The Core

I've got a few quid in a company called AFC energy. They have hydrogen systems designed for off-grid, but their other angle is ammonia cracking to create hydrogen which they claim is more efficient than straight up electrolysis. Remains to be seen whether I trade out in profit.

I think the gist is that hydrogen is tricky to transport and store, so ammonia is effectively a battery and works well for anything off grid.

Seems to make sense that electricity curtailment could be redirected towards storing energy chemically, especially in places that lack preferential hydro geography. Lots of sums and energy (in)efficiencies involved and big unknowns like government subsidies.

Ammonia sure will have its challenges though, it is very corrosive to plastics and some metals, and pretty toxic to humans at relatively low concentrations.   Maybe boats and ships are a good place to start because energy density is less important there than in other forms of transportation. 

Ammonia has a lot going for it too.  We've been making it for a long time.  It has hydrogen in it but no carbon.

Yeah, that's an interesting idea too.  On a related note, I've often thought they could run their equipment off of the energy from their animal waste.   It seems like a huge resource not to use.

In the Midwest, a lot of family farms have gone straight grain and no longer raise cattle or hogs like they did up until the 1970's.  It's hard to compete against huge factory cattle operations.  They have even removed the fences which used to enclose each field since the fences are not needed for cattle anymore.