• fine_sandy_bottom
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    9 months ago

    Toyota has bet on hydrogen.

    Someone will be along in a moment to tell us all about how you can’t store hydrogen. Meanwhile there are eyewatering amounts being invested into water cracking facilities right now.

    Check out the map of West aus:

    https://www.wa.gov.au/system/files/2023-11/00232_1_hydrogen_projects_oct23_a4_web.pdf

    Or 15,000 km2 of solar & wind producing 3.5m tonnes of hydrogen pa:

    https://wgeh.com.au/

    It takes a lot of hubris to bet against the largest car manufacturer.

    • aidan@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      Saying that a company convinced a politician that something was a good idea doesn’t make it true. A lot of money has been invested in really stupid things in the past.

      • fine_sandy_bottom
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        9 months ago

        Politicians aren’t pouring many billions of taxpayer dollars into these facilities.

        Large companies, global consortium size companies, are doing research which is leading them in this direction.

        It’s not Toyota execs sitting in a board meeting saying “what can we do to be edgy”, it’s well resourced think-tanks being asked for potential solutions to our energy problems.

        • aidan@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          Politicians aren’t pouring many billions of taxpayer dollars into these facilities.

          Not billions but tens of millions

          Another one, the first large scale hydrogen project in all of Australia over half funded by the government

          And over $160 million more(AUD I assume) to other projects

          So yea it is pretty heavily government funded

          Large companies, global consortium size companies, are doing research which is leading them in this direction.

          Again, a lot of money is invested in really stupid things. If you’ve worked in a big company you know that, if you haven’t watch a Thunderf00t video then. I personally was in a meeting several months ago where $500,000+ was spent on a new machine, rather then just extend the meeting for a couple hours and plan the process for how it could be avoided.

          • fine_sandy_bottom
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            9 months ago

            The WGEH I linked will cost many billions.

            Just because money has been invested in stupid things, does not mean that investing money is evidence of a stupid thing.

            • aidan@lemmy.world
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              9 months ago

              Every one of the largest projects in the plan you linked have been significantly (in the cases I linked half or more) funded by the government.

              Just because money has been invested in stupid things, does not mean that investing money is evidence of a stupid thing.

              No, but it does mean that money being invested doesn’t prove its a smart thing.