Solar-to-hydrogen is a growing industry. A few state governments around Australia are already investing in startup programs. Thusly:
Build a plant near the ocean with a decently sized solar farm
Suck water out of said ocean
Electrolysis
Store oxygen in one tank and hydrogen in another
Put on big boat, sail to China
Sell hydrogen to China where they can use it in gas turbine generators
The benefits are that there are no ongoing electricity costs because you get it from the sky, and the by product of hydrogen combustion is fresh water vapour.
Once the initial investment in solar panels is paid for then it’s an easy business case to continue. It does require a hell of a lot of energy to refine the water but the sun pumps it out for free.
And natural gas turbine generators only need slight modifications to convert to hydrogen use. The steam could be released to precipitate somewhere else (a possible source of climate change if the scale is big enough) or it could be captured and used in industrial settings and released into the water treatment system, saving some of the town water supply for other uses.
Some drawbacks:
China is the main customer, and we know how tricky they can be
Storing hydrogen is very difficult as its atoms are smaller than the gaps in the structure used to hold it, meaning it has to be COLD and stored in large volumes to reduce evaporation
The ideal location for these plants is close to China to reduce transit time, but a lot of northern Australia is pristine wilderness
Other than that this is a great way to massively reduce carbon emissions. And yeah we’re talking about car fuel here; just do the same thing but for cars.
Reply With Quote
Originally Posted by Dicknose
