Hydrogen cars and alternative energy

I pasted this from http://forum.physorg.com H2 is hydrogen depolymization converts plastic and some other kinds of trash to oil LHV = liquid hydrogen vehicle? Volume? LH2 =liquid hydrogen CNG = cyrogenic natural gas =LNG? MJ = megajoules Nat gas = natural gas = methane Do you agree?
Hydrogen takes up a lot more room than a gallon of Gas does.

then there's the question of how do you keep H2 liquid, and in a car for a week at a time? how big of a tank will you need to store enough H2 to drive the car for 300 miles?

how do you get the H2 from the pump at the station to the car? can we still self serve? what will leaking H2 into the atmosphere do to the environment?

there's more questions I'm sure. I really don't think Hydrogen is the answer everyone is looking for. I think the answer is two fold, possibly more.

First, build lots of thermo depolymerization plants and turn the bulk of our garbage into nice clean oil. this solves 3 problems right off the bat. 1. less garbage 2. less dependece on foriegn oil and 3, no new carbon being added to the environment, since we're just using carbon that's already in the cycle.

Second, build lots of pebble bed nuclear power plants.

so the oil runs our cars, and the nuke plants run our houses and offices. we can also increase solar and wind and wave. huge barges off the coasts with wind mills on them would do wonders. Also I'd like them to start researching Microwave transmission of power again. so we can put up giant solar collectors in orbit and beam the power to the ground, and Giant solar farms on the moon.

this way we don't have to destroy our entire gas infrastructure, and we get a cleaner environment to boot.

Hydrogen 142 MJ/kg 120 MJ/kg 0.18
Nat Gas 38 MJ/kg 35 MJ/kg 0.08
Gasoline 35 MJ/kg 32 MJ/kg 0.11

LHV gasoline 32 MJ/kg * 3.727272727 kg/US gal = 119.2727273 MJ/gal

Actually 1 kg H2 is a bit better than 1 gal gas.

All the rest is nonsense. BMW and Linde are already in process of building 400 liquid H2 auto fueling stations all over Europe. Their stations have a robot attendant to fill you up, you don't even leave your car. Using liquid H2, the auto range, though lower, is not a problem.

Mass density Energy density
H2 0.07 kg/litre 8.4 MJ/litre
Gasoline 3.73 kg/litre 119.36 MJ/litre

Note that LH2 is significantly more tank-effective than CNG, which all taxis in my area now use for fuel. Need better numbers? Get a hybrid. Using NREL's high-pressure carbon fiber liquid H2 tank design the storage retention time is not an issue. (eg by Chart Indust. stated NER% for their smallest tank, a 13 kg auto tank should only need to have used/evaporated 70 grams per day starting on the third day. Plan ahead. Or better yet, use a Plug Hybrid based on ACPropulsion's inverters and grid-connect the vehicle if it's going to sit idle for any time period. It can then start up once or twice a day to generate power back into the grid to cool down the tank, and use the grid to charge some small Li-ion batteries needed for regen braking anyway, to reduce further it's fuel requirements with off-peak windpower or those pebble beds etc..)

Bio-diesel is a curiosity, but should be reserved for aircraft (which can't arbitrarily shorten re-fueling stops or be quickly re-designed for LH2). Once those are done, then is there any left? And please carefully eval. the gabage burning idea, way too many heavy metals which can't reasonably be separated except from flue gases in large centralized incinerators.

Meanwhile quit blocking, dump your Texaco shares, and get going.

I have to say that site didn't do much to convince me.

all I got out of it is that fuel cells are only about 35% efficient and they are expensive.

so I'll have to pay more for a car, and probably higher maintanence for it.

and this doesn't tell me how much H2 I'll need for my 300 mile trip, it's easy to tell people to plan ahead, but people don't and frankly they don't want too. you'll never convince any large group of people to accept something that's going to make them work harder or be inconvienced. People in general just don't care.

so if you want to really sell this, it either has to be cheaper, which I don't think it would be. the initial cost of the car will be more, and I'm betting the cost of the fuel will be more. It has to be easier, which it could be, but I'm betting it won't be. the cost of maintaining those robot pumpers is going to jack up the price and will probably take longer to pump, which is bad when you didn't plan ahead and have to fill up before work and you over slept and you're running late.

though that is something I'd like to learn more about.

How much is H2 going to cost at the pump? how will it be made, how much can we make, how much will it take to give a comparable range to the car. how much will the cars cost. and how much will it cost to keep the car. how much re training will he have to have and how long will it be before we have enough competent mechanics to meet demand? and how much more are we going to have to pay them?

 

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

In my opinion there won't be a hydrogen economy. I base that mostly on James Howard Kuntsler's book, The Long Emergency. Refining hydrogen from garbage isn't an answer, since the huge amount of garbage we produce is based on having cheap fuel in the first place.

Hybrid cars are more complicated to make, and cannot be made at all without substantial use of petroleum.

Nuclear power may be our only alternative, but they only produce electricity, and many things like airplanes and industrial machinery, mining equipment, and the like cannot run on electricity, neither can airplanes. Also, we are not building nuclear reactors now, and we might not be able to without petroleum, much less maintain them into the future.

Basically, we are in for a big, big change in lifestyle in the near future, and we aren't prepared for it. Environmental movements have the right idea, organic farming, local economies, small scale power generation, etc. But they all assume that if we just recycle, everything will more or less continue as they are. But it will be as radical a change as the industrial revolution, and not at all a smooth transition.

 

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

Biodiesel is also a fantasy. It is impossible to grow enough biomass to fuel our present need, there isn't enough farmland. Today we have factory farms, tractors, fertilizer and pesticides made from oil, and deep aquifers for water, all of which increase yields. Without these, farmland will be too valuable to waste on growing vegetable oil for fuel.

My solution? Buy a horse.

 

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

Hi spidergoat: You and Kuntler are partly correct. The present applications for petroleum are not easily filled by alternatives, especially aircraft. We need to phase in some of the easier alternatives at a faster rate or our children and grandchildren are likely to buy oil and gasoline at higher prices than milk and wine. My guess is a small nitch each for biodiesel, biomass, hydrogen, geothermal, horses, and perhaps several percent each for hybred vehicles, recyle, conservation, nuclear, solar power and wind power. The present progress will be too little and too late, unless new technology saves the day. Neil

 

Yeah, that's about right. But only Al Gore is interested in the subject. His book, Earth in the Balance was a work of genius. He didn't just talk about alternative energy, but our whole mental pathology.

 

Here is an interesting paste from the NY times I got from www.able2know.com

All that changed last month when Honda handed me the keys to a 2005 edition of its FCX (for Fuel Cell Experimental), the first zero-emission, hydrogen-driven vehicle to be certified by both the Environmental Protection Agency and the State of California for everyday commercial use. This is a street-ready hydrogen car with license plates and no rough edges, a test bed for green technology worth well over $1 million.

Only 20 similar cars exist in the United States and Japan, and I was one of the first journalists to drive it for an extended, unsupervised period - a week in the mixed company of Northeastern traffic.

Given my experience with fuel-cell prototypes that were noisy, balky and incapable of going very far between refuelings, the FCX was something of a surprise. Featuring the latest generation of Honda's own fuel cells (hundreds of them are arrayed in two multiple sets, called stacks) and a body and electric motor derived from the company's unsuccessful EV Plus battery vehicle, the FCX felt like a real car, not a high-strung test mule.

A small two-door hatchback with seating for four, it came with traction control, a CD player and even an automatic climate-control system. There may be fewer than two dozen of these cars in the world, but Honda went to the trouble of giving this one classy floor mats embroidered with the FCX logo.

With new noise-suppression technology, the FCX is one of the quietest cars on the road. While driving, you hear only a low rumble from the fuel cell's compressor and the brakes' vacuum pump, complemented on acceleration by a jet-taking-off whine.

The main hydrogen components are hidden: an 86-kilowatt fuel cell under the front passenger area, two tanks (holding a total of 8.3 pounds, pressurized to 5,000 pounds per square inch) under the rear seat and the ultracapacitor (which stores electricity and takes the place of a battery pack) behind a cover in the cargo area.

Although top speed is only 93 miles an hour, the low-end torque of the 80-kilowatt electric motor is substantial, booting the little car off the line with alacrity. The 107 horsepower has to move a relatively weighty 3,700 pounds, so it takes about 11 seconds to accelerate to 60 miles an hour, but there is no noticeable lag or flat spots in the power delivery.

The FCX is equipped with a standard hybrid feature, regenerative brakes, which capture energy that would otherwise be wasted and feed it to the ultracapacitor. While the brakes feel a bit spongy, they stop the car with confidence thanks to antilock technology and electronic vacuum assist.

Getting under way in the FCX is a little different. You turn the key and a "system check" message appears on a dashboard display, followed (in five to eight seconds) by a "ready to drive" message. You just drop the normal-looking shifter into drive - the car has a single-speed transmission - and take off. No drama, no sonic symphony.

The latest FCX incorporates several improvements, including a new aromatic electrolyte fuel-cell membrane that allows cold weather use to minus 4 degrees Fahrenheit. The cell itself, with thin stamped steel separators replacing bulkier carbon dividers, is half the size of Honda's previous design, but produces twice the power.

In most important ways, the FCX feels ready for prime-time combat on the world's roads. But its Achilles' heels are price, travel range (about 190 miles) and refueling capability. My loan was interrupted by a trip to the nearest compatible hydrogen station - in Latham, N.Y., near Albany -a three-hour journey in an enclosed trailer.

Continued
http://www.nytimes.com/ads/washdc/popWashDCJune05.html?sz=550x480;ord=2005.06.05.14.24.47

I would not want tanks under my seat pressurized to 5000 psi. Is the ultra capacitor or the fuel cells the heaviest component? How many minutes did it take to refill the hydrogen tanks at Albany? Does compatable hydrogen mean 5000 psi is rarely available and/or regular hydrogen has impurities that would eventually degrade the fuel cells? Will the FCX go a mile on the ultracapacitor charge when the last of the hydrogen is used? Is the capacitor discharged completely climbing a long steep hill at 80 MPH? Do you need to slow down to avoid over heating the electric motors and/or the fuel cells in very hot weather.
I presume the 190 miles range is less, driving non-stop at high speed, into a strong head wind. Most vehicles use 5 times 8.3 pounds of gasoline or diesel to travel 190 miles. I'm impressed. Neil

 

There are lot of wastelands that are not fit for farms, they dont have big trees but are full of weeds and shrubs. So in the future, with a little enrichments of land and genetic engeineering we should be possible to get biofuel, but to get there we will have to start research today.

 

If they are not fit for farms, then you can't farm there. What are you saying? Enrichment of land usually means fertilizer, which, incidently, comes from fossil fuels, and anyway is unsustainable. Careful conversion to organic farming is necessary, but in that case, the land will be too valuable to waste on the ineffecient conversion of solar energy into plant oils, then into ineffecient combustion engines to transport us to jobs that won't exist anymore when the oil economy is gone.

 

In the USA there is lots of idle, but marginal farm land. Think of vegetable oil for fuel as a soil bank, which can be converted to growing food quickly, if a food shortage develops. Hungry people are mostly an ecconomic, political and distribution problem at present. USA can double food production by 2020 if the food can be sold at a sizable profit. Double might produce 2% of the world's energy. Every little bit helps. Neil

 

Nothing will ever replace my baby...

http://img13.echo.cx/my.php?image=dscn13155oo.jpg

 

Hi NO1: A hydrogen car or hybred can look a lot like your baby, and perform about as well. Neil

 

never replicated. never duplicated.

( 1996 NA AUTO SPORT ROOF)
http://mkiv.com/specifications/sales_numbers/retail_sales.html

http://mkiv.com/specifications/sales_numbers/color.html
11 baby thats 11. although I changed colors 3x

The 2JZGE ( convert to T) with Mobil 1 mixed with good ol 100 octane race fuel will perform just nicely for me.

Hi.

 

U waste our time, our bandwidth, U r boring, this thread is not for U.

 

i don't want to double post, but many here may find my two recent posts in the "solar energy" thread interesting - they are about Brazil's (where i live) alcohol cars - cheaper than gas, cleaner burning, why alcohol fuel reduces global warming, and is currently economical solar energy. Brazil has about 30 years of alcohol car experience and for the last few years our cars will operate on any mix of alcohol and gas every well. See those posts to learn what you must do to drive more cheaply now with many other benefits just mentioned (friendly to enviroment etc.)

 

I'm all for biodiesel, but it's a transitional fuel, and a good way to recycle used cooking oil.

 

Not Solid Hydrogen. A disk the size of a hockey puck will power a vehicle for a year, and if we can fill the frame and/or body panels with it, it will be free of refueling for at least a human lifetime.


Dave

 

Using hydrogen won't make you lose your ride only change what powers it. They have had hydrogen powered vehicles exced 200 MPH already and we are just starting to understand hydrogen today. Imagine in 20 years if we persue hydrogen based fuel we will have a cleaner environment and fast cars too!

 

I suppose you know best. As for testing the alternative cars, nothing compares to the brute stubborness of the 2JZ. Hybrids - aint happenin. I encourage the alternative resources as long as they know what they are doing.

 

Is this your invention or there are some links on this one ?

 

It's ready to go, the Solid Hydrogen, the manufacturer is being quashed by higher powers in gov/big 3. Bod Stemel former GM CEO has been more than ready for over 3 years. We should all be driving them already.

http://www.thecarconnection.com/?article=6332

On the Road to Hydrogen
Former GM CEO has a “solid” solution to storage problems
by Paul A. Eisenstein (2003-09-01)



It's the most abundant element in the universe. It is also one of the most difficult to work with, and that's one of the obstacles in the effort to create a so-called "hydrogen economy."

A new approach to storing hydrogen in solid form could overcome one of the most difficult challenges to using hydrogen as a clean alternative to gasoline.

"We're going to make hydrogen a practical fuel," asserts Bob Stempel.

If the name is familiar, that's because he briefly served as CEO of General Motors Corp. in the early 1990s. These days, Stempel is still deeply immersed in the auto industry, but now as chairman of a quirky Detroit company known as Energy Conversion Devices. Over the last few decades, ECD has patented a number of innovative technologies in a wide range of fields, from copiers to solar cells to batteries - it developed the high-power nickel metal-hydride cell, among other things. Now ECD engineers believe they can solve the thorny problem of hydrogen storage.

The lightest element in the universe, hydrogen is being touted these days as a sort of wonder drug of fuels. Most of the major automakers are racing to develop commercially viable fuel cell powertrains. A few others, such as BMW, are focusing on hydrogen powered internal combustion engines. Either way, when you use it, all you get out the tailpipe is water vapor.

Even if such technologies prove feasible and affordable, there's the issue of producing enough hydrogen for the nation's fleet of nearly 200 million automobiles, delivering the gas to your local service station, and then storing it onboard your car.

Bringing it all together

"If you're going to have a hydrogen economy," cautions ECD founder Stan Ovshinsky, "you're going to have to have the entire system."

The storage problem might seem simple to solve and, indeed, there are a number of alternatives. You can compress the gas, but even at the crushing pressure of 10,000 pounds per square inch, you need so many tanks, range is limited to little more than 150 miles on a fill-up. You can cool it to liquid form, but that requires a temperature as low as you'd find in deep space, near absolute zero. Getting there requires a lot of energy and over time, liquid hydrogen will boil off from a parked car.

The approach unveiled by ECD is to store hydrogen in solid form. Ironically, the material that does this is quite similar to the compound in a nickel metal-hydride battery. Hydrides are so named because they tend to bond with loose hydrogen. But apply heat and the hydrogen breaks free, and can be fed into a fuel cell or IC engine.

Hydride storage is under development by a number of companies, it must be noted, but ECD is the first to put it into serious field testing. The firm last week unveiled a modified 2002 Toyota Prius hybrid-electric vehicle. Much of the HEV was left as you'd find it at the local showroom. But instead of running on gasoline, the Prius's engine was converted to use hydrogen instead of gasoline.

Open the trunk and you'll find a prototype hydride tank developed by Texaco Ovonic Hydrogen Systems, a joint venture between ECD and Chevron-Texaco. The tank can hold about 3 kilograms of hydrogen, each kg equal to roughly a gallon of gasoline. It might not sound like much, but in the current configuration, that'll give you about 150 miles range. And the plan is to double the volume of hydrogen, so the Prius could match the range of a conventional automobile.

That's one of the promises, anyway, and there are others still requiring a small leap of faith. According to ECD officials, it currently takes about 10 minutes to get a 90 percent fill-up, with the goal to cut that time in half.

Fill 'er up -- quickly

Of course, that would require you to find a filling station that not only offered hydrogen, but which used the special, three-piece nozzle currently required by the ECD tank.

The entire storage assembly weighs over 400 pounds, a hefty penalty compared with a conventional gas tank. And even though it's a potentially significant improvement compared with compressed or liquid hydrogen storage, the hydride tank is still relatively inefficient. When full, hydrogen accounts for only about 1.6 percent of the system's total weight.

There are more efficient hydride compounds, explains Ovshinsky, but to get them to release their hydrogen would require temperatures of as much as 300 degree Celsius. And that would require a lot of energy. The system shown last week draws upon waste heat generated by the Prius's internal combustion engine that would normally be shed through the radiator. And at just 90 degrees C, the system could rely on waste heat from a cooler-running fuel cell, as well.

As to the price tag? "Our goal is to compete with any hydrogen storage system," contends Rosa Young, the vice president of technology for Texaco-Ovonics. Eventually, experts say, that will mean not a lot more than a conventional gasoline fueling system, though getting there will be a challenge.

Indeed, despite all the enthusiasm over hydrogen, the reality of getting the fuel into widespread use remains daunting. Few expect to see the fuel cell in widespread use before the latter part of the next decade. But it might never happen if the storage issue isn't solved.




Solid Hydrogen Storage Powers a Practical Hydrogen Hybrid Vehicle


PALM DESERT, Calif., Aug. 16 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- As many of the
world's hydrogen fuel and vehicle experts gather in Southern California this
week to help guide surface transportation along its evolutionary path, there
is the realization that serious building blocks must emerge to make clean,
hydrogen-fueled vehicles a reality.
One of those crucial elements, along with an expanding "Hydrogen Highway
Network" fueling infrastructure, is the ability to outfit vehicles with safe
and efficient on-board hydrogen storage. Texaco Ovonic Hydrogen Systems LLC
(TOHS), a joint venture of Energy Conversion Devices, Inc. (ECD Ovonics)
(Nasdaq: ENER) and ChevronTexaco Technology Ventures LLC, is demonstrating how
this can be achieved through the use of its metal-hydride hydrogen storage
system in a modified hydrogen-electric variant of today's best-selling hybrid
sedan.
The modified hydrogen hybrid will be available for test drives at the
South Coast Air Quality Management District's "Hydrogen - Fueling the Clean
Air Future" conference today and tomorrow, August 16 and 17, at the J.W.
Marriott Desert Springs Resort in Palm Desert, Calif.
"We believe that one of the key enabling technologies for implementing the
hydrogen economy ... now ... is our metal hydride storage solution," says Bill
Roth, Chief Operating Officer of TOHS. "Our storage system could be used today
in cars and trucks that operate with either internal combustion engines or
fuel cells, it could also be used as an alternative to batteries for power
back-up systems, as a fuel alternative for on-site generation, and it could be
installed in just about any end-use application that today uses traditional
hydrocarbon fuels."
TOHS' solid hydrogen storage system works by absorbing hydrogen in a metal
powder, with the hydrogen and powder bonding at the atomic level upon contact.
Removing heat drives this absorption process. Hydrogen is released out of the
metal powder and into the vehicle's fuel system by adding heat to reverse the
chemical reaction. Those who have driven the modified hydrogen hybrid vehicle
say the system works as seamlessly as the more conventional gasoline tank and
fuel pump systems found in today's automobiles.
This converted hydrogen hybrid has led to a follow-on South Coast AQMD
program that will add five more hybrid sedans modified to run on hydrogen
stored in TOHS' solid hydrogen storage medium by next spring.
In an environment where 5,000 psi gaseous hydrogen storage provides
insufficient driving range and 10,000 psi systems are being developed, the
TOHS solid hydrogen storage system offers the option of storing hydrogen at a
low 250 psi. Refueling, which occurs at the relatively low pressure of 1,500
psi, takes under 10 minutes. In the future, when used with hybrids, this low-
pressure, solid hydrogen storage technology has the potential to deliver the
same kind of range, driving experience, and refueling convenience expected of
the vehicles we drive today.


Scope

The conference will cover a variety of issues related to solid state hydrogen storage materials, ranging from processing, hydrogen storage properties, cyclic stability and lifetime assessment to material-specific application development.

The conference is expected to be useful for people who are dealing with

Hydrogen gas generation
Hydrogen storage
Hydrogen based automobiles
Batteries
Thermal energy management based on waste heat or renewable energy
Hydrogen isotope separation
Refrigeration and air-conditioning
Electric energy generation and augmentation


The conference will bring together scientists and academicians as well as the nascent industry involved in storage materials together with industry representatives who will need to be attuned to the long range goals of the hydrogen energy development program. The platform will be designed to combine the technical expertise in the field from around the world with excellent prospects for networking among the participants to enable collaborative R&D in this frontier area that would have far reaching impact on the society. The topics covered would include:

Storage Materials

• Metal hydrides
• Chemical hydrides
- inorganic
- organic
• Physisorption
- carbon
- zeolites
• Emerging materials



Applications in

• Fuel cells
• IC Engines
• Batteries
• Nuclear applications
• Energy management
• Heat and mass transfer
• Reactors