Update (September 2026): “Building India’s City of the Future” — a letter to the editor

Continuing his decades-long advocacy for hydrogen-based “green” energy, Béla Lipták sent the following letter to the editor in response to a news article on India’s planned new capital city in Andhra Pradesh.

TO THE EDITOR:

RE: “Building India’s City of the Future” (news article, Monday, August 31, 2026, B1)

The conversion from the Oil Age to the Hydrogen Age has barely started. In the case of transportation, for example, in 2025 total global car sales amounted to about 93 million, while only about 21 million (22%) were battery-operated electric vehicles (BEVs). These vehicles are not “green,” because they indirectly also damage the climate, as their recharging electricity often comes from hydrocarbon-burning power plants. Out of these 21 million BEVs, only a tiny portion can correctly be called “green,” because if we disregard nuclear and other experimental EV cars, the remaining truly “green” vehicles (their global number is about 2,500) are only the ones that are hydrogen-fueled (HEVs). The fuel of HEVs is relatively free (water), inexhaustible, and when burned emits no carbon, but on the other hand they are still expensive, due to the high cost of electrolyzers. Considering that 2,500 out of 93 million is next to nothing, we can say that the conversion to “green” transportation has not even started.

The same holds true for the Hydrogen Age in general, because today there are only a few exceptions to this pessimistic assessment. One exception is India’s Prime Minister, the global statesman Narendra Modi, who is leading a Marshall-Plan-scaled effort to solve our global energy problems. He is doing that by building the city of the future, where some 25,000 people are already working on building this new capital city of Andhra Pradesh. One can only hope that his efforts will be followed by others, and that instead of building better drones we will make the needed steps towards the Hydrogen Age.

Béla Lipták
Energy consultant, author of the book titled “Controlling the Future.”

Solar-Hydrogen Demonstration Plants

A technical overview by Béla Lipták.

Global warming is real and the burning of fossil fuels is causing it. It is time to stop debating whether warming is in fact occurring and how soon its dire consequences will materialize, and start to take action. The carbon dioxide content of the atmosphere can be reduced by removing it once it has already entered the atmosphere (planting trees), removing it from the flue gases before they are emitted into the atmosphere, or by not generating carbon dioxide at all, by replacing the fossil fuels with clean and un-exhaustible energy sources.

The time for just holding conferences and just writing articles is over. It is time to build those demonstration plants that will determine the feasibility and costs of the various alternative energy systems. It is time to get serious about the transition to the post-oil, clean and un-exhaustible solar-hydrogen economy.

The goal of demonstrating this technology by building pilot plants is to obtain reliable data, so that the debate over the feasibility of converting to the solar-hydrogen economy can be closed and the transition can start. The other goal of building demonstration plants is to identify and eliminate the technical bottlenecks, optimize the processes and to generate globally standardized specifications that would allow the mass production of the equipment.

Described below are solar-hydrogen generator units, which by 2050 could meet about 50% and by 2100 nearly 100% of mankind’s energy needs. These packaged units should eventually be mass produced to generate both fuel and electricity. The smallest of the standardized hydrogen generator units, the 1,000 kg/yr capacity one, would be designed to serve individual households; the 10,000 kg/yr unit for schools, hospitals and other institutions; the 100,000 kg/yr package to serve small communities; while the 1,000,000 kg/yr plant would become the power plant of the future.

Once these demonstration plants have been built, a concentrated effort should be made to minimize their first and operating costs, maximize their efficiencies, and to take advantage of free market competition to optimize their manufacturing, distribution and installation practices. If the best scientific talent is mobilized, it is estimated that by 2020 the cost of solar electricity can be reduced to between 5¢ and 10¢/kWh, and the cost of the hydrogen equivalent of a gallon of gasoline to about $2.

This document describes the present state of the alternative energy technology, the features and operation of the equipment blocks comprising the solar-hydrogen demonstration plants, and provides a roadmap for completing these demonstration plants by 2010.

Global Warming

During the last 50 years, the global population doubled, energy consumption quadrupled and the global GDP increased 6-fold. This caused both global warming and a possibility of energy wars, which can turn nuclear. According to the 2007 report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the mass extinction of species can occur. It is estimated that in the next 50 years the global demand for electricity will triple. For these reasons, and because solar energy is practically unlimited, the petroleum-based economy of the 20th century should be gradually replaced by a solar-hydrogen economy in the 21st century. This conversion from fossil to clean and un-exhaustible solar energy will require the mobilization of such scientific talent as did the Manhattan Project, and must be followed by an international effort on the scale of the Marshall Plan.

Global Energy Use

When discussing global energy consumption, the unit most often used is the quad (Q = 10¹⁵ BTUs). Today, global energy consumption is between 400 and 450 Q and is rising at a yearly rate of 20 Q. It is expected to reach 600 Q by 2020. The distribution of the presently used energy sources is: oil (35–37%), coal (25–26%), natural gas (20–25%), wood/biomass (10%), nuclear (7.5%), and renewable sources such as hydroelectric power (2.4%), solar (0.6%), geothermal (0.4%) and wind (0.05%).

The total fossil fuel reserves of the globe are estimated to amount to 75,000 Q, and global consumption from 1950 to 2000 increased from 100 to 400 Q. Total energy consumption is rising at a higher rate than the supply of fossil fuels; the difference is being provided from nuclear and renewable sources. Projections suggest a maximum yearly fossil production capability of about 700 Q around 2050, and exhaustion of this energy supply by the year 2200.

This does not reflect the consequences of global warming or of energy wars. Besides the exhaustible nature of fossil fuels, their continued use also results in some 27 billion tons of carbon dioxide being released into the atmosphere.

Sir Nicholas Stern estimated that by 2020 the effects of the resulting global warming will cause a 20% reduction in the global GDP. The continued reliance on fossil fuels is not only likely to result in “energy wars” but could also cause the collapse of the global economy. Yet none of these need to occur. There is still plenty of time to gradually convert to an inexhaustible and clean “solar-hydrogen” energy-based economy, while reducing greenhouse gas emissions — some of the major companies are already making those changes.

Below, I will discuss: a) the amounts of solar energy needed to meet present and future global energy needs, b) the types and efficiencies of today’s solar collector designs, c) the methods to convert solar-generated electricity into chemical energy (hydrogen), d) the methods to compress, liquefy, store and distribute hydrogen, e) the investments and operating costs required for building a solar-hydrogen demonstration plant, and f) the infrastructure needed to fully convert to this technology by 2050.

Solar Energy Requirement and Availability

The amount of solar energy reaching a unit area (m²) is called “insolation.” Insolation varies with the geographic area, the weather, the orientation of the collectors, and diurnal and seasonal variations. In addition to the continents, solar energy can also be collected on floating islands in the oceans.

On a clear March day in Daggett, California — assuming collectors with tracking mechanisms that continuously point them toward the sun — the total solar energy received per square meter of collector area is slightly under 4,000 kilowatt-hours per year (kWh/yr).

Today, per-capita energy use on the planet ranges from 1,000 kWh/yr in Africa to 16,000 kWh/yr in Canada. Therefore, if the efficiency of a solar energy collection and conversion system is assumed to be 10%, and if the solar energy is collected in a high-insolation region such as Daggett, the per-capita collector area required would range from 2.5 m² for people living in Africa to 40 m² for the residents of Canada.

Using conservative insolation values, the collector area required to meet today’s global energy needs is 3% to 5% of the area of the Sahara. The total area of high insolation on Earth is much larger than that of the Sahara, and solar energy can also be collected in areas of lower insolation or in the oceans.

Thermal Solar Collector Designs

The thermal collectors on the roofs of private homes usually serve to provide the residence with heat and/or hot water. Larger thermal power plant designs are either concentrating or flat, stationary or tracking, and can convert solar energy (photons) to thermal energy (heat), to electricity (electrons), or directly to hydrogen.

These larger designs are often referred to as solar-thermal-electric generating systems (SEGS). An example is a 354 MW plant that has been in operation at Kramer Junction and Harper Valley in California since 1985. In this design, parabolic mirror reflectors (troughs) track the trajectory of the sun and concentrate sunlight onto absorber tubes located at the focal line of the parabolic mirrors. Inside the absorber tubes, heat-resistant oil is circulated and transports the collected heat into steam boilers, which drive turbine generators.

In some of the more recent SEGS designs, the circulating fluid temperature has been more than doubled, while in others direct generation of steam (DSG) has been achieved, increasing power production by some 15%.

Solar Updraft Tower

The chimney effect generates an updraft because heavier cold air on the outside displaces and pushes lighter warm air upwards in the chimney, driven by the pressure difference between the two. Static home cooling systems utilize this effect to pull cold air from underground ducts into homes. In winter, the same effect increases the heating load of high-rise buildings, because cold air is pulled in by the chimney effect at the bottom of the building and has to be heated. (I eliminated this effect on the new IBM Headquarters Building at 590 Madison Avenue in New York by equalizing the inside pressure with that on the outside.)

The solar updraft tower converts solar-based thermal energy into concentrated aerodynamic energy (wind). Air is heated under a circular greenhouse-like canopy whose roof slopes upwards from the perimeter toward the center, where the tower stands. The sun heats the air under the canopy, which rises up the tower and generates electricity by driving an array of turbine generators.

This “low-tech” solar energy converter concept is over a hundred years old, but its first 50 kW working model was only built in 1982. Today, much larger installations (50 to 200 MW) are planned in Australia, China and the American Southwest. Thermal storage can be provided by covering the ground with heat-absorbing surfaces, so that power generation can also continue at night. The investment cost (about $30/m²) and the solar energy collection efficiency (about 5%) are both low, while the energy payback period is expected to be 3–5 years.

Photovoltaic (PV) Collectors

PV collectors convert photons to electrons. Sunlight is composed of photons containing various amounts of energy corresponding to the range of wavelengths within the solar spectrum. When photons strike a PV cell, they may be reflected, pass through, or be absorbed — only the absorbed photons generate electricity, because the construction material (the silicon atom in the crystal) has to receive 1.1 electron volts to cause its valence electron to move into the conduction zone.

A typical silicon PV cell is composed of a wafer with an ultra-thin layer of phosphorus-doped silicon (N-layer, negative character) placed on top of a thicker layer of boron-doped silicon (P-layer, positive character), connected by the P-N junction. When sunlight strikes the surface of the cell, an electrical field is generated that provides momentum and direction to the light-stimulated electrons, producing a current flow when the cell is connected to an electrical load.

Flat-plate PV collectors contain an array of individual cells connected in a series/parallel circuit and encapsulated within a sandwich structure, the front of which is glass or plastic. Unlike thermal collectors, the backside is not insulated, because for best performance the cells need to be cooled by the atmosphere; eliminating this energy loss in new designs could much improve conversion efficiency. Flat PV collectors can also track the sun by tilting about their axis. Flexible thin-film solar cell strips and collectors are also available.

Parabolic PV collectors combine the steam-generation capability of thermal collectors with direct electricity generation by PV cells: silicon solar cells bonded to the coolant tube generate electricity, while the high-temperature coolant is used to generate steam.

Today the energy payback period of PV collectors for thin-film systems is about 3 years, and for multi-crystalline silicon systems about 4 years; as manufacturing techniques improve, these periods are likely to drop to about 2 years. With a minimum lifespan of 25 years, the ratio of energy obtained to energy invested in manufacturing PV collectors is 10:1 — favorable compared to, for example, oil shale, which has a ratio of only 4:1. The carbon dioxide emission payback period of PV collectors is estimated at 3 years.

Storing and Transporting Solar Energy

The storage of solar energy is important because it is needed to compensate for diurnal, seasonal and weather-related variations in insolation, so that continuous energy users can be supplied without interruption. On small installations, storage can be provided by hot water tanks or high-density batteries. On mid-sized installations, pumped hydro storage can be considered. For larger installations, compressing air into underground caverns has been suggested.

A better option is to eliminate the need for storage. This can be achieved if an electric grid is available in the area, taking excess solar electricity when not needed or supplementing the shortage when more is needed — for example, if a solar power plant is located close to a hydroelectric or fossil power plant, that plant’s rate of generation can be adjusted as the availability of solar energy changes.

A favored method of storage is to convert solar energy into chemical energy and store or distribute it in that form, as a gas, liquid or solid. In one process, high-temperature solar chemistry uses mirrors to concentrate the sun’s rays on zinc oxide and vaporize it at 1,200°C; the vaporized zinc is later condensed into a powder, transported, and when reacted with water vapor produces hydrogen fuel while recombining with oxygen back into zinc oxide. This method is not yet commercially available.

Chemical energy can also be stored in hydrogen, generated from ammonia, from the reforming of fossil fuels, or by the electrolysis of water. When made from fossil fuels, the carbon is exhausted into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide, contributing to global warming.

Hydrogen can be stored as high-pressure gas, as cryogenic liquid, or absorbed in solids such as metal hydrides (sodium borohydride) and metallic “sponges” (zirconium, platinum, lanthanum).

Hydrogen as a Transportation Fuel

Hydrogen is stored as a cryogenic liquid or as a gas compressed to some 350 to 800 atmospheres (5,000 to 12,000 psi). On a weight basis, the energy content of hydrogen is 3.4 times that of gasoline; on a volume basis, hydrogen requires 3 times the volume of gasoline to store the same amount of energy. Hydrogen can also be stored in solids — “reversible solid” storage is probably the safest approach, but is still experimental and today can store only small amounts of energy.

Because of its lower volumetric energy density, hydrogen fuel tanks need to be roughly 3 times the size of today’s gasoline tanks to provide the same driving range (somewhat less in practice, because hydrogen engines are more efficient than gasoline ones). High-pressure hydrogen tanks are made of carbon fiber; cryogenic (liquid) hydrogen tanks are double-walled with the space between the walls evacuated for thermal insulation.

If electric cars with battery storage are used instead of hydrogen fuel, batteries can be recharged at electric filling stations, which in the future are likely to also provide both gasoline and hydrogen fuel, as the automobile fleet of the next couple of decades is likely to become a mixed one.

Compressing hydrogen consumes about 16% of the gas’s energy content with a single-stage compressor, or 12% with multistage units and intercoolers. Liquefying hydrogen costs about 30% of its energy content; some of the liquid in a storage tank will also vaporize due to heat infiltration (“boil-off”), reducing the volume available for storage. The liquefiers serving NASA’s Space Shuttle program (Air Products) have a production capacity of 35–40 tons/day.

Because of its lower density, transporting hydrogen through pipelines requires more energy than transporting natural gas. Transporting compressed hydrogen gas by truck is inefficient, because an empty truck (capable of holding several hundred atmospheres of pressure) weighs almost as much as a full one, and its tank can hold only about 400 kilograms of hydrogen — a busy gas station could require 10–20 deliveries a day, versus a single daily delivery if liquid hydrogen is used. This favors transporting and storing hydrogen as a liquid, despite the additional energy cost of liquefaction.

Safety is another important consideration. Hydrogen has been extensively used in the petrochemical, food and space-exploration industries for decades, making its storage, transportation and handling reasonably safe. Hydrogen tankers and trucks are designed similarly to LNG carriers. Hydrogen has a safety advantage over LNG: in case of a leak, high-molecular-weight gases such as propane accumulate on the ground, while hydrogen quickly escapes into the atmosphere — a property confirmed by crash tests of automobiles with hydrogen tanks.

Hydrogen Generation, Electrolysis

About 98% of the bulk hydrogen produced today is generated from steam reformation of natural gas (methane, CH₄), where methane is reacted with water vapor over a catalyst to form carbon monoxide (CO) and hydrogen. Ethanol, biomass, other fossil fuels or organic waste can also be used to produce hydrogen by “reforming” — a process that also releases large quantities of greenhouse gases.

Vegetation, including algae, produces hydrogen from water while absorbing sunlight, combining the hydrogen with carbon dioxide to produce glucose. Solar- or wind-based electrolysis (or ultrasonic splitting) of water are the only hydrogen-generation processes that are completely non-polluting.

In 1820, Faraday discovered electrolysis by passing electricity through water, generating hydrogen at the negative electrode (cathode) and oxygen at the positive electrode (anode). Plants use a similar process, using chlorophyll as a catalyst and the sun’s energy to decompose water into oxygen and hydrogen, which is then reacted with carbon dioxide to form glucose. Until the industrial age, atmospheric CO₂ concentration was constant, because the CO₂ exhaled by animals was consumed by plants.

Electrolysis is an endothermic reaction requiring energy for its operation:

H₂O + (286 kJ of energy) ⇌ H₂ + ½O₂

It takes the same amount of energy to split water into hydrogen and oxygen as is generated by oxidizing hydrogen back into water. Because electrolysis increases entropy, not all the energy needs to be supplied as electricity — only 237.1 kJ of electrical energy is needed to make a mole of hydrogen, with the surrounding environment contributing the additional 48.7 kJ of thermal energy.

Water can be converted into hydrogen and oxygen using electricity from a battery or any other source, including solar electricity. (In nuclear submarines, electricity is provided by the reactor, and the main purpose of onboard electrolysis is to produce oxygen.) When battery electricity is replaced by electricity from solar collectors, “solar-hydrogen” is produced: one mole of water yields one mole of hydrogen gas plus a half-mole of oxygen gas, both in their normal diatomic forms.

The target set by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is to increase the efficiency of electrolysis (presently around 66%) to 75%, while eliminating the need for platinum electrodes. (Efficiency is the ratio of the energy contained in the hydrogen produced to the energy it takes to produce it.) The DOE target has already been reached by some designs using new porous electrode materials.

Fuel Cells

When hydrogen fuel is burned, it emits no carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide, volatile organic compounds, or fine particles — the only by-product is water vapor. Forming a mole of water (18 grams) this way also releases 286 kJ of energy. If the combustion takes place in a fuel cell, only 237.3 kJ of this energy can be recovered as electrical output, while 48.7 kJ heats the environment — the mirror image of electrolysis, where the environment instead contributes 48.7 kJ of heat.

In an ideal (theoretically perfect) fuel cell, the fuel’s energy content is converted to electrical energy at 237/286 = 83% efficiency — far greater than ordinary hydrogen combustion. Real fuel cells are less efficient (about 66%), but still much more efficient than fossil-fuel power plants or internal combustion engines (25%).

Fuel cell designs are categorized by their operating temperature, electrode design, electrolyte, and fuel type; electrolytes can be acidic or alkaline liquids, solids, or solid-liquid composites. Low-temperature alkaline fuel cells (AFCs) were among the first designs used in the U.S. space program to produce water and electricity on spacecraft, but are subject to carbon monoxide poisoning, are expensive, and have short operating lives.

Phosphoric acid fuel cells (PAFC) are “first-generation” mature designs used in larger vehicles and buses — medium-temperature (400°F) units, generally 60 to 200 kW, up to 85% efficient generating both electricity and heat (about 50% for electricity alone), but large, heavy, and around $4,000/kW.

Polymer electrolyte membrane (PEM) fuel cells (proton exchange cells) suit passenger vehicles: low-temperature (190°F), high power density, low weight, hot water as by-product, 60 to 200 kW range, using a solid polymer electrolyte, porous carbon electrodes and platinum catalyst (developers are exploring catalysts more resistant to carbon monoxide poisoning).

Larger high-temperature fuel cells (250 kW to 3 MW) use carbonate or solid-oxide materials, operating at 1,200 to 1,800°F with high-pressure steam as a by-product.

Once lightweight, low-cost fuel cells are available, they could generate electricity in solar-hydrogen homes or power electric vehicles without pollution, potentially outperforming today’s heavy storage batteries — though the outcome of the battery-versus-fuel-cell race remains open, since batteries are less expensive, their energy density is rising and their size is dropping, while fuel cells are still expensive.

Solar Collector Efficiencies and Costs

Solar collectors are the first link in the equipment chain of the solar-hydrogen economy. Photovoltaic (PV) cell efficiency ranges from about 8% for amorphous silicon to 12–17% for crystalline silicon designs; concentrating and reflected PV designs can reach 25% to 30%.

The first cost of crystalline PV collectors is about $3/Wp, with an installed cost of about $5–$6/Wp; for an average home this ranges from $40,000 to $60,000 for a 5 to 8 kWp installation. Such an installation pays for itself in about 12 years if partially financed by state support and if the state requires power companies to allow grid connection, so excess power can be sold and credited rather than stored in batteries.

The unit cost of electricity from larger PV installations is about 20¢/kWh; from higher-efficiency thermal solar plants, it drops to 8¢–17¢/kWh — competitive with fossil-generated electricity in some areas, 1.5 times higher in others. Israel and China are both building large solar power plants at investments of about $2,500/m² of collector area. In some states, collector systems can now be purchased without an “up front” payment via a Power Purchase Agreement (PPA), under which the generated electricity is purchased at a negotiated price (6 to 30 cents/kWh) over an agreed period (5 to 25 years).

Electrolyser and Hydrogen Handling Costs

After solar collectors, electrolysis is the next link in the chain. Electrolyser efficiency is around 66%, with a DOE target of 75%. The installed cost of smaller electrolysis equipment is around $3,000/kW, dropping substantially as size increases.

Compressing generated hydrogen is 84–88% efficient, consuming about 16% of the gas’s energy content with a single-stage compressor or 12% with multistage units and intercoolers; liquefying the compressed gas is about 70% efficient.

Beyond collector, electrolyser and hydrogen-handling equipment costs, there are transportation, storage and infrastructure expenses. Today, liquid hydrogen made from natural gas costs about $8/kg, and high-pressure gaseous hydrogen $25/kg; since a kilogram of hydrogen has the same energy content as a gallon of gasoline (around $7–$8 in Europe, $2–$3 in the U.S.), this is not yet competitive. Hydrogen made by electrolysis from water using fossil-fuel-generated electricity costs about $4.50/kg. Solar electricity is still more expensive than fossil-generated electricity today, but its price is falling, and solar-hydrogen is expected to become competitive.

Economics on the Global Scale

Meeting today’s global energy consumption with solar energy would require covering 3% to 5% of the Sahara’s area with collectors. At today’s costs, this — plus the associated hydrogen generation, transportation, storage and handling equipment — is prohibitive. Yet Sir Nicholas Stern, former chief economist at the World Bank, estimated the cost of inaction by 2020 at 20% of global GDP, and rising. By comparison, just updating old refineries and modernizing the global oil infrastructure is estimated to cost $3 trillion.

On the brighter side, as new technologies mature and their equipment is mass-produced, prices drop — computer performance improved by orders of magnitude each decade, and wind-power electricity costs have dropped to a quarter of those from the first installations. It is not unrealistic to expect mass-produced solar-hydrogen energy costs to drop similarly as markets expand, making the cost of transition over several decades manageable.

The implications of a shift to the solar-hydrogen economy are profound: freedom from dependence on fossil fuels would end not only global warming but also the geopolitical tensions that have preoccupied national security planners for the last 50 years. This transition can begin slowly but is likely to gain momentum; its pace and direction depend not just on technology but on social, economic and environmental forces and the response of industries, governments and society as a whole. Public support can best be gained by providing actual cost and performance data from operating demonstration plants.

Conclusion

The time for holding conferences and writing articles is over. It is time for action — time to build complete solar-hydrogen demonstration plants. Once built, they will provide reliable cost and efficiency data, allowing the components of the equipment chain to be optimized until they are both reliable and cost-effective.

These packaged units should eventually be mass produced to generate both fuel and electricity in various sizes: the smallest standardized unit (1,000 kg/yr) for individual households, a 10,000 kg/yr unit for schools, hospitals and other institutions, a 100,000 kg/yr package for small communities, and a 1,000,000 kg/yr plant as the power plant of the future.

At present efficiencies, the cost of solar electricity is between 10¢/kWh and 20¢/kWh, and the hydrogen equivalent of a gallon of gasoline costs from $4.50 to $8.00. One goal of building the demonstration plants is to drastically reduce these numbers.

The solar-hydrogen equipment chain

The original document illustrated this section with a process-flow diagram, not preserved in this archive; the stages and figures it labeled are summarized below.

1. Solar energy is converted to electric energy (photons to electrons) — efficiency ≈15%.
2. Electrolysis converts electric energy to chemical energy, stored in hydrogen — efficiency ≈66%. (Cost of the solar electricity input: about 20¢/kWh.)
3. Hydrogen is compressed and liquefied so its chemical energy can be stored and transported — efficiency 35% to 62%. (Output forms noted in the original: low-pressure H₂ gas, or liquid H₂ at about $5/kg.)
4. Combustion of H₂ in fuel cells and power plants converts chemical energy into heat, work and electricity.

With today’s technology, only a small portion of the solar energy falling on a unit area can be converted to useful energy for homes and industry, because of the low efficiencies of each link in this chain (see the tables below) and losses in the many conversions between thermal, electric and chemical forms. Building demonstration plants is meant to establish hard numbers, close the debate over costs, identify and eliminate bottlenecks, and generate standardized packages — after which an international effort should minimize generator costs through mass production and free-market competition.

Once generator units are on the market and can be distributed worldwide, not only will the transition from oil to solar energy begin, but mankind’s confidence in the future can return, as it did for Europe through the Marshall Plan. Past efforts like the Manhattan Project and the Moon landing prove this is achievable, and the consequences of inaction should convince all that it must be done.

Solar Collectors

Electrolysers, Hydrogen Handling & Fuel Cells

Estimated Efficiencies (comparison)

Today’s cost of hydrogen is $5/kg in the USA and $8/kg in Europe.

Prepared by: Béla Lipták (liptakbela@aol.com), former adjunct professor of Yale University, editor of the Environmental Engineer’s Handbook, recipient of ISA’s Life Achievement and Control’s Hall of Fame awards.