EV support

The really big problem with hydrogen cars is the lack of infrastructure. But again every thing has to have a beginning of sorts and they don't expect everybody to jump on the band wagon until it's more of a mainstream product with a worth while reason to buy it. I believe it's Toyota that's going to set up a test area in the US. But other companies won't be to far behind.

 

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Even if the infrastructure were there, I don't see any benefit to hydrogen cars over regular battery powered cars. What value do you see in them?

 

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I disagree. One of the problems with solar/wind is that they are unreliable - you don't know when the power will be available. Since most people want to use power when they want to (i.e. they want to turn on their lights when they are in the den and it's dark) this is a problem. You can get them to change their thermostat a bit, but people in general aren't going to be willing to sit in the dark because the wind isn't blowing.

However, EV's can charge at almost any time. High load at 7pm when people get home? Then EV's stop charging and wait until midnight. Did it suddenly get windy at 8pm? Then all those EV's start charging and use that available power, so you don't have to shut down the nuclear plant (which is hard to do quickly.)

Makes sense for us. A good employee incentive, and we don't have to draw down the grid to make it happen.

Makes even more sense to run your A/C at night, chill water in storage tanks, then use that to cool your buildings during the day. Or, when the local grid is short of power, then run a natural gas generator and use the waste heat to run an absorption cycle chiller for A/C. (I know, all marketing gimmicks, but again they work for us - and we pay very little for power compared to most companies our size.)

Well, again, it works for us. We're saving money, making our employees happy, getting an excellent backup generator for safety requirements and reducing the load on the local grid when they are overloaded. We don't see those things as "fads" but I guess they are to some.

 

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Somehow we're using the same point to make different arguments. Might be due to focusing on different alternate energy sources and their different issues: Adaptive charging at night is a great idea, and it does help some with wind, but solar only works during the day (obviously) and it's peak output dovetails well with the grid's peak load (which is in the middle of the day, not at 7pm). Because solar peaks when the grid peaks, it can realistically be used to offset some power plant construction, but I agree (I think we agree) that wind cannot because it is tough to predict when it will work and when it won't: so it needs a 100% conventional backup either way.

Oh, I agree it can and I'm glad it does: energy conservation as marketing helps me make a living!

Yes. We'll see how variable electric pricing changes how power is uesed, but for now there is tons of extra energy and cheap energy at night for such things.

Maybe in SoCal due to high electric power costs. Notsomuch in the northeast, though maybe just CHP without the chiller.

No, the definition of a "marketing gimmick" for me is something that is done for marketing purposes that only costs money and doesn't make money on its own. Combined heat and power (or with an absorption chiller) and ice storage can be significant money makers. For some of my clients, such projects are even handled separately, under separate budgets, with separate rules. Energy projects are required to pay back in 5 years, are funded by an energy project budget and executed by an energy team, while a solar-powered sign at the street is handled by a capital project budget, by a capital project team, and isn't required to have a payback.

As above, separate things, by my definition. Something that makes money or has a real environmental impact isn't a fad, while something that is done strictly for marketing is. Or worse, something that tricks people into thinking it will make them money, but doesn't. But a fad as marketing, if there is no deception? Perfectly fine.

Companies like Tesla and even Apple rely heavily on the fad value of their products. If Apple, suddenly stops being cool, they are doomed because they don't have enough real innovation to stay alive on technical merrit. Tesla's fad value means they can charge an absurd price for their cars and people will still buy them -- hopefully that will enable them to recoup their R&D before one of the big automakers builds a similar car for 2/3 the price and drives them out of business. The Prius was initially sold at a loss and even then was too expensive, but Toyota was big enough to ride that out until it became profitable. That's a good example of a fad that became mass-market viable.

 

Fuel cells are clean and don't have the problems that batteries have and once you have the hydrogen infrastructure in place you aren't tied to the price of oil or unfriendly foreign governments.

 

Agreed.

Not if your loads are dispatchable, as EV's are. Once EV's (and other similarly dispatchable loads) make up a large portion of the load, then managing wind power and other intermittent sources gets a lot easier.

Hmm. Our solar power systems save us money by generating power during peak power times during the day. The employee benefit of EV charging is one of the things that allows us to retain a skilled workforce (along with all the other benefits we supply of course.) So I'd disagree that EV charging or solar-PV are marketing gimmicks.

 

I think they do. Fuel cells degrade with time, they can leak and catch fire, hydrogen tanks have trouble holding enough hydrogen to give you a reasonable range - those sound like similar problems.

Sure you are, since hydrogen comes from fossil fuels.

 

Fuel cells are easier and cheaper to replace when needed and hydrogen can be made without fossil fuel. That's where solar power can come in very handy.

 

Cheaper? Not sure about that. A new Leaf battery pack costs around $5000 - what does a new fuel cell cost?
Easier? DEFINITELY not. A battery unbolts and has two power connections, along with a data connection. A fuel cell has power lines, feed lines, condensate lines, control lines and (usually) cooling lines. Lots of liquid and gas connections to make. And make a bad seal on a feed line and boom! no more car.
(Also you still need batteries for fuel cell cars - so you'll be paying for that as well.)

So can methane - and all you need for that is garbage.

Handier to just charge EV's if you have the electrical power.

I honestly don't get the whole hydrogen thing. It's like claiming that D cells can power a car, and are a perfectly clean, endless fuel (as long as the D cell manufacturing costs are ignored, of course, and you recycle.)

 

What problems?

The main reasons I don't like hydrogen for cars (vs batteries) is:
1. Making hydrogen is inefficient.
2. Using hydrogen is inefficient.
3. Hydrogen is dangerous.
4. Hydrogen storage is problematic.

 

They'd have to be pretty big for the best charging time to stop being in the middle of the night with or without wind, but sure.

I'd be shocked if that were true when you include the cost of the array, but I'm not clear on California's incentives: perhaps if the state paid for most of the solar array's cost it would be a money maker for your company (though not on its own/for the total cost). Without generous incentives, my understanding is the payback is typically still longer than 20 years and that's a very bad investment on financial terms.

As I said, most of my clients won't do an energy conservation project that has a payback of longer than 5 years (for some, it is 4). So solar power is a tough sell on fiancial basis. Instead, it is done so people can see it from the road or on the corporate website.

Providing charging stations doesn't have anything to do with solar power, but I agree that providing charging stations is a nice benefit.

 

The following link is How Stuff Works and details the different types of fuel cells for anybody who's interested. My next car however will probably be a chargeable hybrid that will average hopefully over a 1000 miles per fill-up, due to running on the battery for many short around town driving trips.

http://auto.howstuffworks.com/fuel-efficiency/alternative-fuels/fuel-cell1.htm

 

Somehow I missed this last night:

The fuel cell isn't a storage device, so it isn't a good comparison to just compare the cost of the battery to the cost of the fuel cell. Anyway, for right now, the bigger problem is that the hydrogen is made from natural gas and is much more expensive than electricity:
http://cleantechnica.com/2014/12/01/fuel-cell-economics-vs-batteries/

 

Steam reformation of natural gas is the most cost efficient method used to manufacture hydrogen. 95% of all hydrogen produced globally uses steam reformation. That ties hydrogen prices to the price of natural gas. Natural gas is also a commodity on the open market, which it is influenced by unfriendly foreign governments. Gunfire at a Nigerian refinery causes gasoline prices to rise in the USA.

 

Agreed. Which in why in general it's easier/cheaper/cleaner/more efficient to use the natural gas directly. We already have cars, buses and trucks that can run on this clean fuel. And if someone is really into fuel cells, you can reform methane right in the car and get hydrogen that way. You get the benefits of hydrogen without the dangers, and an easy way to eventually adapt hydrogen into the fuel stream.

 

Not available in the west, but this Chinese model should sell well in Chinese cities and help their pollution problems:
http://www.sciforums.com/threads/electric-cars-are-a-pipe-dream.101877/page-163#post-3263109

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Cost in dollars is 12,360. Has only electric drive. Parks in 10 foot gap.

 

Please see the following web page article.
http://cleantechnica.com/2013/07/11/low-cost-hydrogen-breakthrough-uses-solar-power-and-rust/

Looks very promising to me.

 

Looks cool, but I have been seeing such articles for 20 years now.

 

That may be true, however there might be a great deal more incentive to get it working as more fuel cell cars hit the road. This particular system looks to be very modular and could be ramped up as the demand increased. Also, looks like a very cheap way to install stations in more remote locations.

 

A cheap source of hydrogen would be a huge benefit for a great many industrial processes, not just fuel cell cars. (We consume 50 million tons of hydrogen annually, so the demand is certainly there.) Again, it's great if it works, but I have my doubts - especially since the article itself contains errors. There's a long distance between a questionable article to a cheap and effective source of hydrogen.