Slashdot Mirror

Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Letter, June 1998
Shell, April 1999
Time, January 2000
National Hydrogen Association, Spring 2000
Red Herring, July 2000
Fast Company, October 2000
ENN, December 2000
BBC, December 2001
etc.

Could it be that the big oil interests have no interest in a cheap efficient environmentally friendly source of power ?

You have to wonder sometimes when good technology is ignored, is there some sort of hidden oil-company aganda ?


And this got labelled informative? Sheesh.

Here you can see a list of solar cell manufacturers - at least two oil companies (BP and Shell) are on it.

Here is a view from the EU about the future of big business in photovoltaics.

Here is an account of Shell's involvement in Fuel Cells and Hydrogen power in general.

Here is an account of some of Shell's involvement with biomass power generation.

Here is an overview.

Still, no doubt these will be dismissed with a "Yes, but apart from the solar cells, the fuel cells, the biomass research, the wind energy, and forestry, what have the oil companies ever done for renewable energy?".

Can't speak for the American Oil crowd, but I know for a fact that the Euroeans are looking very seriously at all sorts of alternative/renewable energies. BP and Shell are two fairly big players in solar, biomass, geothermal, and forestry.

The green-leaning unwashed masses aren't the only ones who are aware that we're burning dinosaurs faster than we're making them. Forecasts vary on the catastrophic oil-running-out deadline (the USGS forecasts are held in fairly high repute). There are many more you can find, with wildly varying dates.

However, a fact much more interesting to an Oil company is when it's going to stop getting cheap to recover oil. All these businesses know it is definately going to get more expensive to extract oil. They also know it's a real posiblity it's going to get more expensive to buy it from countries which make it cheap (OPEC getting its shit together, and other "disaster" scenarios).

So yeah, they thought of that. They reckon that as companies who've got a pretty good idea how energy is used, they're pretty qualified to in this area. Anyone heard any oil company propoganda on fuel cells?

This is almost available at petrol stations here in Victoria, Australia.

I thought it was pick and burn, but from the sounds of their blurb it will only give you a "chart CD".

This may mean it is just a glorified vending machine (although if it does burn, then create-your-own CD can't be far away!)
I've never used one, so that's all the info I can give.
Anyone else ever used one? Or involved in their creation?

I think you can figure out why.

You'd rather have corporations than governments control the web, eh? SO who would you rather turn your web site over to: The MPAA, Microsoft, or CyberCop?