Smart engineers chose Hydrogen as the first stage fuel fuel the Space Shuttle, and it turned out to be a terrible choice.
H2 offered the highest ISP, ie energy per fuel mass, and originally they wanted the Shuttle to be a single stage to orbit vehicle. But Hydrogen also added larger, much heavier tanks and engines didn’t have enough thrust for that. So they had to add large Solid Rocket Boosters to get off the pad. And all they additional dry mass meant the higher ISP of H2 was wasted.
And now the SLS is repeating those mistakes, not because engineers didn’t learn those lessons, but because politicians require them to repeat them.
Engineers recommending Hydrogen for cars are
influenced by regulatory requirements and benefits, and politically by company objectives. If your CEO says Hydrogen is important to use because our government and regulators say it is, you as an engineer will find a way to make the best of a bad choice.
I have no horse in this race, but the pros and cons of a technology that is aiming to replace an incumbent that has lasted a century across the globe with millions (billions?) of users and units produced have to be evaluated as a complete system and in many more ways than pure engineering calculations. Fuel production, distribution networks, behavioural science, town planning, etc. were of little to no interest to the scientists you deride, but need to be considered too.
H2 offered the highest ISP, ie energy per fuel mass, and originally they wanted the Shuttle to be a single stage to orbit vehicle. But Hydrogen also added larger, much heavier tanks and engines didn’t have enough thrust for that. So they had to add large Solid Rocket Boosters to get off the pad. And all they additional dry mass meant the higher ISP of H2 was wasted.
And now the SLS is repeating those mistakes, not because engineers didn’t learn those lessons, but because politicians require them to repeat them.
Engineers recommending Hydrogen for cars are influenced by regulatory requirements and benefits, and politically by company objectives. If your CEO says Hydrogen is important to use because our government and regulators say it is, you as an engineer will find a way to make the best of a bad choice.