can propagate through that depends on the gasses.

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