Just wanted to say that I appreciate the nuanced debate here, and that neither of you resulted in insulting each other after getting to the bottom of it. More of this on Lemmy!

I think the analogy would be a plant-based burger from Beyond or Impossible, but I totally agree with the sentiment!

I never refuted your claim in certainty, rebutting with my own truth statements. In my comment, I pointed to the variables in effect leading to whether Biden stays in the race or bows out. Realistically, it's uncertain at this moment.

I will say that if and once donors dry up, I do think that the DNC will take action. What action that is will depend.

It's going to be an exciting few days/weeks.

It's up to the DNC as to which candidate takes the running ballot. I'm betting there are a lot of conversations right now about who will be that person.

You are half right and half wrong because that decision will come down to whether establishment Democrats or populist Democrats win.

And to be quiet frank, I don't even think the DNC gets a say. Since Biden is the incumbent, unless he bows out voluntarily, I don't think we the people or the DNC get to choose.

Our hands are really tied when it comes to the presidential frontrunner, unfortunately.

I mean, if anything, the fact that the Oil & Gas industry uses hydrogen for refining means that there is a possible, robust market for green hydrogen to get into (don't like this because it means oil is still the focus, when we need to consider green chemistry and stop with oil).

The O&G industry also helped usher in solar PV at an early stage because of the needs of remote power in hazardous environments such as offshore rigs and near potential sources of release like oil tanks (I used to work as an engineer in O&G myself).

There's actually a lot of work by GE and Mitsubishi to start shipping new gas turbines to be capable of firing a non-zero amount of hydrogen in addition to natural gas. I think some plants are even capable of doing 50/50 hydrogen/natural gas, with that former number increasing year over year.

Hydrogen could outstrip conventional fuels someday. The bottleneck has always been supply though.

If renewables are so abundant and cheap, then we'll finally have a reason to deploy hydrogen infrastructure on a massive scale (at least in the US). Hell, you look at the major inverter manufacturers for utility PV like Sungrow, and they have containerized electrolyzers ready for implementation. I haven't done a market survey, but if they're in the game, then so are other players.

If you want to be convinced of the progress of hydrogen, I would look into the project that Sargent & Lundy is working on in Utah. They're planning on using a salt cavern for hydrogen storage, and I believe there is a CCGT onsite as well to make use of the generation.

Hydrogen is even on the minds of offshore wind developers like Siemens.

The substance isn't doomed like others in this thread make it out. There is active interest in the market to develop a supply chain and economy.

Edit: The one thing I don't see a lot of people talk about though is where the raw materials for this hydrogen will come from... Likely groundwater unfortunately. Since groundwater is already a highly sought after resource for consumption and agriculture, I'm not sure if hydrogen in this way will take off. This is why offshore hydrogen seems to be more promising, but as we see with wave and tidal power, the ocean environment just sucks for any commercialization.

It's an uphill battle, but the same can be said for the climate crisis in general. Hope we make enough progress before it's too late.

Locking hydrogen up in ammonia is what the industry looks to be moving to to avoid the problem you describe.

Also, look up the 7 Hydrogen Hubs in the US as an example of this market getting started. There are no downsides to developing a hydrogen market if we're going to have oodles of excess renewable energy.

Oil & Gas companies didn't want Solar, Wind, and Storage to proliferate, yet they did because of cost savings.

I think we could start to see that for these alternative-ion batteries if lithium supply ever becomes an issue. There will always be a niche that has the opportunity to grow in the economy. Just takes the right circumstances and preparation

Really hope green hydrogen kicks off. Could begin society's efuel saga

Redox flow, sodium ion, iron air, etc.

There are some 600+ current chemical-based battery technologies out there.

Hell for me, once sodium is cracked, that shit is so abundant that production wouldn't have many bottlenecks to get started.

Thank you for keeping track of this

Think they still add the beef flavoring to the oil. Check my edits

McDonald's also fries things in beef tallow, iirc

Edit: after confirming online, there are multiple reports saying that McD's stopped using animal-based fats for cooking some 5-30 years ago depending on the market (e.g. US, Canada, etc.). The big push to move away from beef tallow in the US was in the '90s, and now McDonald's confirms that there is beef flavoring in their fries.

Edit 2: and I guess McDonald's uses mostly a canola-based oil blend, but beef flavoring still goes into the blend.

Edit 3: And looking at the ingredients of the vegetable oil itself, the beef flavorants come from hydrolyzed milk derivatives, so not vegan. Apparently McDonald's uses different oils for different things, so I wonder if in the future people could ask for the oil without the flavoring.