Hydrogen is being tested as a fuel for buses. Compared with burning diesel, what is the main environmental advantage of burning hydrogen?
Question 1 Report
Hydrogen is being tested as a fuel for buses. Compared with burning diesel, what is the main environmental advantage of burning hydrogen?
Answer Details
Hydrogen contains no carbon at all, so burning it cannot produce carbon dioxide. The only product is water: 2H2 + O2 → 2H2O. Diesel is a hydrocarbon mixture, so its carbon is oxidised to carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas that contributes to climate change. Removing that output at the point of use is the main environmental advantage of a hydrogen bus.
Soot is a product of incomplete combustion of a carbon-containing fuel, so hydrogen produces none; suggesting large amounts of soot reverses the chemistry. Sulfur dioxide comes from sulfur impurities in fossil fuels, which pure hydrogen does not contain. Hydrogen is not a fossil fuel, and no fuel never runs out.
Note the honest limit: the benefit depends on how the hydrogen itself was manufactured.
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