The plant was first scheduled to be shut down in 2018. State lawmakers approved a tax break in 2019 that had kept the facility active.
WV gave this plant tax breaks to burn coal for an unspecified length of time. The hydrogen thing is supposed to make you feel good about it.
So they’re going to continue burning coal until some unspecified point in the future when a new hydrogen-burning plant is built “next door”? Do I understand that right?
If they’re burning hydrogen, where does the carbon to make graphite come from? I don’t get the plan here.
not a lot of info in the article, i read it as they’re burning coal until a new “hydrogen facility” is constructed near by
There isn’t enough info in the article but it appears theyre producing hydrogen by burning coal.
Hydrogen could be a decent source of energy if it’s produced from renewable sources as hydrogen is much more energy dense than lithium batteries. However, that doesn’t appear to be the case.
No, hydrogen is a dead end with current technology. There is no good way to produce it at scale. We basically have two options:
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Strip the hydrogen off of hydrocarbons, usually methane. The leftover carbon becomes CO and CO2 which is released into the atmosphere.
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Split water molecules using electricity. This requires generating a ton of electricity using a traditional power plant. You’re better off just making the electricity and skipping the hydrogen step.
Alao, once hydrogen is produced it really wants to burn. You do not want to get in a car accident with a tank of hydrogen under your back seat.
Split water molecules using electricity. This requires generating a ton of electricity using a traditional power plant. You’re better off just making the electricity and skipping the hydrogen step.
I’m not an expert, but I know poeple on Reddit say that storage is a drawback of renewables. Could energy be stored as hydrogen?
Potentially, yes. I’m not sure about the cost effectiveness compared to other solutions like pumped storage hydropower. There’s also the risk of explosion when storing hydrogen, which is a tough problem to solve.
the explosion thing doesn’t really seem like a problem because of our relationship with gasoline and lithium batteries. maybe there could be a hydrogen future after all :)
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