Hydrogen Fuel cells

[TonyTonic]

What do you guys think? Any future in that?

Looks like Germany is ramping up fueling stations and so are Asian markets. There are a number in London with plans to install several more.

 

 

[Ootohere]

Arnold Clark Aberdeen has a Toyota Dealership with trained technicians to work on Hydrogen cars.

There are 2 filling stations and Buses that run on hydrogen and also vans, and 1 Taxi on a pilot scheme, maybe more now.

But then there is lots of electricity in the area from renewables for producing hydrogen.

Similarly in Fife. Hydrogen powered light goods vehicles being used.

 

 

Hydrogen dual-fuel sweeper joins Aberdeen fleet.mhtml

Edited 21 September, 2018 by Offski

[xman]

I wonder if Shell will do a Super Nitro plus Hydrogen fuel......

[xman]

5 minutes ago, Offski said:

Arnold Clark Aberdeen has a Toyota Dealership with trained technicians to work on Hydrogen cars.

 

Arnold Clark technicians....What could possibly go wrong...

 

 

[KenONeill]

Where does hydrogen come from? Or is this another of these misguided efforts to reduce trace combustion products at the vehicle and ignore carbons?

[xman]

Allegedly, the low-mass elements, hydrogen and helium, were produced in the hot, dense conditions of the birth of the universe itself.

 

 

[SuperbTWM]

6 hours ago, KenONeill said:

Where does hydrogen come from? Or is this another of these misguided efforts to reduce trace combustion products at the vehicle and ignore carbons?

 

You can get hydrogen from electrolysis but it uses a lot of energy. I'm not sure whether there are any other ways of producing bulk hydrogen.

 

We used to use a lot of Hydrogen at work, it was used as a coolant inside each of the 500 MW generators

[Ootohere]

Hydrogen is being produced in Scotland on the island where there is lots of wind generated electricity being produced and no way to store and the interconnections not in place,  so production of hydrogen which can be transported is the obvious thing to do.   So happening right now if anyone cared to check that out.   More investment needed obviously,  but there is already lots of that being done. There is a market for the hydrogen.  Obviously a market for the electricity. Just it is not going to the national grid...

Edited 22 September, 2018 by Offski

[mac11irl]

On 21/09/2018 at 16:07, KenONeill said:

Where does hydrogen come from? Or is this another of these misguided efforts to reduce trace combustion products at the vehicle and ignore carbons?

 

Theres an exRN guy who has a fantastic way of getting all the hydrogen you need. And its even the right type of hydrogen!

 

[PetrolDave]

13 hours ago, mac11irl said:

And its even the right type of hydrogen!

Deuterium or Tritium?

[punyXpress]

or: Dihydrogen Monoxide ?

[Ootohere]

 

 

 

[KenONeill]

@xman @SuperbTWM - Exactly; you have to produce the H2 first, and that process uses more energy than it produces burnable "clean H2", hence generating more pollutants.

[xman]

I say use a fusion reactor....simples...

[chimaera]

8 minutes ago, KenONeill said:

@xman @SuperbTWM - Exactly; you have to produce the H2 first, and that process uses more energy than it produces burnable "clean H2", hence generating more pollutants.

One of the consistent challenges in vehicle emissions control is finding a solution that's portable and efficient, and also reliable.

 

Battery or hydrogen EV move the emissions from the tailpipe of the car back to the plant where portability is not a problem and efficiencies of scale can be realised: it's much easier to scrub NOx and PM in a fixed installation than it is on a car. Due to the enhanced efficiency of a large scale process, CO2 emissions can be reduced too, though that's murkier since there's some loss of efficiency in the downstream conversions (damned 2nd Law again). There's also the opportunity, as Offski points out, of using renewables for this.

 

Hindenburg-esque fireballs are unlikely too. The Hindenburg turned into a fireball because a very large surface area of hydrogen was exposed to the air once the skin burned away. A metal or composite cylinder is never going to offer than kind of opportunity. I'd be inclined to think that the hazard posed by a hydrogen tank in a collision is not much worse (if at all) than a petrol tank.

[Ootohere]

 

 

[mac11irl]

6 hours ago, chimaera said:

One of the consistent challenges in vehicle emissions control is finding a solution that's portable and efficient, and also reliable.

 

Battery or hydrogen EV move the emissions from the tailpipe of the car back to the plant where portability is not a problem and efficiencies of scale can be realised: it's much easier to scrub NOx and PM in a fixed installation than it is on a car. Due to the enhanced efficiency of a large scale process, CO2 emissions can be reduced too, though that's murkier since there's some loss of efficiency in the downstream conversions (damned 2nd Law again). There's also the opportunity, as Offski points out, of using renewables for this.

 

Hindenburg-esque fireballs are unlikely too. The Hindenburg turned into a fireball because a very large surface area of hydrogen was exposed to the air once the skin burned away. A metal or composite cylinder is never going to offer than kind of opportunity. I'd be inclined to think that the hazard posed by a hydrogen tank in a collision is not much worse (if at all) than a petrol tank.

 

Its also been shown that the coating used on the hindenberg to keep the hydrogen in turned itself into a thermit like material during the initial fire due to the temperature it reached. Result - a runaways exothermic reacting skin over a massive bubble of highly flammable hydrogen gas.. not ideal...

[xman]

Just now, mac11irl said:

 

Its also been shown that the coating used on the hindenberg to keep the hydrogen in turned itself into a thermit like material during the initial fire due to the temperature it reached. Result - a runaways exothermic reacting skin over a massive bubble of highly flammable hydrogen gas.. not ideal...

 

I hope the Arnold Clack technicians know that.......

[Ootohere]

I think they will have all the gear and more than just an idea. The loons in the north east are a bit more on the ball maybe.

Winter tyres on for starters was a good move.

http://scotcars.co.uk/news/2017/march/first-scots-hydrogen-centre-opens

 

The busses have been a but crap though.

 

Edited 24 September, 2018 by Offski

[stever750]

https://www.energy.gov/eere/fuelcells/hydrogen-production-natural-gas-reforming

 

Were doing some work with some of the car manufacturers looking at fuel cell technology, far more attractive in the long term than battery powered propulsion looks like being at the moment. 

You can produce hydrogen at a small local level using reduction processes, essentially a unit the size of a shipping container sits at the refuelling station. 

[mac11irl]

Use of Methane for the reforming reactor is a double environmental boost (potentially).

Given i (a long time ago in college) had to do a project once to design a landfill site (yeah, I know, but it is a part of environmental civ eng.. and better to design them properly..) , into which i took the extra hour of effort and included a fairly decent methane capture system under the cell capping layer. By average methane production during a cell decomposition,theres a lit of land fill gas that could be utilised for the Hydrogen cells. 

And not to mention if methane capture in the Agri sector could be made feasible. Cow farts are serious greenhouse gas contributor that is overlooked/ignored a lot, as cars etc are alot easier to tackle than farm animals..

[mac11irl]

@stever750

What kinda energy consumption levels are the shipping container reactors running at to produce the hydrogen?

[stever750]

No idea I'm afraid! We're working on purity standards for H2 and how to assess quickly. 

 

One of the conferences I attended a few months ago concluded the biggest issue is land grab. Electrification requires 6 times the land area of fossil refuelling stations because its a much slower process. There isn't much left to put hydrogen refuelling stations, and batteries are a more popular solution at the moment. 

[mac11irl]

Mmmm, i was just curious as to whether a solar array on top and a decent H/V-AWT would be a capable power supply to run it.

 

[xman]

Just stick a diesel powered generator next to it.....doh!