It might not be as far off as one might think. Matthew Wald has the scoop in a story in Sunday's Times entitled "Hydrogen Production Method Could Bolster Fuel Supplies":

Researchers at a government nuclear laboratory and a ceramics company in Salt Lake City say they have found a way to produce pure hydrogen with far less energy than other methods, raising the possibility of using nuclear power to indirectly wean the transportation system from its dependence on oil.

I'm not such a huge fan of nuclear power (for obvious reasons), but let's read on, shall we?

The development would move the country closer to the Energy Department's goal of a "hydrogen economy," in which hydrogen would be created through a variety of means, and would be consumed by devices called fuel cells, to make electricity to run cars and for other purposes. Experts cite three big roadblocks to a hydrogen economy: manufacturing hydrogen cleanly and at low cost, finding a way to ship it and store it on the vehicles that use it, and reducing the astronomical price of fuel cells.

"This is a breakthrough in the first part," said J. Stephen Herring, a consulting engineer at the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory, which plans to announce the development on Monday with Cerametec Inc. of Salt Lake City.

The developers also said the hydrogen could be used by oil companies to stretch oil supplies even without solving the fuel cell and transportation problems.

Mr. Herring said the experimental work showed the "highest-known production rate of hydrogen by high-temperature electrolysis."

But the plan requires the building of a new kind of nuclear reactor, at a time when the United States is not even building conventional reactors. And the cost estimates are uncertain.

Well, maybe this plan is not the panacea Bush, Schwarzenegger and the Republicans might have you think it is. Nevertheless, we should look into efficient and clean methods of producing hydrogen to help wean us off of traditional fossil fuels. When oil is $200 per barrel, it's not exactly going to be possible for us to be driving Hummers...