A Big Thank you to Governor Chris Gregoire

Today Governor Chris Gregoire signed into law a bill shutting down the only coal plant in Washington. For the past few years it has been importing its fuel from Southern Montana to power the plant at increased cost to customers. It has been the second largest risk to our air quality in the state behind internal-combustion engines for a while. Now we can move towards a direction to catch up to Germany in terms of solar power (Munich is the furthest south city at the same latitude as Vancouver, BC) to decrease costs, decrease pollution, and make our energy sustainable. We can also power through geothermal. We have faultlines across the State, at Nisqually, which anyone who was in Western Washington in 2001 will remember, that can be harnessed to produce reliable power from a source that we can count on being consistent for only a few BILLION years.

How to get the Infrastructure for Fuel Cells in Less than 3 Years.

Pretty big goal, go from being near the bottom of the heap of industrialized nations in terms of renewables to the top considering our massive size. Many people are going to say this cannot be done, but I know it can through economic tax incentives.

Every year, we send billions of dollars to the Middle East, funding terrorism, and causing environmental problems (go to LA and smell the sweet air) by burning more fossil fuels than any other nation, except maybe China. Fossil Fuels are dirty, there is a limited amount in the world and are only in certain regions despite being demanded by every country. The high demand and decreasing supply will inevitably lead to us running out in 50-100 years (estimation). So, we need to use another fuel source that will last for hundreds of years. Fortunately, this already exists and the principle behind this technology was discovered by Schönbein in 1838. This is of course the fuel cell. I know how we can have fuel cells be able to run across America by 2015 and stop giving billions of dollars to big oil every month.

What we do is give tax breaks to owners of gas stations that install hydrogen pumps. If they can save money by installing the pumps and tanks than they will do it. Once the pumps are in, they will be able to attract business from people with fuel cells from all over the country and we will have energy independence and terrorists will stop getting our oil money. The major part to this is that the hydrogen could be produced on-site. In an October 2006 publication by the Department of Energy, Hydrogen Production, it ends by saying that developing technology to create the fuel for electric cars was going to be available in the near-future.

The only question is how do we produce the fuel cells? The answer is in two steps: on-site hydrogen production and on-site electricity production to offset the shock to the grid.

1. It is possible and almost feasible to get the hydrogen by splitting water molecules with electricity which gives you the hydrogen you need to fuel cars. On-site tanks could store the hydrogen like they currently store fossil fuels which is as easily and quickly dispensed as gasoline.
2. The amount of energy to split a water molecule is large. It would be a large shock to the grid to be developing that much hydrogen on our current aging grid. On top of roofs nothing is produced. The elements are kept out of the house and then nothing else is done. If there were tax credits for everyone who puts solar panels on their roofs than there would be enough surplus power to power the splitting of water atoms at fuel stations. Then once people have the solar panels on their roofs saving them money on electricity, that would also stimulate the economy.

Now that the  question of power has been addressed, how do we get the infrastructure for such a massive amount of space so that one can do a road trip from any two points in the Contiguous United States (and Continental once Canada improves their infrastructure) in a short period of time? The answer is economical and simple. We already have it. We have enough gas stations throughout America that if they all got the proper incentive to install hydrogen pumps than people could quickly phase out fossil fuels. If the Federal Government gave tax incentives of a 100% tax break over two years to owners of fuel stations who successfully install water splitters, hydrogen tanks, and hydrogen pumps, we could have all the infrastructure we need in three years after the start of the program. We will have our energy become sustainable and destroy our carbon footprints.

We are Americans. Our country is the greatest nation on Earth. The first nation to have the radical ideals of freedom of religion, speech, press, and other radical ideals. We are a leader of the world and if we make a radical change across a continent the rest of the world will follow. It is in our power to become greater. Let's do it now. Let's end our addiction to foreign oil with a fuel source that will not run out until the Earth is absorbed into the Sun.

Why renewables are the answer to the high costs of fuel.

Everyone knows that gasoline is expensive all over the world. Exxon Mobile makes gigantic profits year after year and there is nothing to stop them. This is because they have a near-perfect monopoly on oil sales throughout the entire world. There is no incentive for them to lower their prices because it will decrease their profit and that is not what a rational company does. Being rational and being benevolent are completely different.

There is a simple solution to this problem. It has been done before too, and it worked. Early 1900s, Standard Oil owned more than 90% of the world's oil reserves making Rockefeller the richest man in the history of the world. He had no reason to decrease the prices because there was no competition and he created the market price. In the 1940s the US government decided that Standard Oil had to be divided, and the prices went down because every company had to take the market price determined by supply and demand.

There are solutions, and they are being taken after being put aside for at least a decade. The US government is funding more research into renewable energies to make them efficient, which will make them viable competitors to internal-combustion engines.

First, the idea of drilling in the arctic is a short term solution. What do we do when the oil there is depleted? We have to move somewhere else and spend more money moving equipment to other places and more research. An extremely short-term and inefficient solution to the oil crisis.

So, the US government funds scientists and they work hard over the next ten years making fuel cells extremely efficient. We need to make sure that the fuel cells have hydrogen to run. The solution to this is simple. Water is a common resource, hydrogen is a limited resource. What we need to invest in is a way to use nuclear fission to separate the hydrogen and oxygen in water atoms and then put them into cars. We put the hydrogen into the cars and you drive off. Simple. The argument that hydrogen is flammmable is true, but not viable because gasoline is also viable. Light a spark next to gasoline and it will start combustion at an uncontrollable rate. Hydrogen may not be stable like water, but neither is gasoline. Nothing in terms of safety will change, and the transportation of hydrogen is silly because we will produce it on-site, which makes it better than gasoline.

Now, who will provide the converters? Companies of course! There will be many companies eventually and people will purchase them, there will be competition, and it will work.

Another thing is, what about the desert? If we can make hydrogen out of water, we can make it out of any thing in the Universe. We just need to improve nuclear fission.

There's the answer to the energy crisis. In essence, it is water.

I don't claim these as my ideas. I am merely putting together ideas from many places.