It's like a battery: you put energy in, you get energy out, and it's zero sum game.
A battery with 100% charging efficiency (not to mention other losses in charger, etc.) is a remarkable thingy.
So you understand that hydrogen is not a fuel, but rather a storage thingy?
(And yes there are losses in any charge/discharge process, so 100% is never on the table.)
The point I'm making -- and nimblebear doesn't understand -- is that hydrogen is not laying around waiting to be harvested (like oil and coal). You gotta make it, and making it takes more energy than you get out of it.
For example, take 1000 BTUs of energy (from some real source like coal or solar or nukes) and apply it to water. By doing so you can separate hydrogen from oxygen and harvest the hydrogen.
Now, burn the hydrogen (ie, re-oxidize it). How many BTUs do you get? Less than 1000. It's impossible to break even.
If you want 1000 BTUs from hydrogen, you gotta use MORE than 1000 BTUs (and that's gotta come from somewhere else, like from coal, nukes, etc.
Hydrogen is not a fuel, it's a less than 100% efficient storage thingy.
I fully understand what H2 is and how we will use it.
Its abundance IS TOTALLLY relevant. Efficiency only matters in the cost of the technology or stuff needed to get it, and the size. You can get H2 from a multitude of sources. That is the point. H2 is about storage, being a carrier, about abundance, about its natural occurance, and about its use as a fuel. And you can use it without COMBUSTING it, which it appears YOU don't understand, or appreciate what that means.
If you want to debate me on the use of H2, or fuel cells, be my guest. I worked for a fuel cell developer, and a company who funded the development of fuel cells since the '70's.
P.S. where doo you get the "oxidization' or 'burning' garbola ? Did you just make that up, or did you read it somewhere from the "reliable" info on the internet ?
P.S. I'll give you 50% correct. There is a oxidation half reaction. And there is a reduction half reaction. This gives you a cell reaction. 2H2 +O2 ---> 2H2O. You can't have one reaction without the other. Oxidation half reaction: It is a process where a chemical species changes to another species with a more positive charge due to the release of one or more electrons.
PPS A fuel cell is 2 to 3 times more efficient than an internal combustion engine.
PPPS. A battery is also an energy conversion device. Both battery's and fuel cells are are electrochemical conversion devices.
There is NO COMBUSTION (or 'burning') involved in either fuel cells or batteries.
Fuel cells advantages over batteries are:
smaller size
lighter weight
quick refueling (vs. re-charging)
longer range
The energy from this:
2H2 + O2 ---> 2H2O
CANNOT be more than the energy from this:
2H2O ---> 2H2 + O2
Splitting water into H2 and O2 takes AT LEAST the same amount of energy as you can later get from H2, whether from subsequent combustion or from a fuel cell (and that's not counting the ordinary costs of the conversion -- ie, the costs of production).
The basic chemistry, reduced to its elemental pureness, is zero-sum.
Again, if you want 1000 BTUs of energy from hydrogen you have to put AT LEAST 1000 BTUs into water (plus the costs of production). THINK about that, Understand that.
H2 is a battery, not a fuel. What you get out of it is always less than what you put into it Whether you burn H2 as a gas or use it to produce fuel cells the math is the same: NO gain, only recovery of some percentage of whatever energy was used to produce it.
Natural gas? That's a fuel. Mother Nature captured solar energy and stored it in natural gas eons ago. Same with coal. Same with oil. Those are all captured solar energy.
Nuclear is diffferent: matter itself is converted directly to energy.
Solar (and wind) are simply real time capture technologiies, grabbing current solar energy.
Hydrogen is NONE of those. It is not energy. It is a means (via electrolysis or other methods) where the energy from true fuels is stored. Invest 1000 BTUs in producing hydrogen and at best you get less than 1000 BTUs back. By definition you can never get more than what you put in it, just like a battery.