I'm thinking that pumped storage might be more useful on the spot market, the very limited market where you can get 100 times the normal price for electrcity.  Stored hydro would have to be principally for this spot market during summer months.  

And I think that pumping from Lake Michigan would have to be limited.  Lake Superior has almost 3 times the volume of Lake Michigan (12,100 km2 for Superior compared to 4,920 km2 for Lake Michigan.) As well, I think that there's a lot of hydropower potential in Ontario and Quebec.

As for hydrogen, I think that it's only a matter of time until it becomes cost competitve. And for geological areas suitable for large scale storage, how about a giant, abandoned salt mine beneath the city of Detroit.  With Detroit being the center of the American auto industry, the implication of having a huge hydrogen supply in close proximity to the vast majority of US auto construction should be obvious.

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