Concrete may have found it's killer app in graphene and silicon and germanium. [1][2] [1] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanotube](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanotube) [2] [http://www.wired.com/2014/07/graphene/](http://www.wired.com/2014/07/graphene/) ~~~ p1esk What's the benefit of this over current lithium batteries? I'm not saying this isn't important, it is, but what kind of battery will graphene help us build? ~~~ ThePherocity The benefit of the battery is in the electrodes. Nanotubes can get up to 100% and graphene can get close to 400% in volumetric energy density than standardised lithium-ion batteries. [http://www.nature.com/ncomms/2013/130710/ncomms3037/full/nco...](http://www.nature.com/ncomms/2013/130710/ncomms3037/full/ncomms3037.html) ------ yoz-y To me this looks like yet another "energy revolution". The whole world is going crazy with solar panels. Everybody is producing and buying batteries. The fact that the price of oil keeps going up seems to be more of an after thought to many people. ~~~ marcosdumay I have a counter-counter-counter-claim. Everybody is producing and buying batteries too. Until now, they were the reason for which the price of solar panels kept going up, and they were so expensive that it made no sense for anybody. And as you say, the price of oil keeps going up too, but it's mostly because of a production problem, not because of the use. ------ gwern > One thing we may all expect in the coming decades is an increase in the > volume and prevalence of hydrogen-powered vehicles—although right now it is > almost a rarity. Huh? Hydrogen-powered vehicles are the rule in Europe and Japan, and are on the verge of coming to the US market, with [http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/hydrogenpowertrucks.shtml](http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/hydrogenpowertrucks.shtml) , [http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/zeroemissionvehicles.shtml](http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/zeroemissionvehicles.shtml) , and [http://www.usaid.gov/locations/asias/ec/aspen/pdfs/usaid- ea...](http://www.usaid.gov/locations/asias/ec/aspen/pdfs/usaid-eas-report- hydrogen-fuel-cell-vehicle-trends-0.pdf) all saying that they're rapidly increasing in number. The only two barriers to hydrogen at this point are safety (hydrogen is very dangerous to transport and handle and can explode if the wrong amount is mixed with oxygen) and infrastructure (existing fuel infrastructure was built around gasoline and diesel, and would need to be modified to support something like filling a tank with hydrogen or a pressure tank of methane or ammonia). ~~~ vitus There's a few more barriers than that. The only thing "hydrogen" is truly environmentally-friendly is... hydrogen itself. Once you produce the hydrogen, all of the emissions created during that process aren't as great as creating those emissions from the combustion of petroleum products. ------ gizmo Why is this piece of news on HN? Every day there are hundreds of articles like this one. There's always the same pattern: 1) "Scientists from XXX University have discovered the next X" 2) "X is so great, because the future is X, and X is a disruptive technology, X is _almost_ ready for mainstream adoption." 3) "If you've got the next X, you have a bright future, so invest in XYZ." ~~~ Retric A lot of people on HN are futurists of a certain type. ------ jostmey If you are interested in solar energy and are looking for an entry-level job, I just found one -- [http://solar.gobots.com](http://solar.gobots.com) ~~~ anf Hi, just wondering, I sent you a reply. Are you looking for a particular kind of job? ------ mikevm Hydrogen is indeed a great candidate for the fuel of the future, but I don't think it can compete against gasoline. ------ jordache what a long road to travel before hydrogen fuel is viable for widespread adoption. the only viable production methods of hydrogen fuel right now is natural gas and coal gasification. ~~~ krisdol ... And methane from fracking, yes. ------ krisdol What a dumb title. I don't even know where to begin. ~~~ mikeash I don't know either. "Hydrogen is the fuel of the future" seems completely uncontroversial to me. Sure, I can think of some other "the future"s that it doesn't compete well with, but why would that stop the title? ~~~ danellis > Why would that stop the title? Because it's a completely meaningless statement. And yet, he still made the decision to put it in the title. ~~~ krisdol I'm not sure how that's an answer. It was a title for the article. I doubt the author had any idea of what it would look like before putting it on the page. ------ seandougall No mention of nuclear power, the only power source that will _never_ run out. ------ sthatipamala Is "the future" the same as "future"? ~~~ gizi Yes. ------ MCRed I think the title makes this guy either a liar or a fanatic about his field. The future is just what the future is going to be. If its hydrogen, then that is it. ------ Dumbnewt Maybe my opinion of future technology makes me biased, but I hope they will make hydrogen from electricity one day. After all, this is better than taking out a big loan for coal or natural gas. ------ kator As with most things you should expect the hydrogen fuel of the future will require natural gas. Natural gas is the most efficient way to store chemical energy and that's probably one of the reasons why it's been chosen to store it. There will always be people fighting over the current hydrogen fuel and arguing over what the future will be but for all practical purposes the world is not going to stop buying oil anytime soon. What is going to happen is that the cost of oil keeps on going up and oil will be used for a much longer time than any of us would like to admit. If the government does everything right with energy it will likely be very efficient overall but we'll have to hope they implement some measures to incentivize alternative fuels. Hydrogen for example can be produced via electrolysis from water. It turns out that the technology to do that was developed almost 100 years ago and I was personally using a device that did it almost 50 years ago, but it cost a lot of money to produce the required electricity. This of course changed as China and India, among many other countries scaled up the solar and wind energy industries. However even back then I realized that I would be putting away more energy than I would gain from doing so and of course today that has changed dramatically. Now I do it for free because I'm living in a house that gets well over 100 kWh/m2 of solar energy each year. I personally have a system that I can drop in the water and get electricity using just solar and wind energy. Sadly the grid here where I live is horrible but I'm hoping to get a solar plant on my house soon so I can get paid to produce the power when I do the most -- between 10 and 4PM, basically right in the middle of the day when all that heat makes my AC run harder. The problem is that we are moving away from oil to solar and wind power. We need oil to build and deliver solar and wind power and solar and wind power are being driven by oil in almost all instances. And as a funny anecdote here is what my house produces in a day: [https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1107387840962521&sei...](https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1107387840962521&seid=15