Yep, once you realize that hydrogen is basically a leaky, explosive, battery with a low return rate, hydrogen is a non-starter. Most hydrogen is made from natural gas nowadays, lets compare using NG as a fuel for FCVs and BEVs.
Converting NG to H2 has about a ~30% energy loss in steam reformation.
Compressing the H2 to 10,000 PSI is another ~15% energy loss
There is more nonzero losses for storage. hydrogen is just a single proton and can leak out of literally anything. It will be travelling much faster for a given temperature than any other material. The longer you store it the larger the loss. People have estimated a 10-20% leakage loss in a hydrogen infrastructure, we'll go with the lower 10% loss to be fair.
An FCV-sized fuel cell is about 50% efficient at converting H2 heat energy into electrical energy.
Electric motors are about 90% efficient at converting electrical energy into rotational energy. Some of this electricity will need to be stored into batteries, so the losses will be slightly higher, we'll say 12%.
Electric motors don't need complicated transmissions, but there still is some losses, around 5%, less than the ~15% for and ICE engine with a gearbox/etc.
So, 0.70 x 0.85 x 0.90 x 0.50 x 0.88 x 0.95 = 0.2238 NG thermal energy to wheels efficiency.
!!!
That's really only slightly better than a modern efficient ICE w/ hybrid drivetrain! (0.25 x 0.85 =0.213 )
Now lets compare a BEV using a modern NG CCGT.
an NG CCGT is a pretty efficient machine, it can convert ~60% of thermal energy into electricity.
after that you'll have an about 12% loss in the grid and utility self-usage.
about a 7% loss each way in the battery (Charge, discharge)
10% loss in the electric motor, and 5% loss in the drivetrain/wheels.
0.60 x 0.88 x 0.93 x 0.93 x 0.90 x 0.95 = 0.39 NG thermal energy to wheels efficiency. 74% higher than the FCV.
What about if you have some clean electricity as a energy source(Solar, Wind, Nuclear, etc)?
You'll need to electrolyze water to make hydrogen, you're looking at a ~40% loss doing that, then all of the other losses mentioned above after the hydrogen is created.
0.60 x 0.85 x 0.90 x 0.50 x 0.88 x 0.95 = 0.1918
LOL 80% of your clean electricity is wasted... what about BEVs? you can skip the losses converting heat to electricity.
0.88 x 0.93 x 0.93 x 0.90 x 0.95 = 0.651 more than triple the return of FCVs.
FCVs are a joke. anyone who has done the math (like Elon) knows this.
