The Garage Doors Have Opened on Project Driveway

13 Responses to “The Garage Doors Have Opened on Project Driveway”

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   Mike756 Says:
   October 17th, 2007 at 12:17 pm

   “They have a 93 kwh fuel stack and a 73 kwh (94 kwh peak) motor”

   This statement doesn’t make sense. Do you mean 93/73/94 kw?

   I don’t mean to nitpick but since I am an electronics technician, I can’t help noticing these things.  
   
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   Lyle Says:
   October 17th, 2007 at 12:21 pm

   sorry..kw.  
   
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   kent beuchert Says:
   October 17th, 2007 at 1:45 pm

   Lyle, I’ve said kw when I meant kwhr and vice versa so many times I’ve lost count.
   I’d say that hydrogen’s chances grow smaller each day, as batteries come closer to practicality. Hydrogen simply can’t compete with a practical battery, which already has a complete infrastructure for fuel delivery in place, even into the home (how convenient). 15 years ago everyone was talking about “the coming hydrogen economy.” Nobody talks that way anymore. We don’t really need (or want) another complete fuel distribution system. One is quite enough, and a whole lot more efficient and cost effective.  
   
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   OhmExcited Says:
   October 17th, 2007 at 2:20 pm

   Hydrogen doesn’t need to compete with the battery. It could be used as a range extender. Unless you want gasoline to continue being the sole, strategic commodity.  
   
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   noel park Says:
   October 17th, 2007 at 3:02 pm

   I really worry that hydrogen will become another cover story for business as usual, al la ethanol.

   The State of California bought a whole fleet of “flex-fuel” Tahoes to show how “green” our esteemed Governator is. Not one of them has ever burned a drop of ethanol, because there is no ethanol fueling infrastructure worthy of the name in California. For example, there is one (1) ethanol station in Los Angeles County, and one more in San Diego County.

   Arnold gets PR, GM gets credit against CAFE, everybody burns gas, and the beat goes on.  
   
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   SteveF Says:
   October 17th, 2007 at 6:03 pm

   How I see things is that GM and other auto suppliers will have cost effective fuel cell vehicles in about 5 years. Only they will not have effective supply of hydrogen. Effective production and storage of hydrogen is at least 10 or more years. Only positive thing is that hope they can use the knowledge from the electrical components to apply them to the E-Flex based vehicles. E-Flex is based on existing technology but effective generation and storage of hydrogen still needs to be invented.  
   
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   Dave G Says:
   October 17th, 2007 at 6:12 pm

   I think most people have a basic misunderstanding about hydrogen. People think of hydrogen as fuel. After all, they call them “fuel cells”, and hydrogen is what powers them.

   The reality is quite different. Hydrogen is not a fuel source. It’s a fuel carrier. In other words, there is some other source of energy that is converted into hydrogen. So hydrogen is more like a battery. It just stores the energy created by some other source.

   So when you think of hydrogen, think of what it takes to produce it.

   The main energy sources for hydrogen are electricity and natural gas. Yes, there are some experiments with using special metals to produce hydrogen, but producing and refreshing these metals uses lots of electricity and/or other fossil fuels. Yes, some recent experiments have shown that hydrogen can be produced directly from sunlight, but this is a lot more expensive and inefficient than using solar cells. So the bottom line is that hydrogen is produced from electricity and/or natural gas.

   To make matters worse, hydrogen isn’t a good fuel carrier. There are inherent inefficiencies. A fuel cell vehicle is only about 20% efficient. That means that 4/5 of the energy source is lost in hydrogen inefficiency. This is actually worse than gas engine. By contrast, an electric car running on batteries is around 70% efficient, which means that only 1/3 of the energy source is lost. See details here:
   http://www.physorg.com/news85074285.html

   So let’s stop getting fooled by fuel cells. If you look at it objectively, fuel cells are a dead end. Why do you think the oil companies are all backing hydrogen? That’s why they call them “FOOL SELLS”.  
   
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   Bill Says:
   October 17th, 2007 at 6:45 pm

   Energy density is too low for compressed hydrogen (is there any other way to economically store H2 on a car?)

   If you want a practical, clean-burning range extender, use compressed natural gas (CNG) in an ICE.

   Plenty of infrastructure already there – both public and home refueling stations available.

   >[hydrogen] could be used as a range extender  
   
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   Jeff M Says:
   October 17th, 2007 at 11:33 pm

   #7 (Dave) sums it up pretty good. I suggest everyone in doubt google “hydrogen myth”, quick link… http://tinyurl.com/24cpx6

   You may have noticed big oil and gas are all for the so called “hydrogen economy/highway”… as Dave hints at, hydrogen can come from water (using electricity to break the bonds in H2O) or natural gas (CH4)… the latter is more economical (relatively speaking) source for producing hydrogen, with the byproduct CO2 (the often talked about greenhouse gas). Keeps big oil/gas part of the so called future economy, and keeps you the consumer tied to an inefficient distribution model (filling stations, be it gasoline, diesel, or hydrogen). But the real big benefit to big oil/gas of promoting hydrogen, which is part of the argument used to kill California’s ZEV mandate that gave us EV’s in the 1990’s and very early 2000’s, is that it’s a great delay tactic (good not only for big oil/gas, but also big auto, auto dealerships, OEM’s, and 3rd parties making parts for ICE based vehicles that needs lots of maint. and parts).

   Hydrogen has been a big boondoggle wasting away lots of your taxpayer dollars on research that would have been better spent.

   There are a few niche places where hydrogen does make sense, but transportation is not one of them.  
   
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    Chad Says:
    October 19th, 2007 at 9:27 am

    #7:

    “I think most people have a basic misunderstanding about hydrogen”
    -Couldnt agree with you more.

    Its not a “fuel carrier”, its an energy carrier. Imagine a bung of protons floating around in a tank.

    98% of TODAYS H2 is produced from fossil fuels. With help from new nuclear reactors and coming steam reforming techniques of H20 into H2 along with electrolysis possibly being powered by wind,hydro, solar etc… This number will change rapidly. Especially if there is a dependance on H2.

    I dont know if youve actually done the calculations yourself or if youre just trusting an unknown source you found on the internet, but a FCV is more like 40-50% efficient, where ICEs are much lower. A battery may be said to be 70% efficient, but at what temperatures? what about degradation? what about battery life? What about overheating and exploding? We are talking about high storage lithium ion batteries here.

    Natural Gas is a great idea!

    Fuel cells are used to power buildings, spacecrafts, and satellites. Why not autos? Be a little open minded here. If a huge change is needed in the infrastructure, whats wrong with that? That means jobs for everyone!! Adam Smith would have been proud!

    I could talk about this all day, but alas, back to work.

    One thing though to fuel the fire for all of the haters out there: Platinum. Read about it. I really do think thats going to be the hardest problem to solve with FCV.  
    
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    Jeff M Says:
    October 19th, 2007 at 11:21 am

    #10 (Chad)… having done enough research myself (and not from a single or few biased web sites), it’s obvious that Dave (#7) has done the same thing (though he may not be up to date on FC efficiency which has been improving since their inception, but speaking of being out of date, you battery efficiency is higher than 70% as well, at least 80%).

    The problem with H2 production from electrolysis of H2O is that you are already wasting energy right fromt he start… the H2 produced only has 70% of the energy that it took to produce it. And because H2 is a gas (the lightest element) you need to highly compress it right away… that takes more energy (which you don’t get back when you use the H2)… and then you need to to transport it (more energy). Even once you have it stored inside a tank in a vehicle you lose H2 as it warms (boils) and needs to be vented (pressure release valve). And finally you are using the H2 as input to a fuel cell to turn back into electricity (more loss due to inefficiency of the FC) to drive the electric motor.

    Compare that to using the same electricity you’d use for electrolysis to produce H2 and instead feeding it into the power grid, transporting it efficiently over transmission lines, charging batteries, which is then used directly to drive the same electric motor above (in the FC vehicle).

    Well-to-wheel hydrogen is going to lose. Maybe in 20 years they will have solved enough pieces of the puzzle to improve it, but that’s what they said 20 years ago. And battery (or other electrical energy storage devices like supercapacitors) technology isn’t going to stagnate either.

    More important, battery EV technology is here today (well it’s been here for over 100 years but that’s another story). The infrastructure is already here for fueling (charging) at home, and extending that for charging along the “highway” is relatively easy and very inexpensive to build (especially compared to what a hydrogen fueling station would cost). And in the mean time onboard range extending generators work for longer trips… and those generators could be more energy efficient diesel, natural gas, etc (even when gasoline it’s more energy efficient than a full blown ICE).

    That’s not to say hydrogen doesn’t have it’s uses such as for backup power supplies, but for general transportation, it’s been a great delay tactic for big oil and big auto (the promise of it is what helped kill CA’s ZEV mandate), and big oil/gas still becomes the predominate source of hydrogen if it ever does work (much easier and cheaper than from water), still producing plenty of CO2 as a byproduct.

    Oh yea… regarding batteries overheating/exploading… you are behind on your reading in that area… the notebook and cell phone batteries you’ve heard about in the news are a different Li-ion battery chemistry than what will be used in EV’s. And I’d rather be driving around with a battery than with a tank full of very highly explosive hydrogen (if you really want to scare folks, think space shuttle).  
    
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    Chad Says:
    October 19th, 2007 at 2:58 pm

    (#11 Jeff)

    Look, i’m not saying that batteries are a bad idea. I LOVE the Chevy Volt concept. But there are still areas that a battery will have to evercome. And just like most situations, there will be tradeoffs in using one over another.

    I agree about electrolysis. In the end you are using a whole lot of energy and some of it is wasted. When using cryogenic cooling for liquid H2, you are going to have boil off. Not when using a high pressure H2 vessel though. Tanks nowadwys can hold 30k psi before rupture. Yes, it takes more energy to fill that up, but how many other ways of actually STORING energy are there?

    Wheel to wheel, the H2 loses on efficiencies, but I do believe it wins in practicality. You can make unlimited amount of H2 and store it. Not the case with electricity.

    You are right about batteries though, they too are a good idea!! (BTW, fuel cells have actually been around since the 1850s)

    I know that big oil/gas are already getting their hands into hydrogen reformation from fossil fuels, but isnt the point here not to be paying ridiculous prices for transportion etc… As long as fossil fuels arent used, this can be a CO2 free process. BTW, how many coal burning power plants feed into the electricity that we would be using to power our batteries?

    Right now energy generation isnt efficient or healthy. People are scared of nuclear power for no good reason. This ones a whole different discussion though.

    Regarding batteries, I’m not behind on my reading, although i wish it werent so… We are not talking about small notebook Li-ion batteries that plagued Dell. We are talking about batteries that would help with 300 miles of travel on one charge. Big batteries or arrays of smaller ones batteries. There is definetely still a problem with how dangerous these big batteries can be. Explosions and overheating are still an issue. Check out lithium polymer?

    Electricity will be produced purely for these EV vehicles. During the night, people will charge them, and then drive them away come work time. How many people charging their vehicles does it take before we start overloading the power grid? You say the infrastructure is there, but its still going to take a hell of a lot of work to make sure EVERYONE can get power off of the grid without brown and black outs. Also, temperature cyclicing, life expectancy, internal resistance and overtemp to name a few random problems.

    Why hasn’t Toyota come out with a pure EV, or GM for that matter? Personally, I think its a battery issue…What happens when you forget to charge your vehicle for 5 hours? Looks like youre not going to work juuust yet

    Lets see, H2 storage… I wrote a journal article for school about a year ago, so hopefully im still up to date. When using multi layer high pressure H2 tanks, you must understand, its not going to blow up. Its not like having a bomb on board, no more than a tank of gasoline or a Lithium-Ion battery. People are scared because they dont know… I would dare someone to do research to find out what kind of tests these tanks go through before approved for proper H2 storage. Quantum does bonfire tests, bullet peircing tests, compression tests, environmental cycling tests, drop tests. You cant even imagine what 4 or 5 layers of kevlar, carbon fiber/epoxy and high molecular weight polymer can protect you from…

    This surely sounds like a stretch right now, but I am in the industry and I really can see things moving forward. Believe me, when I was an undergrad, I had nothing but doubt, even after working for a fuel cell company and taking classes. One of my teachers almost convinced me that making H2 a reality was not even possible.
    Im not saying that believing in batteries are wrong, I just think H2 is the better option.

    P.S. Seriously though, use the platinum argument in your arsenal. Most people overlook it as there are more than just PEM fuel cells and not every on uses platinum. Platinum is rare, expensive as hell, and I believe most of it has African ownership… We need a non platinum catalyst!!!!!!!  
    
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    shumin Says:
    November 4th, 2007 at 1:41 pm

    Chad,

    How reliable are fuel cells? Who is the best in making fuel cells? Who is the best in making electric motors?

    Thanks.  
    
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