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John Day MD's avatar

Electrolysis takes more energy than it stores by separating hydrogen and oxygen, of which only the hydrogen needs storing. Hydrogen is awkward to store. It can be combined with other things, but that uses yet more energy. This is the same problem as with batteries. It takes a lot of energy and mineral resources to make batteries, then you still have to get electricity from somewhere. They are not an energy source, only an expensive storage medium.

What could work efficiently is small vhicles with a gasoline or diesel motor driving the rear wheels, and sometimes charging batteries a bit, and regenerativ-braking moors on the front wheels only, to capture energy as electricity, and use it for sudden acceleration from a stop, or for passing. It's the Toyota Prius balance. It works. You don't store much electricity, and you get it from braking, for "free".

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Happiness: AViewpoint!'s avatar

My son and my husband worked up in Fort McMurray, Alberta. “The oil sands”.

I had tours in a couple of mines up there. It really is amazing how they do it. There is a discovery centre in Ft. Mac that shows how it is done.

I went up and down the rows of mountains of sand. On one side were miles of black sand, way over on the way back there were miles of very white sand.

The dirtiest thing up there is the fine alluvial sand as it was once a sea.

I went again when Syncrude filled in their huge pit and reclaimed the land for wildlife. There is a double fenced area you can see vast plains and 20 year old trees and roaming buffalo . Lol. There were some tourists there that couldn’t see the buffalo. So I put my fingers in my mouth and loudly whistled. Low and behold, over the ridge came the buffalo running in unison coming near then dipping through another ridge then stopping and staring at us. They thought I was the Buffalo whisperer. They were bored, and they are used to humans. They would come for anyone’s whistle. Lol.

But, one of the cleanest operations anywhere. The stories of their beginning in 1940’s were very interesting. Lots of inventing going on there.

Millions of barrels of oil a day. There are so many operations up there. Canada has bought back the main ones. My husband worked for Shell Canada in a medium sized operation, huge huge utilities and warehouses. Omg everything there is sooooo big. Canadian National Resources Ltd. bought out Shell Canada. CNRL. Royal Dutch Shell was a great company to work for. CNRL,....not so much.

Maligned by the media for far too long. The companies built wonderful recreation centers and amenities there. All mines combined put out 1/10th the pollution of New York. Never mind the biggest polluters in India and China. I learned a lot about the ‘media’ when I was there. Bought and paid to put out already written narratives but actual facts are none making reporters dumber than stumps.

There is lots of oil people.

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