THE HYDROGEN FUEL-CELL versus THE DIESEL-ELECTRIC HYBRID

President BUSH is talking up the hydrogen fuel-cell as the best alternative to our predominently gasoline- and diesel-powered automobiles and trucks.

This is a standard trick that government-sanctioned public monopolies play: They promise exotic technologies just over the horizon while maintaining their monopoly power. They use that power to extract tax-like monopoly rent and share a bit of that rent -- mistakenly called profit by far-left ideologues -- with their political protectorate. This business as collection of rent and indirect taxation lead them to fail even to keep up their old plant, much less to replace obsolete plant with new technology.

Pseudo-capitalists are no different from pseudo-socialist communist in this regard. Both clothe their self-serving avarice in the fake patriotism, altruism, or aesthetic that a half-baked ideology provides them with and corrupt or just stupid office-tenders go along with.

The oxidation of hydrogen is a perfectly pollution-free reaction, in theory. It yields water. Pure water? Well, maybe not. Depending on what makes up the cell, the water may have traces of heavy metals in it. Oops, that is a pollution problem. Then there is the source of hydrogen: It could be ultra-refining hydrocarbons? Well, that is just more, not less refining of oil and gas. Electro-chemistry? That consumes lots of electricity from ... what: Coal-fired plants, nuclear reactors, ... who knows.

This is not a serious proposal. It is a rhetorical trick.

However, while the US is closer to autarky than most countries, it is not at all so in automobile or truck production. On the contrary, these are still declining domestic industries, despite various degrees of government protection and subsidy. Maintaining the status quo behind a facade of exotic, over-the-horizon, techology concepts is very dangerous. Better alternatives will reach the US market from abroad.

The most promising (or threatening) is the diesel-electric hybrid. This is a high-speed, lightweight diesel engine with a brushless direct-current motor-generator where the flywheel would be, batteries or capacitors to store power, and sophisticated contol and conversion electronics to regulate every aspect of engine output. This technology is not any sort of breakthrough. It is a matter of extensive electro-mechanical re-engineering almost every component technology and automotive sub-assembly. The end result will not be just a more efficient and less polluting vehicle, but a fundamentally more robust one, simpler to assemble and easier to maintain.

Our public choice is not picking the diesel-electric hybrid shortly or the fuel-cell someday. Our choice is relying more and more on military might to somehow make up for a failing industrial economy. Alternatively, we can maintain our position in world technology markets by vigorously developing diesel-electric hybrid technology.

This is actually a glamorous undertaking. Americans love excellence in engineering and despise indolence in government.

See also: This fine piece by Gregg EASTERBROOK.