Renewable Energy - Methane Economy

Today, it is often assumed that our future mobility needs will be met to a large extent by electric cars employing Lithium batteries. Has the thought ever come to mind if the supply of Lithium can be scaled up to the projected demand? So, what is it that we can do to make electric cars a common sight?

The challenge is the often invoked factor 10 in energy density. There is simply no suitable battery chemistry in sight capable of delivering this milestone in energy storage.

Can Green Hydrogen created using renewable energy cover this performance gap? Can it be the universal fuel of the future?

Using fuel cells, Hydrogen can react with oxygen in the air, producing electricity to power electric motors with only water as the by-product. A battery electric vehicle can, in general, travel 160 - 320 km on a single charge but Hydrogen ones can get around 480 km, according to AutomotiveTechnologies.

I believe that Hydrogen could play a significant role in grid balancing, as fuel for commercial, utility vehicles and electric cars using fuels cells. However, the use as fuel may have some limitation because of the high temperature of burning Hydrogen and the formation of nitrogen oxides.

Although Hydrogen is the most common element in the universe, it does not exist in its pure form. That means, if we wish to use it as fuel for our cars, we will have to produce it out of other compounds like other fossil fuels, natural gas or hopefully in the future only with water and electricity. Here the environmental and economic costs will come into the equation.

We could produce Hydrogen in a clean way by electrolysis of water but the process of separating the H2 from the O molecules would require a high amount of energy, hence making it a very expensive process at the current moment.

We could look at a third alternative...The emergence of efficient solid-oxide fuel cells (SOFC) for Methane production directly from water and the CO2 from air, or other CO2 sources may be an alternative to Hydrogen allowing for safer and more efficient storage, lower flame temperatures and the possibility to decarbonise air transport.

I believe that Green Methane can be produced cheaply on an industrial scale in the future. However, until then the journey will be long and it will still requires immense work. So until then we will invest in Hydrogen bearing in mind that you will not hear the end of the Methane Economy.