Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin: Less is more: Why an economical Iridium catalyst works so well (at producing hydrogen)

[NNadir]

1. Where is the Iridium for stupid adventure supposed to come?

Iridium is one of the rarest and most expensive elements in the world. Today's price is $161/gram, if one can get it.

The concentration in the Earth's crust is 0.001 ppm.

I would hope that in high school chemistry, although it's been a very long time since I was in one, one is at least exposed to the idea that a catalyst has no effect on thermodynamics. Therefore, as always, making hydrogen wastes energy, and making it, as a consumer item, given its horrible physical properties is a fucking dumb idea.

There are zillions of ways to make hydrogen; electrochemistry is the most destructive of exergy, since electricity, by its very nature is thermodynamically degraded energy. Of course, it's very popular for people trying to rebrand fossil fuels as "hydrogen" to claim that all of the hydrogen on Earth comes from vast stretches of wilderness industrialized for the useless solar and wind industry as a paean to advertising and ignorance. Almost none of it is so manufactured; almost all of it is made from the reformation of fossil fuels, with the waste dumped directly into the planetary atmosphere.



The caption:

Figure 1. Global current sources of H2 production (a), and H2 consumption sectors (b).

Progress on Catalyst Development for the Steam Reforming of Biomass and Waste Plastics Pyrolysis Volatiles: A Review Laura Santamaria, Gartzen Lopez, Enara Fernandez, Maria Cortazar, Aitor Arregi, Martin Olazar, and Javier Bilbao, Energy & Fuels 2021 35 (21), 17051-17084]

I referred to this graphic, and reproduced it, discussing a paper in the journal I discussed above here: The current sources and uses of hydrogen.

None of this reality stops people from advertising the fucking lie that hydrogen is "green."

The more we hype stupid ideas about hydrogen, the worse things get, and let's be clear, they are getting worse faster.

The Disastrous 2024 CO2 Data Recorded at Mauna Loa: Yet Another Update 12/03/2024

There's nothing quite as disturbing at this point as clueless reading of press releases by universities designed to get grants and taking them as being even remotely serious on an industrial scale.