It also doesn't leak, if you simply monitor it correctly. Even better, use reprocessing and breeder reactors to cut the waste even more, but most of that is illegal in the US because we are stupid.
Frankly, I wouldn't bury it in the ground, you can't watch it that way. I'd put it 20 feet into the air on raised concrete platforms, so that you can see under the storage if it is leaking or not. That way, no one can claim "oh, we missed it" when you can drive a bus under the platform if you wished to.
The gas used to heat homes is natural gas, far less explosive than hydrogen is...
Also, last time I checked, my house doesn't crash into other houses all that often, it rather tends to stay in one place.
The forces in a crash, the small size of cars (compared to houses), the higher compression required for hydrogen to be able to carry enough of it, the whole thing sounds like a mess to me.
Yes, cars have gasoline in them now, but gas tends to burn, not explode. It actually takes a lot of effort to get gas to explode rather than just burn.
Hydrogen is the other way around, it will explode if not burned in a controlled fashion.
Physical dangers: The gas mixes well with air, explosive mixtures are easily formed. The gas is lighter than air.
Chemical dangers: Heating may cause violent combustion or explosion. Reacts violently with air, oxygen, halogens and strong oxidants causing fire and explosion hazard. Metal catalysts, such as platinum and nickel, greatly enhance these reactions.
Electrolysis is terribly inefficent, if it was worth doing, that is how we'd get our hydrogen.
No matter how much better it might or might not be than gasoline, the fact is it costs FAR less to pull hydrogen out of natural gas than it does from water.
So using your numbers, it would be almost FREE to power our cars with hydrogen from natural gas.
Except, that it wouldn't be, there are a few laws of thermodynamics you're breaking there. We already have natural gas cars and they are good, but not nearly 10 times better than gas cars. You sure aren't going to get further improvement beyond that by using hydrogen.
Yea, I thought of that too, but when our solar power generated in the US is only about 0.17% of our total electric usage, that would be pointless, we'd be better off using solar to replace coal fired power plants.
Yea, I thought of that too, but when our main power grid is already only about 0.17% of our total electric usage, that would be pointless, we'd be better off using solar to replace coal fired power plants.
Besides, where is all the electricity going to come from to do from pure water? Coal fired power plants? Yea, that sure fixes the problem!
So either you take it from natural gas, which is about 80% efficient, or you take it from water which isn't efficient at all and get the electricity from coal power plants, which isn't clean either.
I'm all for replacing oil and gas as our fuels, but unless we use nuclear energy to power the Electrolysis to pull it from water, this isn't solving anything.
BTW, less than 5% of hydrogen is actually obtained from water, 95+% is obtained from fossil fuels.
But where in the first (or most-recent) dozen decimal places of our understanding of the 4 forces of physics are these wonderful new capabilities?
Where in of our understanding of physics does dark matter reside?
It is a very human trait to believe that "now we've got most of it figured out".
That has been said, and proven wrong, many times throughout human history. Why would today be any different?
Example: We know gravity exists, its effects can be shown and seen everywhere. But what is it, what causes it, and how would we control it? We can bend light, we can alter matter, why can't we control gravity, or even hold onto it, or effect it?
Can we? Can't we? Who knows, that is an entire area that needs more work.
The police have no right to stop me for any reason, unless they have probable cause that I am doing something illegal. And they must be able to state what it is they are stopping me for, not just some random, "well, he looked fishy".
Otherwise, I have the right to be left alone and not be harassed by the police.
I agree with you in principle, but I can also come up with some examples where the principle fails in the real world.
If possible, we should capture criminals and give them full due process of law. But sometimes trying to capture them presents risks that are unacceptable, the certainty of simply killing them outweighs the benefits of capture.
To give you an outright extreme example:
Lets say you discover someone is driving down the street in New York City, turns out in the trunk of his car is a nuclear weapon, and when he gets to the Empire State Building, he plans to set it off. You have 50 blocks to go.
Yes, you could try to capture him, block his car, try to shoot out the tires, stun him, etc. But he also has a trigger and can just set it off where he is (already inside the city).
Or you can hit the whole car with a Hellfire missile from a Predator, making completely sure to kill him and prevent him from setting off the nuke (which it won't, nukes don't work like that).
You'll probably also kill 50-100 innocent people around the car in the process.
Did they deserve protection? Did the criminal deserve due process of law?
Yes, to both. But the risks to trying to capture him are far, far outweighed by what would happen if the nuke goes off.
When I said exception, that is what I had in mind. That is far, far outside of "normal".
Do I think we should be going around the world just "picking off" random terrorists using drones? No, that happens too often to be on the short list. Bin Laden would perhaps be on the list, but that's about it.
Yes, I know, that is the point. Cops shouldn't be able to just say, "oh, he said sure, go ahead and look".
The burden of proof is on the police, not on the citizen. If they have PC, they should be able to back it up.
The idea is that in a free country, we are not subject to inspection or investigation by our government unless we have actually taken actions that draw such attention to ourselves.
You're either trolling, or stupid, not sure which...
Replace drugs with "beating kids/wife/husband" and lather, rinse, repeat.
If you really don't understand why the police pulling you over for no reason than to "hope" to catch someone, then I can't help you, but you'll be really sorry if our country continues down that path.
Yes, and since people grow illegal drugs in their house, they are without the bounds of "probable" to kick down your front door and search the place, since sometimes they will find drugs in some percentage of houses searched.
Didn't we fight a war against Briton for nonsense like this?
The rights of somebody else granted by law should be respected even when they're violating the law.
Yes, the measure of a people and a nation is not how it treats its best and brightest, but how it treats its unwanted and criminals.
Everyone* should be given the due process of law and the right to a proper defense.
*Well, I say everyone, there are exceptions, but those should be so far outside of normal that they stand out and you can list them in a very short list.
I have no problem with that, if the cop already has PC to pull you over "you're speeding or ran a red light or your tail light is out", then he has the right to ask you for ID. If, by standing outside of your vehicle, he can smell alcohol on your breath, then that is reasonable that he can then ask you to get out and take a breath test.
He should not be able to ask you to take a breath test just because "you look specious" or "you were driving near a bar".
Maybe you live near by and drive by every day, none of the cop's business.
It would be nice to go a bit back towards having peace officers rather than law enforcement officers.
Is it their job to keep the peace, or to rack up convictions (and fines)?
One of the best protections you can put into place...
Do not allow people to give permission.
Either the cops have PC or they don't, otherwise they can use intimidation to get "permission".
Cops shouldn't be going around asking random people, "can I search your car/person". Either they have a reason to, and don't need to ask, or they should be leaving you the hell alone.
Does Australia have something in it's constitution similar to the 4th amendment that the US has?
In other words, is it legal for a cop to pull you over "just to see if you might be committing a crime"? In the US, it is not, the cop has to have a probable cause to pull you over, or (in theory), anything the cop finds would not be allowed in court against you.
If so, then more power to you. It is illegal here, even if the cops try and do it anyway (which is just an abuse of power, but what are you going to do, call the cops about it?)
I personally think this is something that has to be stumbled upon, rather than sought out.
Most of your post was quite wise, but I'd just like to make a point here.
Imagine trying to fly without the internal combustion engine... The Wright Brothers figured out that power was their problem. Nothing a human can do will enable us to fly using just our own power, we're too heavy and the flying machines are too heavy, we need engines.
Once engines of light enough weight and great enough power came out, we had airplanes all over the place.
Could you build an airplane out of a steam engine? Perhaps, but not really, it wasn't reasonable without the proper technology.
We are likely completely lacking a required technology to do this, once we find the technology, we might find a galaxy of civilizations just waiting for us, I highly doubt radio is it.
Everything is hard until it isn't... Right now, many think that FTL travel is impossible. Maybe it is, maybe it isn't... If we do ever figure it out, we'll likely go from "we can't go anywhere" to "now we can go anywhere" very quickly.
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It also doesn't leak, if you simply monitor it correctly. Even better, use reprocessing and breeder reactors to cut the waste even more, but most of that is illegal in the US because we are stupid.
Frankly, I wouldn't bury it in the ground, you can't watch it that way. I'd put it 20 feet into the air on raised concrete platforms, so that you can see under the storage if it is leaking or not. That way, no one can claim "oh, we missed it" when you can drive a bus under the platform if you wished to.
Also, last time I checked, my house doesn't crash into other houses all that often, it rather tends to stay in one place.
The forces in a crash, the small size of cars (compared to houses), the higher compression required for hydrogen to be able to carry enough of it, the whole thing sounds like a mess to me.
Yes, cars have gasoline in them now, but gas tends to burn, not explode. It actually takes a lot of effort to get gas to explode rather than just burn.
Hydrogen is the other way around, it will explode if not burned in a controlled fashion.
I read a lot of hype about hydrogen, but that is an expensive road
It also has the side effect of exploding when released under pressure and sparks are applied.
http://www.lenntech.com/periodic/elements/h.htm
Physical dangers: The gas mixes well with air, explosive mixtures are easily formed. The gas is lighter than air.
Chemical dangers: Heating may cause violent combustion or explosion. Reacts violently with air, oxygen, halogens and strong oxidants causing fire and explosion hazard. Metal catalysts, such as platinum and nickel, greatly enhance these reactions.
Any physical pollution created can be put in sealed storage and monitored as long as required.
Electrolysis is terribly inefficent, if it was worth doing, that is how we'd get our hydrogen.
No matter how much better it might or might not be than gasoline, the fact is it costs FAR less to pull hydrogen out of natural gas than it does from water.
So using your numbers, it would be almost FREE to power our cars with hydrogen from natural gas.
Except, that it wouldn't be, there are a few laws of thermodynamics you're breaking there. We already have natural gas cars and they are good, but not nearly 10 times better than gas cars. You sure aren't going to get further improvement beyond that by using hydrogen.
Yea, I thought of that too, but when our solar power generated in the US is only about 0.17% of our total electric usage, that would be pointless, we'd be better off using solar to replace coal fired power plants.
Seems like a good application for solar.
Yea, I thought of that too, but when our main power grid is already only about 0.17% of our total electric usage, that would be pointless, we'd be better off using solar to replace coal fired power plants.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_the_United_States
Solar keeps getting talked about, it gets a ton of media attention, but it isn't even close to prime time.
Hydrogen itself is just made with electricity and water.
Yes, except that is not really how most of it gets made.
Frankly, one of the cheapest sources for hydrogen is from natural gas:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_production#Steam_reforming
Besides, where is all the electricity going to come from to do from pure water? Coal fired power plants? Yea, that sure fixes the problem!
So either you take it from natural gas, which is about 80% efficient, or you take it from water which isn't efficient at all and get the electricity from coal power plants, which isn't clean either.
I'm all for replacing oil and gas as our fuels, but unless we use nuclear energy to power the Electrolysis to pull it from water, this isn't solving anything.
BTW, less than 5% of hydrogen is actually obtained from water, 95+% is obtained from fossil fuels.
(Do you use your flash light to look through air at things, or to look through walls for things on the other side?)
No, I wouldn't use a flash light...
But I could use a thermal camera... 200 years ago, did we even know such things could be built? 100 years ago?
But where in the first (or most-recent) dozen decimal places of our understanding of the 4 forces of physics are these wonderful new capabilities?
Where in of our understanding of physics does dark matter reside?
It is a very human trait to believe that "now we've got most of it figured out".
That has been said, and proven wrong, many times throughout human history. Why would today be any different?
Example: We know gravity exists, its effects can be shown and seen everywhere. But what is it, what causes it, and how would we control it? We can bend light, we can alter matter, why can't we control gravity, or even hold onto it, or effect it?
Can we? Can't we? Who knows, that is an entire area that needs more work.
I take it you're new to planet earth.
Yes, now where is my copy of "Hitchhiker's Guide to Earth"?
Otherwise, I have the right to be left alone and not be harassed by the police.
When was the last time you checked, 1970? : )
Sadly, it would seem that you are correct.
How do we get that back? Seriously, not as in a "Internet forum joking manner", how do we, as a people, in the real world, turn that back?
Absolutely not. No exceptions, no "lists".
I agree with you in principle, but I can also come up with some examples where the principle fails in the real world.
If possible, we should capture criminals and give them full due process of law. But sometimes trying to capture them presents risks that are unacceptable, the certainty of simply killing them outweighs the benefits of capture.
To give you an outright extreme example:
Lets say you discover someone is driving down the street in New York City, turns out in the trunk of his car is a nuclear weapon, and when he gets to the Empire State Building, he plans to set it off. You have 50 blocks to go.
Yes, you could try to capture him, block his car, try to shoot out the tires, stun him, etc. But he also has a trigger and can just set it off where he is (already inside the city).
Or you can hit the whole car with a Hellfire missile from a Predator, making completely sure to kill him and prevent him from setting off the nuke (which it won't, nukes don't work like that).
You'll probably also kill 50-100 innocent people around the car in the process.
Did they deserve protection? Did the criminal deserve due process of law?
Yes, to both. But the risks to trying to capture him are far, far outweighed by what would happen if the nuke goes off.
When I said exception, that is what I had in mind. That is far, far outside of "normal".
Do I think we should be going around the world just "picking off" random terrorists using drones? No, that happens too often to be on the short list. Bin Laden would perhaps be on the list, but that's about it.
The burden of proof is on the police, not on the citizen. If they have PC, they should be able to back it up.
The idea is that in a free country, we are not subject to inspection or investigation by our government unless we have actually taken actions that draw such attention to ourselves.
Replace drugs with "beating kids/wife/husband" and lather, rinse, repeat.
If you really don't understand why the police pulling you over for no reason than to "hope" to catch someone, then I can't help you, but you'll be really sorry if our country continues down that path.
Sadly, I think it has to go much further downhill before people wake up, then it takes a lot to get it all back.
Frog in water syndrome... if it was boiling, everyone would jump out, but since it is slowly rising, most people sit there like idiots.
Oh well, God must love crazy people... he make so many of them! :)
Didn't we fight a war against Briton for nonsense like this?
The rights of somebody else granted by law should be respected even when they're violating the law.
Yes, the measure of a people and a nation is not how it treats its best and brightest, but how it treats its unwanted and criminals.
Everyone* should be given the due process of law and the right to a proper defense.
*Well, I say everyone, there are exceptions, but those should be so far outside of normal that they stand out and you can list them in a very short list.
He should not be able to ask you to take a breath test just because "you look specious" or "you were driving near a bar".
Maybe you live near by and drive by every day, none of the cop's business.
It would be nice to go a bit back towards having peace officers rather than law enforcement officers.
Is it their job to keep the peace, or to rack up convictions (and fines)?
Do not allow people to give permission.
Either the cops have PC or they don't, otherwise they can use intimidation to get "permission".
Cops shouldn't be going around asking random people, "can I search your car/person". Either they have a reason to, and don't need to ask, or they should be leaving you the hell alone.
In other words, is it legal for a cop to pull you over "just to see if you might be committing a crime"? In the US, it is not, the cop has to have a probable cause to pull you over, or (in theory), anything the cop finds would not be allowed in court against you.
If so, then more power to you. It is illegal here, even if the cops try and do it anyway (which is just an abuse of power, but what are you going to do, call the cops about it?)
Yes, we are bound by the laws, regardless if we agree with them or not.
And so are the cops, who are bound by the 4th amendment, last time I checked.
How long could someone talk on a data only freq before someone would notice?
I personally think this is something that has to be stumbled upon, rather than sought out.
Most of your post was quite wise, but I'd just like to make a point here.
Imagine trying to fly without the internal combustion engine... The Wright Brothers figured out that power was their problem. Nothing a human can do will enable us to fly using just our own power, we're too heavy and the flying machines are too heavy, we need engines.
Once engines of light enough weight and great enough power came out, we had airplanes all over the place.
Could you build an airplane out of a steam engine? Perhaps, but not really, it wasn't reasonable without the proper technology.
We are likely completely lacking a required technology to do this, once we find the technology, we might find a galaxy of civilizations just waiting for us, I highly doubt radio is it.
Everything is hard until it isn't... Right now, many think that FTL travel is impossible. Maybe it is, maybe it isn't... If we do ever figure it out, we'll likely go from "we can't go anywhere" to "now we can go anywhere" very quickly.