2024-09-26 PL-INT-2024-008822 GP 2045 Draft Comments - T. Keeney

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PUBLIC UTILITIES - COMMENTS P. 91. Be a net power producer with hydrogen and waste management. Comment: It is crucial to understand that both of these strategies for energy production in the case of waste to energy and energy storage in the case of hydrogen are controversial. Directives which are so controversial as these do not belong in the General Plan and thus this directive should be removed. In regard to hydrogen, use of hydrogen for light vehicular transport has little support. Use of green hydrogen is not efficient as utilization of green energy to hydrolyze, store, pump and transport green hydrogen results in a 25% loss of initial energy input. Conversion of hydrogen back to electricity in a fuel cell results in loss of another 50% of the original energy supplied for a net energy production of 25% from the original source. Use of the original green energy for Battery storage loses only 25% of the original energy supplied. This efficiency deficit plus the necessity of a huge initial infrastructure rollout makes hydrogen for light duty transportation impractical. Currently in the US there are 2000 hydrogen cars, 900,000 Battery electric vehicles. Makes investment in infrastructure impractical. Heavy vehicles, before investment by transporters has to have assurance that widespread infrastructure will be present. Not ready for massive infrastructure for only heavy vehicles. Hawaii Island has one hydrogen fueling station. Hydrogen busses can operate from this point, especially from the Kona station. Hawaii County has ordered 3 or 4 or 5 hydrogen busses to operate from this station but this will be only a small utilizing of hydrogen. Hydrogen power for cargo ships is questionable because of the space requirement for hydrogen. This likewise is true aviation's use of hydrogen. Grid energy storage using hydrogen is much less efficient than battery storage and may be less efficient than pumped gravity storage methods. The County needs to specify how hydrogen storage would be utilized before placing this controversial proposal in the general plan. Likewise Waste to Energy proposals are at least as controversial. Certainly the burning of waste streams gives rise to CO2(e) levels in the smokestack considerably higher than burning coal and the toxic hazardous emissions other than CO2 have been implicated in multiple disease processes such as cancer and respiratory disease. There is general agreement among expert sources that the efficiency of Battery Electric Vehicles in terms of Life Cycle Energy supplied per mile of vehicle traveled is about twice that of Hydrogen Fuel Cell vehicles. If there is a limitless source of abundant renewable energy such as Geothermal might offer in the mid-term future then the efficiency is a moot point (as leaving the house lights on when you go to bed). However, until the grid is 100% clean or renewable, to power transportation via hydrogen is an improper wasteful use of that energy. The following are comments which I offered to a COH Request for Information regarding Hydrogen Economy considerations. Let's consider efficiency in the decision to choose Hydrogen fuel cell over battery electric buses. The following are comments by Volkswagen at their `Newsroom' publication. This article, though from 2020, gives an excellent overall picture of efficiency. (Insert link). Volkswagen, Europe's largest car manufacturer, begins with "The crucial question in the automotive industry is: Should we rely on the battery as an energy storage medium or hydrogen? Or even push both to the same extent and subsequently bringing them both to the road?" They continue, "Science is largely in agreement on this issue, as several recent studies have shown. The Federal Ministry for the Environment, for example, assumes that hydrogen and synthetic fuels, so-called e-fuels, will remain more expensive than an electric drive, as more energy is required for their production.The Agora Verkehrswende (traffic transformation) initiative also points out that hydrogen and e-fuels do not offer ecologically sound alternatives without the use of 100 percent renewable energies, and that, given the current and foreseeable electricity mix, the e-car has by far the best energy balance. The article continues, "So which energy storage system has the best efficiency and is the most cost-effective for powering