03/01/2005
Dear Editor:
Publication of the column “Up and Atom,” by Jeremy Rifkin (January 2005, page 40), was, in my judgment, a great disservice to your readers. The so-called hydrogen economy is a sham that is being hyped by Mr. Rifkin and others. Unfortunately, the average American does not have the training in thermodynamics to determine that Mr. Rifkin’s scheme is a cruel hoax. A recently released paper I authored for the Cato Institute addresses these issues.
Although such technologies are at least several decades away from penetrating the market in any significant manner, because of cost considerations, less attention has been paid to the environmental implications of such a transition. Given current technology, switching from gasoline to hydrogen-powered fuel cells would greatly increase energy consumption, even if the hydrogen were extracted from water rather than from fossil fuels (as is currently the case). That is because it takes a tremendous amount of electricity to produce hydrogen from water and deliver it to consumers. Moreover, a transition from gasoline to hydrogen would nearly double net greenhouse gas emissions attributable to passenger vehicles, given the current fuel mix in the electricity sector.
Environmentalists, including Mr. Rifkin, advocate using renewable energy sources such as solar photovoltaic (PV) cells to generate the electricity needed for hydrogen production. Because of the very low efficiencies of these processes, only about 4 percent of the energy in the incident solar radiation on the PV cells appears as electrical output from the fuel cells. Because of this dismal conversion efficiency, the energy required to make the PV collectors will probably exceed the energy produced by the fuel cells over their lifetime.
If you want some compelling evidence that Mr. Rifkin has no understanding of thermodynamics, I invite you to read the next-to-last paragraph in his column. Mr. Rifkin is suggesting using some renewable energy source (such as solar photovoltaic panels) to generate electricity for the production of hydrogen by electrolysis of water. The hydrogen would then have to be compressed and stored and then used in fuel cells to produce electricity that would be fed back to the grid. In this whole process, about 70 percent of the electrical output of the solar photovoltaic panels would be lost. Such a scheme makes no sense from either an energy or an economic standpoint.
Donald F.
Anthrop
Professor Emeritus
San Jose State University
San Jose,
Calif.
Worth welcomes your comments, critiques and suggestions. Please direct your letters to letters@worth.com.
Mr. Rifkin responds:
First, let me say that I am quite familiar with the
laws of thermodynamics. I wrote a book on the subject more than 25 years ago
called Entropy, which has been translated into more than 20 languages and is a
standard reference on the issue of energy transfer, conversion and loss. Second,
it should be pointed out that renewable sources of energy—solar, wind,
geothermal, hydro and biomass—are becoming increasingly competitive with
traditional fossil fuels and nuclear power. Indeed, the European Union and a
coalition of Western states in the United States have already begun benchmarking
a transition to renewable energy. As we make the shift to renewable forms of
energy, hydrogen will be the means to store that energy. Commercial activities
to develop renewable energy and hydrogen storage capacity are advancing around
the world. I suggest that Mr. Anthrop get up to speed on what’s going on in the
commercial arena.
Jeremy Rifkin
President,
Foundation on Economic
Trends
Worth welcomes your comments, critiques and suggestions. Please direct
your letters to letters@worth.com.
Correction: In “A Vinous Victory” (Jan 2005, page 80) the “Charitable Expenses” sidebar gave an incorrect accounting of the costs of the Naples Winter Wine Festival. The correct information is as follows: The 2004 auction brought in $7.6 million, and gave $5.42 million to its beneficiaries. The trustees placed an additional $1.25 million in their “rainy day fund.” They use this money to make future grants on a case-by-case basis. They would also use it to support their existing beneficiaries in the event that the auction could not take place due to some unforeseen disaster. The amount in this fund now exceeds $3 million. The auction event itself costs about $440,000; the balance funds annual administrative costs and staff expenses.