johnnymk

Source: Bangor Daily News Bangor, ME

When President Bush announced in his 2003 State of the Union speech that he was committing more than $1 billion to boost research into using hydrogen to power cars to reduce America's dependence on foreign oil while also improving the environment, many people were rightly pleased. "A single chemical reaction between hydrogen and oxygen generates energy, which can be used to power a car - producing only water, not exhaust fumes. With a new national commitment, our scientists and engineers will overcome obstacles to taking these cars from laboratory to showroom, so that the first car driven by a child born today could be powered by hydrogen, and pollution-free," the president said last January.

This timetable is overly optimistic, according to a report issued last week by the National Academy of Sciences. The academy found there was potential for replacing gasoline with hydrogen in 50 years, but that even with this slower timeline, many technical barriers that must be overcome. Those barriers include the fact that current fuel cells are 10 to 20 times too expensive to be considered for use in commercial vehicles. Fuel cell lifetimes are also too short for use in cars and trucks. Another challenge to be overcome is the high cost of distributing hydrogen to dispersed locations.

This does not mean the research should not be done. On the contrary, finding alternatives to fossil fuels - which hydrogen currently is not because it is produced least expensively by burning coal or natural gas - is imperative. In the meantime, however, the president and Congress should push for energy conservation while also seeking alternative energy sources that can be brought on line much more quickly than hydrogen.

Over the next 25 years, the effects of hydrogen-powered cars on oil imports and greenhouse gas emissions are "likely to be minor," according to the NAS report. With this in mind, the academy suggested that further work on battery-power cars and hybrid cars that combine gasoline and electric motors could be a better choice than investing so much in hydrogen now.

Doubts about hydrogen's potential have also been raised by Joseph Romm, the Energy Department official in charge of conservation and alternative energy in the Clinton administration, whose book "The Myth About Hydrogen" will soon be released.

A major hurdle, according to Mr. Romm, is that the fuels now used to make hydrogen can be better used to produce electricity directly. Most hydrogen produced today is made from natural gas. Using natural gas to create electricity, thereby replacing coal, would provide many more environmental benefits than using the gas to create hydrogen. Americans would get more energy from a cubic foot of natural gas burned in a modern gas-powered electric plant than if it were converted to hydrogen, he told The New York Times last week. "People who want to build 'hydrogen highways' and drive a hydrogen car in 10 to 15 years on a mass scale, are just kidding themselves," Mr. Romm said.

Given these assessments, efforts to reduce pollution by modernizing power plants and reducing fossil fuel consumption by raising the fuel efficiency of passenger cars and trucks must continue. So, too, should projects aimed at creating more energy from the wind and sun.

(C) 2004 Bangor Daily News Bangor, ME. via ProQuest Information and Learning Company; All Rights Reserved

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Kevster

Hydrogen is relatively easy to seperate from pure water. This can be much more easily done by photovoltaic solar panel energy generation than by fossil fuels. Of course there are the naysayers who will quickly state that PV generation is too expensive and my response is they haven't looked at what they've been doing lately with PV cells. Thanks to advances in efficiency and processing techniques (by and large from space program research) PV is now much more cost effective.

Fuel Cell research has also come a long way in a relatively short period of time (15 years?). If they would just spend money for more research and development they could overcome a lot of the hurdles mentioned in the artcle above a hell of a lot sooner.

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PrObLy

The hyrdogen fuel cell has made great advances...but what has been less talked about is the hydrogen combustion engine that produces much more power than the fuel cell powered cars and since it's combustion the exhaust (which is H2O) can then be used in electrolysis or whatever other method of separating the hydrogen from the water and used again. BMW currently has a pretty cool hydrogen cumbustion engine powered car...I'll dig up the links later.

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Airencracken

Also though the Hydrogen comubsiton cars still produce NOx because Nitrogen is so plentiful in the air and it'll be in the fuel/air mix blah blah blah

Also a way that's being used in Iceland to seperate hydrogen from water is geothermal energy, that's a good way.

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InfiniteNothing

I guess all the fuel cell research is a good thing then. Oh BTW this week in Physics Web, scientists discovered how to reform the hydrogen off ethanol. This opens the doors for ethanol fuel cell cars. Since we can get ethanol off of corn this is good renewable power source.

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Bires

Latest DOE H2 research

The CO can be further used to in post processing and the N2 can be electrolyzed into NH3. Nifty idea if they can make the catalysts inexpensive.

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Apex

Seriously. What most people don't seem to realize is that hydrogen is not really a fuel. At best, it's a storage medium for power.

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verve247

Though no one mentions the new problems that arise from new technonlogy, such as hydrogen pollution. When isolating hydrogen or at filling stations, pure hydrogen can easily be released into the atmosphere. Now Hydrogen can react with ozone, forming water and depleting the ozone layer. That ain't good. We just need better battery capactities to be developed.

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InfiniteNothing

Or better fuel delivery systems. Or, just put the reformers (methanol or ethanol) on board.


Theoretically, shouldn't the hydrogen react with the oxygen in the air before it got up that high

Tommy Boomfiger

doesnt a reaction between hydrogen and oxygen need some kind of catalyst before it reacts? its not like you can just take h2 gas and o2 gas and get something else. plus there are a few different outcomes of that combination too: h2o, hydrogen dioxide, hydrogen monoxide, hydrogen peroxide, etc. i think since h2 and o2 are both stable, they wont react by themselves.

not only can it be released into the atmosphere, but the design of current systems require it to. hydrogen powered cars require liquid hydrogen, which is very cold. something like -200F. naturally its going to heat up over time unless there is some type of cooling system. so when it warms up, its going to expand and the tank needs to have some sort of release valve.

verve247

Actually it's H2 and O3 (ozone)which can form water much more readily than O2. Here's one of many articles on the subject. Wish it was more technical though.

http://www.edie.net/gf.cfm?L=left_fr...chive/7157.cfm

InfiniteNothing

No, You don't need a catalyst. H2 is not stable. If it were, we'd use it in blimps. Heat will help but I've seen people combine H2 and O2 to make water condensation. I've seen cars run off gasseous hydrogen. I'm not sure why you say they need liquid hydrogen. And if you are going to have to release some H2 anyways, why not just fill your take a little less. Have the pump sense this.

PrObLy

I think you would want to use liquid hyrdogen because the density is MUCH greater than the gasious form and you could store way more in a smaller space...also wouldn't you want the liquid form for a combsution engine?

InfiniteNothing

I was taking about fuel cell cars. They are cleaner than combustion

xsiled2

i dont care how it works, jsut as long as the cars arnt to terribly slow...

Airencracken

I want cars that run on peace and happiness man. j/k.

xsiled2

on joy and midgits!

Apex

Bah, it wouldn't go anywhere.

You need a car that runs on ROAD RAGE!

Bires

Liquid H2 is very, VERY dangerous due to the fact that H2 has no dipole-dipole interactions to hold the liquid together. Thus, the vapor pressure of liquid hydrogen is immense.

H2 gels have been developed that have a great deal of promise, dramitcally increasing the storage density of H2 while decreasing the volitility of the storage.

The problem, as usual, is cost.

Bires

By "stable" we mean breaks down on its own, which it tends not to do in the troposphere (where we live, with all the weather).

The problem is the sun. In the stratosphere (10km-30km) UV light from the sun strikes N2, O2, and O3 and is absorbed, causing the molecules to break apart into highly reactive radicals. (radicals don't exist in the troposphere because they will react with almost anything)

I wouldn't worry too much about H2 pollution, since the molecule is so light, small, and moves so fast, it usually finds its way up to the exosphere and then out into space.

verve247

Though to reach the the exosphere, it does have to pass through the ozone layer. I don't know the rate of reaction, but ozone's oxygen double bond seems like it can form water or peroxide quite easily when in contact with H.

The reason why people don't know know what will happen is that elemental hydrogen (H2) is not found naturally in the atmosphere. Hydrogen is usually part of some molecule. So all we have are models. I just worry the we will trade one form of pollution for another.

InfiniteNothing

As opposed to O2s double bond?

verve247

To clarify, the double bond bounces from one oxygen to another.

o=o-o to o-o=o

That aspect alone will increase its rate of reaction to hydrogen. I'm not going to go into more detail since i don't have a chem book lying around.

InfiniteNothing

No, resonance usually increases stability. That's why the sulfate ion is so stable alone and why sulfuric acid is so acidic (it could care less about a couple hydronium ions)

kimchicowboy

i failed organic chem. i was lost about halfway up. i got a 113/300 on the final for my first college chem class and still passed. i'm leaving this thread forever now. hahaha. j/k.

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Tommy Boomfiger

ok, im not that good at chem, but if h2 is not stable in the troposphere and reacts with gaseous o2, shouldnt it just mix and turn into water vapor (or something) mostly before it reaches any other level of the atmosphere? if that is the case, there is no problem with h2 pollution in the ozone. does anyone know what kind of effect h2 gas has on our environment?

the reason i was talking about liquid hydrogen is because gaseous hydrogen is extremely impractical as you would either need a huge tank or take short trips. and ive never heard of h2 gels. you are going to have leaks with liquid h2 because as it warms up (which it will without some kind of refrigeration), it expands. doesnt matter how much you fill the tank it will need to release some pressure.

i dont know how a internal combustion hydrogen powered engine works, but wouldnt it need some oxygen to work? if you take a liquid hydrogen spray and ignite it, will it combust without oxygen? it wouldnt work as effectively if you used oxygen or air and it reacted with the hydrogen and produced some other mixture that wouldnt combust, even in small amounts. i dont want water building up in my engine.

there are so many variables when talking about these engines. from types of fuel, states of fuel and even engine type. i should have mentioned in my first post that i was talking about an internal combustion engine that uses hydrogen as fuel. in this case, i believe you need to use gaseous h2, but in order to be practical it needs to be stored in some other state. the nice thing about this engine is that it can be configured to use both hydrogen and petroleum based gas (the stuff we use now). this would be great during a transitional period.

Bires

Well put.

wxtwiztidxc

I spend $10 a day on gas. But i look gooooood in my ride. :smile:

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Airencracken

retard.

This is why gas is soaring to 2 bucks a gallon and more. It's an inelastic good and you're creating artifical demand. Bah! Bah I say to you! :