> > I'm sure there's a number out there some about how efficient petrol > > is, that is the total cost from finding, extracting, > refining etc, but > > I figure it's a fair way on the positive side. > > It's almost for sure on the positive side, but where? > > > Its main advantage is it's a very compact energy store, and easy to > > handle. > > I'd say the main advantage is that we have an infrastructure > in place and that nobody has been fired yet for buying gasoline :) > > > Oil is like me giving you a dollar, and getting 5 back. > > Aha, so you do seem to have an efficiency number. Do you have > a reliable source for this, too? > > > There's nothing inherently wrong with running a car on hydrogen, > > except for the fact hydrogen is a bit hard to come by. > > Well, unless you mean by "come by" go buy gasoline at the > station ("Mami, where does the milk come from?" - "From the > market, you silly!"), it's probably harder to come by than > hydrogen. The facility is somewhat an illusion, created by > the wide availability. Which is not the same. The > availability is created by an infrastructure we've been > building for a century. I'm not sure you (or anyone else) has > a clear view of the whole infrastructure cost. > > Gerhard Nah, I just pulled those numbers out of my arse, much like how the Keelynet folk pull out quantum, flux, resonance, polarized, zero-point and other such terms. I do think the hydrogen number is too high, and the petrol way too low. Getting a real number would be impossible, on par with making your own pencils, see . Nothing to stop some more wild-arse guesses. This oil rig is the worlds biggest. Sticking with money, it cost $500,000,000, and extracts 50,000 barrels of crude a DAY, so $50 a barrel gives you $2,500,000 per day, or $912,500,000 per year. That's ignoring natural gas output, runnings costs, transport and the fact digging a hole in the ground is cheaper & easier. Yeah, I'd say oil is on the positive side. That's in $, MJ would be different. Just compare the energy in 50,000 barrels of crude a day against building & running the rig. Hydrogen is hard to come by, you can't just walk outside and pick some up, or dig a hole & find it at the bottom like you can with wood, coal or oil. Getting it from water takes a lot of effort, and you'd be better off just using the electricity directly. Sure, if oil didn't exist, nor electric motors, then hydrogen would look good. Tony -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist