Questions about a Hydrogen Economy; Scientific American

[Cliff_J]

A battery with that level of capacity would change things dramatically within far more industries than mere transportation.

For storage of H2, my vote is in a hydride. Better density than even liquid H2, slow release, and resists combustion to the point where one company claims that a lit cigarette placed into the hydride filled with H2 will extinguish on contact. Besides a requirement to be heated to release the gas, this storage method seems so much more logical than cryo or high pressure systems that could exceed the dangers of gasoline and have poor exceptance (low production/high costs) or the hassle of the pellet with its return 'product'. But I guess that's why its called engineering and not guessing. ;-)

Motor Trend has a section on the H2 economy in their August issue. Both pro/con viewpoints are presented, and the cavets of the 'promises' being touted as well. A bit negative to H2 and quite positive on the development and production of hybrid cars that can run on natural gas. Logical but shortsighted in my opinion as I don't see how natural gas production can be cleanly scaled up to fit our energy needs as well as H2. Of course, no one really has addressed the scaling issue very well though...

I can't help be amazed at what advances we're making in some regards but yet how much we have left to do in fufilling our energy needs and the brutal infancy of the 'replacement' technologies. Maybe a communist state that pooled its resources and emphasized speed over absolute quality wasn't such a bad enemy after all in terms of spurring scientific development and allowing widespread adoption across a population? 'Cause now things like an H2 economy are a line item in a campaign press release instead of a public agenda.

Maybe I just need some sleep. :-)
Cliff

 

[Ivan Seeking]

'Cause now things like an H2 economy are a line item in a campaign press release instead of a public agenda.

Maybe I just need some sleep. :-)

Or maybe it is just getting so close that you can taste it. This makes the obstacles even more annoying!

 

[Kenneth Mann]

When do we do something?

Did anyone hear the interview of T. Boone Pickens recently, in which he predicted that nationwide gasoline prices at the pump are predicted to go above $3.00 per gallon by year-end (and who can blame the producers when the world has become petroleum captives)? If not now, when do we act? Are Bush and Kerry listening, or is it just politics as usual?

KM

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Last night I watched a Nova [Scientific American Frontiers?] with Alan Alda. They do a nice job of highlighting a few leading H2 technologies. One funny comment made by Alda referenced the "clean laundry" smell of H2 ICE engines' exhaust.

It appears that Iceland will be a supplier of H2. Also, the solid state Hydrogen storage methods do look very encouraging! As one GM R&D, automotive engineer pointed out, if this Solid State H2 pans out this game will change very quickly. "Build them and they will come", he said.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Here we go. You can watch the video online.

See the top of this page:
http://www.pbs.org/saf/1403/index.html

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I almost forgot the best quote from Alda: "That will be a thing that people do; smelling each others tailpipes".

 

[Kenneth Mann]

(Following are a few comments on the forst two pages of this string. If /when I get a chance, I'll continue.)

(Quote - Janitor: If it gets to where the average citizen of India and China lives the middle-class lifestyle of a typical Westerner, I shudder to think what our air and water may become.)

I agree, but barring some kind of global catastrophe, I think it is inevitable, and they have as much right to the "good life" as we do. We nooe do exert more effort to finding our way around the problem before it becomes a disaster.

(Quote russ_watters: Yeah, but there is of course a difference - an important one. For oil/coal the sun and Earth already did 99% of the work to make it - with H2, we have to do all of the work to make it.)

Not really true! When the 'cracking' processes, etc, and other refining and environmental costs are taken into consideration, the production effort that goes into gasoline is considerable (unless you're lumping diesel fuel into that equation - - and it has its environmental problems too). The fact that we're only starting to look seriously at hydrogen derivation doesn't mean that it won't be cheaper in the near future (in fact there are some promising trends). The question here is "Who will be the 'winners' and who will be the 'losers' among the industry groups? In other words, who is going to fight this change 'to the death' to avoid losing their priviledged income sources?

(Quote Ivan Seeking: We don't do the work; nature does by solar powered chemical, biological, or even chemically powered mechanisms such as chemosynthesis. The same for fossil fuels.

Look guys, no one argues that H2 must be produced. AFAWK, we have no ready made reserves for H2 available as we do fossil fuels.)

It is true that hydrogen must be separated from its source compounds, but it is here and it is very, very plentiful (The oceans are full of it as are all of our hydrocarbon sources - there's nothing more abundant in the universe, and only a few elements here on earth). The question is that of 'extracting it' and at least, we don't have to drill down miles to get it in many cases. We also must remember that where "crude oil" comes in nature, gasoline does not; it still must be refined out, and that isn't free. The only real advantage to gasoline Today is the fact that its production infrastructure is 'in place', though not nearly to the level needed to meet Tomorrow's fuel needs, so why not make the 'new infrastructure' something else?

(Quote russ_watters: Politicians (the people driving the issue) for the most part completely ignore the issue of manufacturing the hydrogen. And that's a dealbreaker for the whole idea.)

Maybe not! There appear to be a few promising developments on the horizon - - if the vested interests don't succeed in killing them, and if the politicians are serious and not just playing politics as usual.)

(Quote Cliff_J: And I think this is the main stumbling block/selling point beyond the glassy eyed notion that H2 can work only with exclusive fuel cells produced by hand in the lab. The ICE is here to stay short-term, and the additional costs to equip/retrofit to FFVs that could handle H2 would be pretty insignificant long-term.)

I agree totally with this

(Quote Cliff_J: It'd be interesting to see which oil distribution companies make the journey or completely miss the target like the number of ice-box manufacturers and ice processing companies who embraced the refridgerator. (zero))

I think that they (almost) all will. It's of little consequence to them in the long run (for the most part) whether they make their profits from petroleum or hydrogen. The ones to watch are the drillers, the additive producers, the tanker companies and Opec. They'll fight to the death.

(Quote russ_watters: That would be a deal-breaker due to H2's efficiency as a storage medium when you recover the energy in an ICE vs fuel cells (30% vs 90%). I don't think there is any question that fuel cells can be mass produced - that they haven't is simply a matter of demand.)

I disagree. The practical efficiency of production model" fuel cells will not be nearly as high as the proponents would have us believe. Also the efficiency of the ICE need not be as low as are the present ones. The old Otto cycle is probably the lowest in efficiency of them all, but hangs on because it is so cheap to produce (mainly because of a century of experience). What we need to do is look at the 'continuous burn' engines rather than the, what I call 'pop pop' types. The continuous burn types are usually simpler, more efficient (once maturely developed), much longer lasting (a possible drawback to the producers, who want you coming back for more) and virtually always much cleaner. The most obvious of such types are the Brayton Cycle engines. A couple of intriguing developments of this type are the following:

http://www.almturbine.com/
http://www.starrotor.com/indexflash.htm

I'm also not so sure that the production fuel cell can be produced economically. Only time will answer that. I am relatively sure that in won't be soon (less than 15 years). We've been working on it for over 30 years now. We can all hope, but there are no guarantees.

(Quote Ivan Seeking: This would also mean that the transportation infrastucture for power, such as oil tankers, can eventually be [mostly] dismantled. Power can be produced semi-locally using the best options for each region.

National security benefits greatly. The political and economic value of energy autonomy is hard to even imagine.

The environmental benefits are obvious and vast.

Health benefits can be estimated but I don't have that information readily available. What is the health benefit, for example, in dollars, in eliminating fossil fuel powered vehicles?)

These alone would make hydrogen worth while.

 

[russ_watters]

I've often wondered why there aren't any Brayton cycle cars (except at Bonneville). Jet/gas turbine engines can be made small enough to run a normal car. I think its something that should be looked into.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Russ, if you watched the videos linked above you saw the T0 electric car. This thing does 0-60 mph in 3 seconds :surprise: by using Lithium Ion [laptop] batteries. I can only guess at the cost for that stack! Still, with a three hudred mile range and < 90 minute charge time, if the cost of the batteries can be checked, this car is quite practical.

Also, I saw turbine over electric being explored by MIT some years ago. I assume that someone is still playing with this approach. The stop and go requirements for autos make turbine impractical with a direct approach, but when coupled with electric the efficiencies were quite promising. I haven't heard anything about this for quite awhile though.

 

[Kenneth Mann]

Brayton Cycle Approach

Actually, a Brayton Cycle engine will be considerably smaller and lighter than a comparable Diesel/Otto Cicle engine. Also, Ivan Seeking is correct, the fatal drawback of the Gas Turbine (up to now, at least) has been the engine's highly inertial characteristic (after all it's basically a big flywheel). These are used extensively nowadays in aircraft, and increasingly so in boats, but in autos that lag (both in accelerating and decelerating) has been considered unacceptable to the the average driver. Both designs referenced above claim to have solved that problem, but Ivan Seeking is also correct in asserting that this point would be totally moot in a Brayton-electric hybrid. Where the engine operates best at a sustained RPM (any engine is relatively inertial, even the Otto Cycle), the electric motor is superior at incremental< ie. accelerative operation, so if you couple them additively, like in the Prius, you have the best of both worlds.

BTW, it isn't true that a gas turbine can't accelerate a vehicle well; its very high torque tells us that. The problem is that heretofore, it wouldn't accelerate itself well. The trick in a drag is to rev the engine beforehand, with the clutch out. Then when ready to go, engage the clutch. It'll suck the doors off anything that way, but I pity the poor clutch (and transmission) with that much torque hitting it. (If you remember your history, a turbine powered car ran about thirty-five years ago in the Indy 500, and ran away from everything else, until with about two laps to go, the transmission turned to silly putty.)

Back to the point, the ideal combination, as I see it would be a small Brayton cycle engine (a big one really wouldn't be needed) and a powerful electric motor (like the one in the T-Zero, that Ivan mentioned). Here, we could get the best of all worlds (almost); low pollution, light weight, good acceleration, very good fuel economy and great durability (it's figured that the Brayton cycle has about twice the life-span of the Diesel engine). And to put the icing on the cake, they'll burn just about anything (as long as it's unleaded), so it would be ideal for a hydrogen powered car. Then the only pollutants would be Oxides of Nitrogen (which occur whenever the air is heated), and water vapor; and since there would be no hydrocarbons, there would be no need to engineer the conflicting reguirements for reducing Nitrogen Oxides against those for hydrocarbons. Nitrogen Oxides could be reduced to an absolute minimum. This would be the ideal approach during the next twenty to thirty years, while we try to bring the cost and other factors of fuel cells to a point at which they are practical for use in the everyday car (and if we can't, we won't be up the proverbial creek without a paddle).

PS: If you're wondering about costs for the Lithium Ion cells, I heard somewhere that you can purchase a T-Zero somewhere (approximately) in the hundred thousand range.

 

[Cliff_J]

It is interesting to think why a high-efficiency turbine hybrid isn't more commonly discussed. It would suffer from public opinion and comparisons to Firebird I & II with the quirky 50's means of generating public interest. But otherwise it would be very well optimized, especially for large scale applications like trucking with constant loads for extended periods of time. High-torque and highly-dependable electric engines already exist in industrial applications so little development work would be needed there either. Make the transition an economical choice and watch out... :)

The T-Zero has gotten a lot of publicity and is a really neat little car. I wouldn't call it practical though, it has the features of a touring motorcycle with two extra wheels.

Cliff

 

[russ_watters]

Most locomotives are diesel-electric too, aren't they? That seems like another place where gas turbine-electric would be better (though the batteries would be truly massive).

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Russ, I believe that some modern trains already use turbine over electric.

Cliff, I meant the other practical. Your point is a good one. I was speaking strickly in terms of performance, range, and charge time.

 

[Kenneth Mann]

more - - -

As promised, I'm including comments on (some of) the statements that have been made. Here are some for pages 2 and 3.


[Quote Ivan Seeking] "Even on fission my mind is still open."

I think fission will come around again once it has matured; if it can be produced econnomically, and if nothing even more economical and renewable comes along.

[Quote zoobyshoe] "Regardless, I'm very much less concerned about meltdowns than about disposal of the waste."

Remember where most of that stuff came from. Except for Plutonium, most already existed, quite radioactive, in nature. It simply took a lot of refining (at great cost) to get large enough concentrations to be useable. If necessary, we can force the users to "unrefine" the stuff (dilute it back to its original concentrations- which would still be a lot cheaper than the original refinement) and re-disperse it into nature (like the ocean floor). Of course, the users would protest loudly. They want to make as much profit as possible - - on the cheap; but if given no other choice, what would you wager that they'd do it?

[Quote Ivan Seeking] "According to the Scientific American article, in practice, electrolytic production of H2 results in a 22% efficiency- as required to create the H2. H2 production by steam reforming techniques can be over 60% efficient. "

If a renewable usage method, such as the "pellets" (ie. NaH + H20 => NaOH + H2) becomes feasible), a relative low sustaining production of Hydrogen might suffice, once there are enough of the pellets out there.

[Quote - russ watters] "I'm not sure about methane. Its certainly preferable to other forms of hydrocarbons, but it is still a hydrocarbon. Whether you convert it to hydrogen to burn in a hydrogen fuel cell, use it as methane in a fuel cell, or burn it, the chemical reaction is about the same and as a result, the pollution is about the same."

Precisely! - - - as is Natural Gas, which some bus companies tout as the "clean fuel". Presently only electricity and, for the most part, hydrogen fit that designation.

[Quote Ivan Seeking] " To me the significance is that we have passed the break even point. I would expect that for the first time, the economy of some energy options finally can compete with fossil fuels. This strikes me as being fairly significant. Also, we get a 63% reduction in ghg emissions."

- - and with many now predicting $3.00/gallon gasoline costs, I think it's slowly beginning to sink in.

Many of you [particularly Ivan Seeking] then go into promising new methods being studied for the extraction of Hydrogen. It sssounds very encouraging.

 

[Kenneth Mann]

- - oops! - -

I meant pages 3 and 4.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Hybrid Turbine Electric Vehicle
...The vehicle will be a heavy class urban transit bus offering double the fuel economy of today's buses and emissions that are reduced to 1/10th of the Environmental Protection Agency's standards. At the heart of the vehicle's drive train is a natural-gas-fueled engine. Initially, a small automotive engine will be tested as a baseline. This will be followed by the introduction of an advanced gas turbine developed from an aircraft jet engine. The engine turns a high-speed generator, producing electricity. Power from both the generator and an onboard energy storage system is then provided to a variable-speed electric motor attached to the rear drive axle. An intelligent power-control system determines the most efficient operation of the engine and energy storage system.

http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/RT1996/6000/6920v.htm

more hits from NASA:
http://search.grc.nasa.gov/query.html?qt=turbine+electric&col=grcint&qc=&qm=0&st=1&nh=10&lk=1&rq=0&rf=0&tx=0&go=Search

This looks to me like another great application for Hydrogen.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

UK company way ahead of the market in creating green hydrogen

..." the key to Hydrogen Solar's breakthrough is nanotechnology. Hydrogen Solar developed a nano-crystalline material that will dramatically improve the production of hydrogen by using solar energy to split water more efficiently into its elemental parts." ...This means the company is fast closing on the target 10 percent performance that has been recognized as the benchmark for commercially viable production on the open energy market.[continued]

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-09/bis-ucw092404.php

 

[russ_watters]

Ivan, that last one really looks like a hoax to me.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Ivan, that last one really looks like a hoax to me.

Contact: Makeda Scott
makeda.scott@fco.gov.uk

 

[Ivan Seeking]

btw, I should have highlighted this the first time

In the coming months Hydrogen Solar plans to open a laboratory in Las Vegas. This will enable it to take advantage of the hot dry area for research. The company is currently recruiting scientists and engineers for the new lab.

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-09/bis-ucw092404.php

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Hydrogen economy looks out of reach

US vehicles would require a million wind turbines, economists claim.

Wind power might be green, but it is unlikely to power the hydrogen revolution.

Converting every vehicle in the United States to hydrogen power would demand so much electricity that the country would need enough wind turbines to cover half of California or 1,000 extra nuclear power stations [continued]

http://www.nature.com/news/2004/041004/full/041004-13.html

Obviously I think their assessment is much too pessimistic. It shows a lack of understanding of the state of the industry and developing technologies. No one serious about this claims that we can convert the entire country to wind produced H2. However, I think the size of the problem we face is made clear.

 

[russ_watters]

Its all about the assumptions. 1000 extra nuclear power stations is probably what you would need to cover the energy used by cars and existing fossil fuel power plants.

 

[Cliff_J]

Although I agree the estimates are pessimistic, I think the idea of highlighting how large a problem the complete tranformation to a H2 economy is warranted.

Maybe a X-Prize or DARPA Grand Challenge style event that includes green production and realistic economics would be a great way to focus some of the efforts of people working on the technologies and gather publicity. Sure the numbers could be twisted but a competition aimed at replacing the average consumer transportation needs without penalty seems like a worthwhile cause.

Figure a mid-sized SUV at 2 tons with a retail price of $25,000 (including H2 generation equipment) with a weekly range of 300 miles and its a plausible goal. To make it a challenge worthy of a large prize, how about if a community like say Boulder or Portland wanted to retrofit existing cars and switch over with an ROI that could offset the initial cost after 5-10 years?

That seems about as impossible near-term as the X-Prize did 10 years ago.

Cliff

 

[Zantra]

Not sure if this has been posted, but:

http://www.time.com/time/europe/specials/ff/trip1/hydrogen.html

By the end of 2002, three state-of-the-art DaimlerChrysler buses with hydrogen-powered fuel cells will start plying the streets of the capital, Reykjavik, with refueling available from a Shell service station. The vehicles will be quiet but above all clean — fuel cells produce electricity by electrochemically mixing hydrogen and oxygen; the only waste product is water vapor. The plan is to gradually switch the nation's 180,000 vehicles — first buses, then cars, followed by its 2,500 fishing vessels — to hydrogen power

 

[Ivan Seeking]

California Unveils State's First Hydrogen Refueling Station

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has unveiled his state's first hydrogen refueling station in Los Angeles. The official says it marks the start of a transition as cars convert from gasoline to hydrogen fuel cells

..."We will not just dream about the hydrogen highway," he said. "We will not just dream about the hydrogen fueling stations. We will not just dream about the hydrogen cars. We will build it." [continued]

http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200410/200410230010.html

 

[Chronos]

I think a hydrogen economy is inevitable. It is the only solution that makes sense in the long run. Waiting until oil reserves are depleted seems a bit short sighted. Other, more valuable uses exist for these resources. The transition is obviously not going to take place overnight. Clearly, it will take decades. Electrical power was the same way. People who lived away from population centers had to wait years to get hooked up. There are other obstacles as well. The technology for hydrogen production is potentially simple enough that people could afford to own household hydrogen plants; which would not necessarily bode well for the oil or power industries.

 

[CharlesP]

Getting all that hydrogen is a near insurmountable problem. Since hydrogen is really just an idle wheel and not the real source of energy I think we should name the economy after the real source of energy if it ever shows up. There will likely be all kinds of nice technologies after we have all frozen to death in the dark.

 

[puf_the_majic_dragon]

what about alcohol? ethanol and methanol are a lot cleaner burning than regular gasoline and can be manufactured. today's cars could run on it without major modification and it can be produced with little to no impact on our current fossil fuel usage for electricity generation.

the biggest problem notable here is that the USA lacks the major biological sources to manufacture ethanol. but that's not any different from importing foreign oil. brazil already uses ethanol in massive quantities as a secondary fuel source. hydrogen is far more ineffecient to manufacture than alcohol, and i expect it will be a very long time in coming, if it ever does.

as for electricity: NUCLEAR. instead of burying all the nuclear fuel for our atomic weapons we should be incorporating it into nuclear power plants. the USA has had only ONE (1) major malfunction of a nuclear power facility, and to my knowledge no one was injured, and it was 20 or 30 some odd years ago.

also, i think there's a big picture here that most of us are leaving unsaid. we couldn't relieve our dependence upon fossil fuels with just cars. we also need to focus on its other uses. we can generate electricity with nuclear power but where are we going to get petroleum jelly? propane? lubricant oil? there's a million biproducts of petroleum that we tend to ignore when we bring up the subject, and developing replacements for those as well is a daunting task at best.

 

[shrumeo]

didn't read all the posts, but I'll just add this

all this talk about renewable resources is fine, we should be looking for something to replace fossil fuels

BUT

it's a question of volume

we'll never ever ever in a million years get the volume of power we get from fossil fuels out of hydrogen, or biomass, or solar, or anything else we have today

if we can get the power we get from fossil fuels from any other source it will be nuclear (fusion)

 

[puf_the_majic_dragon]

didn't read all the posts, but I'll just add this

all this talk about renewable resources is fine, we should be looking for something to replace fossil fuels

BUT

it's a question of volume

we'll never ever ever in a million years get the volume of power we get from fossil fuels out of hydrogen, or biomass, or solar, or anything else we have today

if we can get the power we get from fossil fuels from any other source it will be nuclear (fusion)

i agree that nuclear power is by far the most readily available form of energy in mass quantities, but i don't necessarily believe that it's fusion. right now fusion power is highly unstable and unpredictable. meanwhile current fission power plants are safe and clean and can put out more power than a similarly sized coal power plant. unfortunately nobody (investors) wants to touch nuclear power because of their uneducated worries.

whether it be hydrogen, ethynol, fission, fusion, solar, wind whatever sources of energy we are going to use in the future, our FIRST step should be in educating the general public. we won't get anywhere if we don't know where we're going.

 

[puf_the_majic_dragon]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3997249.stm
very interesting topic, fusion power. perhaps I'm wrong and there is potential for it in the near future.

 

[shrumeo]

I have never heard of this there is a way to make gasoline?!

One way is through Fischer-Tropsch synthesis:
http://www.encyclopedia.com/html/F/FischerT1.asp

 

[hitssquad]

Nuclear gasoline

Apparently, gasoline can also be made from water and a carbon source such as carbon dioxide. Prolific energy commentator Graham Cowan dubbed gasoline thus manufactured with the manufacturing energy supplied by nuclear reactors nuclear gasoline.

 

[russ_watters]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3997249.stm
very interesting topic, fusion power. perhaps I'm wrong and there is potential for it in the near future.

Well, it seems awfully optomistic, but even then it says its planned as a 20-year project and "Final stage before full prototype of commercial reactor is built." So even if it works as advertised, we're still several decades from commercial fusion power.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Hybrids vs. Hydrogen: Which Future Is Brighter?

Scientists Argue Hybrids Make More Sense Than Hydrogen Cars

..."The things that matter here are energy security, climate change and air pollution," said David Keith of the Department of Engineering and Public Policy at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. "Focusing on fuel-cell cars makes no economic sense for any of these goals." [continued]

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/Hybrid/story?id=266883&page=1