The BIGGEST problem with clean energy

About 20 years ago when I was in high school I learned about this startup company promising a hydrogen fuel cell car, Anuvu.  They made some wild awesome claims about their tech, which obviously never came.  Later in college I wrote and delivered a persuasive speech encouraging my classmates to drive hydrogen cars when they come available.  One of my primary arguments was that given the efficiency of the vaporware Anuvu PEM fuel cell and liquid H2 storage they could expect comparable fuel mileage to the Toyota Prius of the time.

But as time wore on the realities of H2 economy became more apparent.  Real PEM efficiencies were much lower than Anuvu promised.  People probably weren't going to carry liquid H2 in their car.  And the Toyota Prius became much more efficient.  Eventually, when learning about the plug to pavement efficiency of BEV's, it became clear: H2 is not the answer.  It's not just that round trip efficiency is worse than every other storage method.  There are other things that we have to worry about.  Hydrogen is very difficult to contain, so leak management must be much better than our current methane infrastructure.  Second, once hydrogen escapes from our storage and transport system, which it will, it's gone forever.  That may not seem like a big deal, but consider that every two hydrogen atoms lost is also a water molecule lost, and an extra oxygen atom in the atmosphere.  At the scale of the rest of human civilization, that might be a problem.  Lastly, the metals involved in PEM fuel cels are very expensive and finite.  Clearly it's not the answer and I think we're fools to chase that dream.

I'm a huge fan of compressed air storage.  Also I think particularly with the duck curve there is much more opportunity to optimize time of use and flatten it out.  I don't hear people talking about that though, besides the Technology Connections channel which recently discussed leveraging short term thermal energy storage available in a modern well insulated house to consume HVAC energy during non-peak hours.