The main problem with hydrogen technology, is that hydrogen is readily available, meaning it cannot be easily monopolized by corporations.
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But as I mentioned above, the powers-that-be will be slow in adopting the technology. If it ever will.
The internet just ate my lengthy reply, but the above just isn't true. Once you get beyond small-scale/experimental use, hydrogen becomes expensive and difficult to work with. The aviation sector is putting $ tens of millions (if not hundreds of millions) into hydrogen R&D right now, on both sides of the Atlantic. The first one to crack hydrogen is going to rack up sales of airliners like nobody's business - the future market is valued in the $ trillions.
Issues with hydrogen are:
Price per tonne is about 2-4 times that of traditional hydrocarbons (assuming oil at roughly USD100 per barrel). Even with better energy densities (2.5-3 times better), hydrogen still needs to come down in cost by AT LEAST 50% to make it economically competitive. Hydrogen production is a ~$150 billion a year industry, so it's not like they're not trying hard on that front either.
Delivery and storage are expensive and difficult. Hydrogen needs to be stored in pressurised containers, or cryogenically frozen to keep it a liquid. Hydrogen is also much more expensive to pipe than oil or natural gas (about a two thirds premium), and much harder to transport physically via ship/road/rail than traditional fossil fuels as well thanks to the storage issues.
Weight is a problem for aviation. For a commercial aircraft, hydrogen power is hampered by the weigh of its storage apparatus. Currently, Jet A1 powered aircraft have a 60-70% advantage in terms of total fuel/fuel system weight when compared to a hydrogen powered aircraft. That's a HUGE disadvantage that needs to be overcome - an A380 on Sydney-Los Angeles will burn around 210 tonnes of fuel (on a 520 tonne aircraft) and the fuel system in total weighs about another 30 tonnes. If you powered the same aircraft with hydrogen, it would need to weigh somewhere in the region of
145 to 160 tonnes more.
There's also hydrogen's lack of volumetric efficiency. Given how bulky pressurised storage containers are, current designs would need to store hydrogen in the rear of the cabin, eating into passenger areas that could otherwise be used for revenue generating seats. A 150 seat narrowbody (A320 or 737) redone with hydrogen fuel cells to power it would lose about 30-40 seats - which would make it totally uneconomical to fly. Commercial airliners need a total rethink in terms of design if hydrogen is to be successful.
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