When will hydrogen energy enter the market?

Answer 1

whenever the technology is developed to make it cheap to produce and safe to store. Neither is currently available.

Answer 2

It will probably strike on the industrial level before it makes it to the consumer level. The infrastructure necessary to support hydrogen energy is quite impressive and imposes significant costs. As such, it is suited to a large manufacturer or energy consumer, or even a utility company that wishes to free itself of the constraints of commodity consumption (ie, oil and coal).

However, I think that the utility companies will continue to rely upon coal since it is abundant, cheap and far cleaner today than it was 15 years ago.

Hydrogen vehicles are underway, but it will still be another four or five years. GM has announced plans to introduce a hydrogen SUV by 2009, though whether there is sufficient infrastructure to support the fuel remains to be seen.

Answer 3

When there is an economically practical way to manufacture, store, and deliver it. At this point, the only practical way to create hydrgon is through electrolysis. This process requires electrical energy that creates more emissions and costs more than the fuels hydrogen will replace. There is no infrastructure existing to store and deliver hydrogen fuel even if a method of manufacturing was developed.

Consider that such a simple thing as an idiot proof method of connecting to and removing the fueling line from a vehicle does not even exist.

Answer 4

The problem with hydrogen technology is that the hydrogen must be extracted from water. Clean water, worldwide, is already becoming relatively scarce, and it's going to become even more so.

In fact, by the time oil shortages become critical, water shortages will be also - so replacing oil with hydrogen is *not* going to be an option.

The best, most reliable, and cheapest energy in the post-oil world will be human-powered. The smart research money should be going into ways to make bicycles, crank-generators, and other human-power systems more efficient.

Answer 5

Its all a matter of politics and money really. I mean, as is we have the technology, we just cant develop it for a number of different reasons. Its got to be a gradual approach to ensure that no one goes bankrupt doing it. And the governemnt has to be a big help as well.
On one side, you got the car companies.They have spent years of their time, and millions of their dollars on R&D to create the technology necessary for hydrogen fuel cell cars. And they now have it at a attainable level for the public (still pricey, but not too over the top, in a few years should be cheap for everyone) However they cant waste their money producing these cars because no one will buy them. Why you ask? Simple, whos going to go to the dealer and buy a nifty new hydrogen fuel cell car if when they take it outta the dealer there isnt a SINGLE gas station offering fuel for it? No one will buy the car because they cant fuel it, which means the car companies will waste millions producing a car that no one will buy.
So why dont the energy companies offer hydrogen energy you may ask? simple answer again, THERE ARE NO CARS to offer the energy to right now. If Chevron tomorow decided it wanted to offer hydrogen as a fuel alternative at gas stations it would have to invest MILLIONS to build the infrastructure for it. First you gotta buy a fleet of trucks that can safely transport the stuff (hydrogen isnt exactly the most stable of the elements) then you gotta build the proper chamber to store this new fuel, since hydrogen has to be in a cool stable environment preferably underground (taking away room for gasoline storing chambers, cutting profits by a significant margin) and then you gotta also develop the manpower to handle this new technology (this means new engineers, and employees who know about the new technology in case any probems arise) Not to mention the millions they will spend in what will most certainly be many government regulations on handling this stuff.
All that money and effort for what? if the hydrogen fuel cell market is 0.% right now? Why offer something when theres no demand for it? and how in gods name will there ever be a demand for something if theres no supply to upkeep it? its a tug of war, and theres no easy simple fast way of doing it. I think that the next 10 years will see lots of change, and that gradually we will slip into a fuel cell market.... till then buy yourself a bicycle to see if you can save a few bucks on gas....

So in short, my answer to your question is that there will be no specific date, its gonna be a gradual slip into a hydrogen fuel cell society. Eventually i believe EVERYTHING will be done with hydrogen, so for the investors out there, invest in hydrogen early, and in 20 years you will be the new version of todays "Oils Moguls". My time line looks something like this:
By ten years from now, the BIG companies that have a major demand for oil, will have switched over to hydrogen (they would rather invest a few million switching their infrastructure to run by hydrogen rather than oil because oil will soon be too pricey to be logical to use for business) and around that time the government will start investing in converting our natural gas energy plants to hydrogen plants. By 20 years, i predict atleast half of our market will be ran by hydrogen, because at that point all the big time companies have shown major interest, sparking that little bit of demand that was needed for further investment by energy companies, and by 25 years cars that run on oil will be a rare sight on the roads.

Answer 6

In some UE country, the have some busses which works with.
But, they have a catalizer that transforms ethanol or Diesel or any other combustible into hydrogen.
That catalyzer was developed in Argentina, at some university that i can't remember the name.

Answer 7

GM just previewed a SUV.They need financial investments to continue research.

Answer 8

It already has

Read a book called "the tipping point" by Gladwell

Answer 9

tomorrow