"Monorail!"-----The H Stands For Hype - Robert Bryce

The New York Times calls hydrogen a “renewable energy source” and other silliness about using an element that’s “a thermodynamic obscenity”

• On June 10, 1975, during the 94th Congress, the House of Representatives held the first of two “investigative hearings on the subject of hydrogen...claimed hydrogen “has the potential of playing the same kind of role in our energy system as electricity does today.”
• In 1996, the Chicago Sun-Times declared “The first steps toward what proponents call the hydrogen economy are being taken.”
• President George W. Bush bought the hydrogen hype. In his 2003 State of the Union Address, he said, “With a new national commitment, our scientists and engineers will overcome obstacles” to taking hydrogen-fueled automobiles “from laboratory to showroom so that the first car driven by a child born today could be powered by hydrogen, and pollution-free.”...

The history of the hype matters because we live in ahistorical times. 

Or, as author Jeff Minick explained in 2022, we are plagued by “presentism.” 

Presentism, Minick wrote, “is the reason so many young people can name the Kardashians but can’t tell you the importance of Abraham Lincoln or why we fought in World War II.”...