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2004-10-30 Home Front: Tech
Hydrogen refuelling station ready for grand opening in D.C.
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Posted by Mark Espinola 2004-10-30 8:07:22 AM|| || Front Page|| [11130 views since 2007-05-07]  Top

#1 

Now if they can only construct comfortable, full size hydrogen powered cars, plus enough refuelling stations it's a fantastic idea for US, and as far as Opec, they can take a flying leap into the Persian Gulf....AT LOW TIDE OF COURSE.
Face Plant
Posted by Mark Espinola 2004-10-30 8:15:56 AM||   2004-10-30 8:15:56 AM|| Front Page Top

#2 The missing Shell hydrogen link
Posted by Mark Espinola 2004-10-30 8:23:18 AM|| [http://www.shell.com/home/Fr  2004-10-30 8:23:18 AM|| Front Page Top

#3 Mark, here in the real world, most commercial hydrogen is created from natural gas.

Until we get serious about renewable electricity sources, and efficient ways of turning electricity into hydrogen, hydrogen's just an expensive way of pretending to do something about oil imports when you're not.

I think we'd be better off using some of those new technologies for turning natural gas into gasoline or diesel fuel... or more efficient ways of using ethanol. Even if it's not 100% efficient, it's still more compatible with existing infrastructure, and doesn't need cryogenic storage either.
Posted by Phil Fraering 2004-10-30 9:45:10 AM|| [http://newsfromthefridge.typepad.com]  2004-10-30 9:45:10 AM|| Front Page Top

#4 Gimmick or not it's enormously positive to see a real-world test case emerge. The knowledge GM & Shell will gain from this experience will be invaluable going forward.
Posted by AzCat 2004-10-30 10:28:11 AM||   2004-10-30 10:28:11 AM|| Front Page Top

#5 AzCat: It would be invaluable going forward if hydrogen weren't made from natural gas. But it is.
Posted by Phil Fraering 2004-10-30 11:24:47 AM|| [http://newsfromthefridge.typepad.com]  2004-10-30 11:24:47 AM|| Front Page Top

#6 Phil, it is for the moment but that may not always be the case. Real-world experience with fuelling infrastructure and on-the-road vehicles will be invaluable if commercially viable sources of hydrogen arise in the future. The fact remains that GM & Shell are going to learn valuable lessons from this that simply can't be learned on a lab bench. The relative distance between our current position and a commercially viable hydrogen infrastructure doesn't diminish their capability to learn.
Posted by AzCat 2004-10-30 11:33:06 AM||   2004-10-30 11:33:06 AM|| Front Page Top

#7 Fuel Cells are coming online now - they are already capable of providing plenty of power, and with electric final drives instead of transmissions (like the newest Navy ships are doing), they accelerate and have torque as good as current gasoline engines.

The problem now is cost and fuel source: they need to work to get cost and weight down. Unlike typical electric cars, fuel cell powered cars don't need huge battery packs.

A solution so far is an auxilliary ethanol engine (small one) to provide constant electrical power when power demands are up, a couple of stoarge batteries to act as load smoothers (like capacitors) for peak loads (startup, etc), and the fuel cell itself.

As for fuel source, there are "catalytic cracking" units that can take current gasoline and create hydrogen - again the problem is cost and weight. And don't forget, fuel cells can produce power 24*7, thats why they are used in spacecraft. SO this might be the true "electric car" that enviros really want: when not on the road, the fuel cell can be plugged into the grid to sell its excess power - or can be "throttled back" and plug into the grid to run the catalytic cracker.

The net effect of hybrid fuel cell, battery, aux, and electic transmissions in a complete set up is to produce vehicles that are as powerful and fast as current ones, and drop the gasoline/petroleum demands by more than half.


As for natural gas - we have plenty of it, huge amounts of untapped reserves, if we were not prohibited to drill for it in places like Wyoming and Alaska and off the US coasts.

But until the weight and cost issues are resolved (i.e. the power unit and transmission have a weight and cost similar to gasoline engines), we will not see these on the market.

Myself, I'd be willing to pay a bit more for a hydrogen car if it meant we as a nation could be come self-sufficient (or close to it) in terms of petroleum, and tell these third-world idiots to piss up a rope.
Posted by OldSpook 2004-10-30 11:33:55 AM||   2004-10-30 11:33:55 AM|| Front Page Top

#8 RE: Concerns about natural gas being the source of Hydrogen.

The best way ouf of that?

Electrical cracking of ethanol, something we can make plenty of here in the US. Problem is where to get all the electricity without burning something to produce it.

The problem is that we need to get past this idiotic anti-nuclear power bias and hysteria here in the US. Japan and France have build safe nuke plants for decades.

The US hasnt built a nuke plant in decades.

Technology has changed since the last reactors were built in the US based on designs primarily from the 1950's and 60's, with computers made in the 1970's. There are modern "fail to safe" designs out there that are capable of producing large amounts of electric power with zero risk of a "melt down", and are capable of burning their own waste products instead of having them stored forever in Yucca Mountain.

We just have to find the political will to overcome the Environmental loonies and their lawyers. Because the real cost in building nuclear power plants in the US is not in the plant, its in fighting the hundreds of nuisance lawsuits and environmental regulations and fearmongering PR by the "Green" politicial movement and their allies in Congress.

The key to fuel-cell and electrical vehicles is power - electric power, and that means nukes, as well as other "clean" reliable sources like hydropower (damned enviros again, remember the "snail darter"?), tidal capture (enviros again screaming about baby seals and probably some rare version fo sludge bacteria) along with some help from solar and wind, which are *unreliable* and not all that useful for base load conditions.

Its time we started showing that environmentalism has a cost - and that cost is American dependence on foreign oil, and the loonies that make money off that oil (in Saudi, Nigeria, Iran, etc). All those "No Blood For Oil" types should be pushing "Nukes and Dams for an energy independent America" if they truly believe what they say.

The cost of Enviro-hysteria is high, and its payoff is third-world despots weilding enormous sums of money because they would rather have a snail-darter fish preserved or raise irratiional gibbering fearmongering (and they lawyers to go with it) than put up a dam or nuke plant that would stop the importation of millions of barrels of oil.
Posted by OldSpook 2004-10-30 11:49:40 AM||   2004-10-30 11:49:40 AM|| Front Page Top

#9 OldSpook: I think if we had the nuclear plants, and the natural gas wells, etc., probably the most efficient way of dealing with the situation would be hybrid gasoline, diesel, or ethanol-powered vehicles, this would bypass the whole problem of needing a cryogenic or pressurized fuel storage system, and would work better with existing infrastructure.

(And if you were building infrastructure from scratch, I think you'd be better off using something like an aluminum-air battery for an electric car. Change the battery to refuel...)

There are lots of different ways to get from local resources and/or grid power to motive power for your car, besides hydrogen, IF we had the grid power.
Posted by Phil Fraering 2004-10-30 12:19:09 PM|| [http://newsfromthefridge.typepad.com]  2004-10-30 12:19:09 PM|| Front Page Top

#10 RE: hydrogen: Steven Den Beste touched on its problems in a post on his blog. (Scroll down to "Hydrogen.")
Posted by Barbara Skolaut  2004-10-30 12:39:12 PM||   2004-10-30 12:39:12 PM|| Front Page Top

#11 Gasoline is going to have to be a hell of a lot higher than $2/gallon before this kind of technology will roll economically without big tax-dollar-funded research grants and big tax-dollar-funded corporate tax incentives. You guys want to reduce dependency on foreign oil? Just having the guts to set serious mpg standards and an implementation schedule would go a long way towards solving the problem.

Anybody want to lay odds on how long before the first hydrogen vehicle accident/explosion occurs in Washington, DC?
Posted by Tom 2004-10-30 12:56:14 PM||   2004-10-30 12:56:14 PM|| Front Page Top

#12 Tom. Mmmmmmmm hydrogen explosion in DC. Not sure anyone would notice.

How much does it cost in energy to extract hydrogen from either air or water? How efficient is the process?

Like the idea of saying screw OPEC. There is always the other option of just taking over the mideast oil fields. Ashhhhh--wishful thinking on a slow Saturday.

What about extracting oil from sand in Canada. Is it cost-effective? What is the outlook for Russian oil?

It may be that we need efforts on all fronts to cut loose from mideast oil.
Posted by John Q. Citizen 2004-10-30 1:31:28 PM||   2004-10-30 1:31:28 PM|| Front Page Top

#13 Now if they can only construct comfortable, full size hydrogen powered cars,..

Motorcycles. Don't forget motorcycles. ;)
Posted by Bomb-a-rama 2004-10-30 2:33:45 PM||   2004-10-30 2:33:45 PM|| Front Page Top

#14 I believe DC's appropriate due to the daily gaseous emissions - they oughtta be able to tap Hydrogen somehow
Posted by Frank G  2004-10-30 2:59:12 PM||   2004-10-30 2:59:12 PM|| Front Page Top

#15 Just a case of nuttiness. This is not an efficent way to power a automobile. if the source of Hydrogen was sea water and the power source was nuclear maybe. Just using the electricity would be most efficent. We can have electric cars if we put our wallets to it. No wasteful conversion to hydrogen as a fuel source/storage medium. Reactors as electrical generators. Biodiesl and ethanol for internal combustion engines for simi trucks and motorscycles.
John Q. they already have a huge operation getting oil out of the Alberta oil sands, they are doing it now.
Posted by Sock Puppet of Doom  2004-10-30 5:21:59 PM|| [http://www.slhess.com]  2004-10-30 5:21:59 PM|| Front Page Top

#16 John Q, we could start by drilling in ANWAR while we work on longer term solutions.
Posted by anon 2004-10-30 5:39:59 PM||   2004-10-30 5:39:59 PM|| Front Page Top

#17 Hydrogen powered cars is just a piece of greenie lunacy. Hydrogen was a solution to urban air pollution. A problem which electronics are/will solve.

There isn't enough oil in ANWAR to make a difference.

France has got it right. Cheap, safe, abundant, non-imported energy from nuclear. Its a complete no-brainer.
Posted by phil_b 2004-10-30 6:00:35 PM||   2004-10-30 6:00:35 PM|| Front Page Top

#18 Hydrogen powered cars is just a piece of greenie lunacy. Hydrogen was a solution to urban air pollution. A problem which electronics are/will solve.

There isn't enough oil in ANWAR to make a difference.

France has got it right. Cheap, safe, abundant, non-imported energy from nuclear. Its a complete no-brainer.
Posted by phil_b 2004-10-30 6:00:36 PM||   2004-10-30 6:00:36 PM|| Front Page Top

#19 We need to get the Alaska gas line built. The problem is one of pricing, but looking where other sources of gas are (Indonesia) we need to look at Alaska from the defense point of view. Just don't run the gas line through Quebec. Heh.
Posted by Alaska Paul  2004-10-30 6:09:58 PM||   2004-10-30 6:09:58 PM|| Front Page Top

#20 

Posted by Mark Espinola 2004-10-30 7:40:31 PM|| [http://www.jxj.com/magsandj/cospp/2002_01/hydrogen.html]  2004-10-30 7:40:31 PM|| Front Page Top

#21 Hot 'hydrogen' stock pick of the week.

'Ballard Power shares surge on launch of Ford fuel cell demonstration fleet' (in link)
Posted by Mark Espinola 2004-10-30 8:35:55 PM|| [http://www.fuelcelltoday.com/FuelCellToday/IndustryInformation/IndustryInformationExternal/NewsDisplayArticle/0,16  2004-10-30 8:35:55 PM|| Front Page Top

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