All discussion of Nikola Motors

[Buckminster]

Nkla will have both bev and hfc trucks, the fuel cell will have a 3ookwh? Battery.

Wild 1st pass approximation, is the energy stored in the h2 system is about 5-10x higher than in its captive li ion battery. So 1.5MWh to 3 MWh equivalent.

Thats
A) a lot of weight saved compared to li ion
B) A LOT MORE SPACE taken up compares to li ion.

So it could work on a long haul truck in a manner not applicable to passenger vehicles.

Agreed, if a breakthrough were to be made, larger vehicles will most likely get more benefits. Aircraft particularly would benefit. Fuel cells are delicate and need to be taken care of. Lots of auxiliary equipment required to keep them fed and watered. They need controlled humidity, temperature and long load cycles - degradation is not nearly good enough at the moment. I'm not expecting a break through - keeping up with batteries is a moving target.

 

[MC3OZ]

i have some hope hydrogen will work for shipping, having refuel stations or loadable tanks at ports isn't hard to organise.

I fuel cells need a controlled environment they will need to dedicate a good spot on the ship...

But on ships the economics of battery/hydrogen just needs to beat diesel...

For land based transport, take one look at the Supercharger network,, imagine what sort of hydrogen refuelling network would be required and what that would cost...

Cost is partially dependent on the number of vehicles refuelling each hour... regardless, stations are expensive to build.. that is before we even start talking about the cost of making hydrogen..

The other reason hydrogen for land based transport is a dumb idea is that I have no doubt Megacharging will work and fast charging in general will get faster. I''m also very confident a Megacharger can be built cheaper than a hydrogen refuelling station.

Nikola would have more credibility if they abandoned hydrogen for land based transport, they are reluctant to do that because then they are only another BEV player.

 

[FrankSG]

Where can I get in on a deal like this?

View attachment 552984

I can spend $5 million of your money to market a truck and I get 10 shares of NKLA per $100 of reservations? So if the reservation price is $1,000 I get $6,400 in stock per reserved truck? (Up to a total of $128 million worth of stock at the current valuation if I can get 200k reservations with your $5 million of market budget.)

Talk about a sweet referral program.

Edit: I see that he has said that the Diesel Brothers are the consultant that got this sweet gig.

I just saw this on Twitter, and I'm in utter disbelief....

Nikola is literally just as much of a fraud as Theranos at this point. Trevor better be damn careful if he doesn't want to end up in jail.

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

The other reason hydrogen for land based transport is a dumb idea is that I have no doubt Megacharging will work and fast charging in general will get faster. I''m also very confident a Megacharger can be built cheaper than a hydrogen refuelling station.

I don't think the problem will be the charging rate. That's particularly relevant for long-distance trucking, and it should be fast enough to fit within Federal legal requirements for driver hours.

I think there's much more likely to be a problem with power requirements.

Diesel:
Max pump rate is 60gpm, but let's say typical rate is half that at 30gpm.
Typical efficiency is 6mpg, so that would pump 180 mpm, which is 10,800mph.

Let's be generous and assume 1kWh/mi for a Tesla semi.
A literal Megacharger would provide 1,000 mph.
So to match current long-haul refill capacity, a Tesla truck stop would need to replace each pump with up to 10.8 Megachargers. That would mean 10.8MW per current pump.
It could offset that requirement somewhat with:
- off-time destination charging at lower power to reduce long-haul charging miles required.
- reduced power demand if drivers are on break with additional time to spare for charging.
- (eventually) platooning to increase efficiency and lower overall power requirements.
- local battery storage to reduce peak grid demand.

The real Nikola problem is that even if HFCV is successful, it's on the wrong side of the moat.

 

[Silent Ludicrosy]

I’m guessing Nikola will give up on trying to produce hydrogen from electrolysis. Should be much cheaper to buy H2 than build the production infrastructure. They’ll hope people will ignore the CO2 released in cracking natural gas and only focus on the hydrogen and oxygen part of the energy equation.

 

[vikings123]

I don't know if I have seen another Chairman/CEO pump his prototypes on Twitter so much. Either this guy is delusional or just a damn good salesman. He has obviously put a lot of time into shaping his story, just make sure you associate yourself with Elon and the market will at least stay interested long enough to buy your lies.

Today he is pumping test rides for his badger at Nikola world. Yesterday it was refuting Bloomberg's story which included a legal letter to Bloomberg accusing them of falsifying information. So much time and negative energy being spent on these distractions. Talk is cheap.

 

[adiggs]

...

Today he is pumping test rides for his badger at Nikola world. Yesterday it was refuting Bloomberg's story which included a legal letter to Bloomberg accusing them of falsifying information. So much time and negative energy being spent on these distractions. Talk is cheap.

Sure it's a waste of time and energy, but if that's all you got, what else you gonna do?

 

[vikings123]

Sure it's a waste of time and energy, but if that's all you got, what else you gonna do?

Yep, apparently Barbara agrees with us. And for that reason I'm out

https://twitter.com/YahooFinance/status/1273700835713671170?s=20

 

[renim]

Like lion battery, an initial tech for real world H2 will be model aircraft and drone technology. For saftey reasons, recreational use limits drones to line of sight so there is little value is going H2, but for more commercial/military use, there can be justification.
DP30 : Powerpack : Doosan Mobility Innovation

http://www.doosanmobility.com/wp-content/themes/doosanmobility/assets/images/powerpack_01.jpg

 

[renim]

Agreed, if a breakthrough were to be made, larger vehicles will most likely get more benefits. Aircraft particularly would benefit. Fuel cells are delicate and need to be taken care of. Lots of auxiliary equipment required to keep them fed and watered. They need controlled humidity, temperature and long load cycles - degradation is not nearly good enough at the moment. I'm not expecting a break through - keeping up with batteries is a moving target.

Take a quadrant, weight limit one axis, duration the other axis.
Battery dominate where weight and duration is not an issue. H2 can exist for duties weight amd duration make battery literally impossible. Some where in the middle both can exist. My expecation is that battery will dominate wherever in 3/4 of the trucking quadrant. But long range, weight limited trucking is a valid target for H2, this market does not exist for passenger vehicles, if only because there is no such thing as a weight limited passenger vehicle.

 

[renim]

I’m guessing Nikola will give up on trying to produce hydrogen from electrolysis. Should be much cheaper to buy H2 than build the production infrastructure. They’ll hope people will ignore the CO2 released in cracking natural gas and only focus on the hydrogen and oxygen part of the energy equation.

No point, cost of transport to site is too punitive, a trucking route optimised distribution network is different to a passenger vehicle network. If there was h2 in pipeline it would be different, but in USA there is no h2 in pipeline.

 

[renim]

Fwiw, for passenger vehicles, the infrastructure cost to upgrade from 350 bar h2 to 700 bar h2 is about the same as an additional 60kwh of li ion battery in each passenger vehicle. So a never be viable competitive proposition.

But trucking can stay at 350 bar, so its competitive proposition is less unhealthy.

 

[MC3OZ]

I don't think the problem will be the charging rate. That's particularly relevant for long-distance trucking, and it should be fast enough to fit within Federal legal requirements for driver hours.

I don't have link, but I once read something that filling 10 cars per hour with hydrogen can cost substantially more than filling 5 cars..

People assume hydrogen filling works the same as gas, the article I read suggested there were tricky issues, especially with high utilisation..

But if I'm honest I expect the reverse problem, low utilisation, at station that costs $10 M to build may take a long time to achieve an ROI if on average only 1 truck per hour fills up.

Electrolysis is the solution for low utilisation, until 5 trucks turn up at the same time and to make a lot of hydrogen, you need a lot of water.

In contrast I think Megacharging can be built cheaper and can be mixed in with Supercharging and we know Supercharging customers will turn up especially if the site has lots of stalls a lounge and a few other amenities.

 

[MC3OZ]

Elon Musk Mocks Nikola Motors’ Hydrogen Fuel Cells As ‘Dumb.’ Is He Right?

Frankly though, none of this mattered all that much in our analysis. Hydrogen came up on our radar for one reason: It was irrationally hated by investors. After many hydrogen stocks plunged 90%+, investors left them for dead. Expectations plunged to zero, which cleared the way for big, quick profits.

I find this level of analysis amusing, they have predict future revenue stream evaluated the competition, looked at demand, margins, overheads etc, instead it is a good buy because the price is low.

Maybe some of these stocks are a good buy, provided they have a good future revenue stream.... RiskHedge.... Hmmm ....

 

[renim]

I don't have link, but I once read something that filling 10 cars per hour with hydrogen can cost substantially more than filling 5 cars..

People assume hydrogen filling works the same as gas, the article I read suggested there were tricky issues, especially with high utilisation..

But if I'm honest I expect the reverse problem low utilisation, at station that costs $10 M to build may take a long time to achieve an ROI if on average only 1 truck per hour fills up.

In contrast I think Megacharging can be built cheaper and can be mixed in with Supercharging and we know Supercharging customers will turn up especially if the site has lots of stalls a lounge and a few other amenities.

This goes to the 350 bar vs 700 bar pressure issue.

At 350 bar, there is only the problem of h2 being h2, ( entitlement etc) but that can be cost effectively managed, particulary for fixed installations (ie choice of steel etc)

At 700bar, its different. Pushing 700bar into a cylinder causes a compression effect that could temporary raise the cyclinder temperature to above its matilerial's safe limits. So now it needs to be super chilled, so now they have to deal with both h2 embrittlement and cold tempetaure brittlement, and cant pump faster than cooling capacity etc, etc.

Even (especially) poor countries can afford 350bar natural gas for vehicles, no one can afford 700bar hydrogen.

 

[Silent Ludicrosy]

No point, cost of transport to site is too punitive, a trucking route optimised distribution network is different to a passenger vehicle network. If there was h2 in pipeline it would be different, but in USA there is no h2 in pipeline.

What about piping in natural gas and turning it into H2 on site. Harder or easier than electrolysis?

 

[FrankSG]

So this analyst Jeff Osborne has a $79 price target for NKLA and a $285 price target for TSLA. Here is a CNBC interview with him about his stance.

So his target valuations are:
TSLA: $57B
NKLA: $28.5B

He believes that NKLA with $0 revenue and 350 employees, is worth half as much as TSLA with $20B+ revenue and 50,000 employees? In what universe does this guy live that this makes any sense?

 

[renim]

What about piping in natural gas and turning it into H2 on site. Harder or easier than electrolysis?

I don't know, that would really depend on many many factors, including how close is the natural gas take-off point. It should be comparatively pretty easy to add a new takeoff from a electricity line compared to a burrowed highpressure gas line.

Different for china....

I suppose therr are suitable 'baby' sized h2 from gas plant, but you really dont want to unless there is other specialist application and use of the H2 at site. Seriously.

 

[EV forever]

I don't have link, but I once read something that filling 10 cars per hour with hydrogen can cost substantially more than filling 5 cars..

People assume hydrogen filling works the same as gas, the article I read suggested there were tricky issues, especially with high utilisation..

But if I'm honest I expect the reverse problem, low utilisation, at station that costs $10 M to build may take a long time to achieve an ROI if on average only 1 truck per hour fills up.

Electrolysis is the solution for low utilisation, until 5 trucks turn up at the same time and to make a lot of hydrogen, you need a lot of water.

In contrast I think Megacharging can be built cheaper and can be mixed in with Supercharging and we know Supercharging customers will turn up especially if the site has lots of stalls a lounge and a few other amenities.

This goes to the 350 bar vs 700 bar pressure issue.

At 350 bar, there is only the problem of h2 being h2, ( entitlement etc) but that can be cost effectively managed, particulary for fixed installations (ie choice of steel etc)

At 700bar, its different. Pushing 700bar into a cylinder causes a compression effect that could temporary raise the cyclinder temperature to above its matilerial's safe limits. So now it needs to be super chilled, so now they have to deal with both h2 embrittlement and cold tempetaure brittlement, and cant pump faster than cooling capacity etc, etc.

Even (especially) poor countries can afford 350bar natural gas for vehicles, no one can afford 700bar hydrogen.

As a lease owner of a FCEV for last 2yr 4months, I can categorically tell you that anyone who thinks hydrogen is a viable fuel alternative for land transport is either completely deluded or just trying to pull a fast one on you. We have a leased Honda Clarity FCEV - it is a 3-year lease, a very sweet deal offered by Honda. We knew while leasing it that we are early adaptors, and were willing to accept some inconveniences. Currently, we are counting down days to when we can finally give it back.

There are lots of problems with hydrogen, it is nothing like pumping regular gas. We have 5 hydrogen gas stations accessible to us between our jobs and residence - even then there were times when we would be struggling to get consistent supply. Now of course, thanks to WFH, last 3 months the car is just sitting in the garage while we continue to pay the lease.

The actual pumping of hydrogen into the car may take only 5 minutes, but it is problem if cars are filled back to back as the gas has to be pressurized and chilled - so we learnt quickly that if there were more than 2 cars in line ahead of us at the filling station, you might as well leave because the pump goes offline for 10-15 minutes after 2-3 cars are filled. Even in the dry weather of southern California, the pump nozzles ice up due to the cooling - sometimes it will get stuck due to the ice. We keep a towel in the car to wipe off the condensation/ice and to hold the freezing nozzles. To make matters more complicated, the nozzle locking mechanisms at each pump is slightly different. The nozzle has to be locked in position while pumping due to the high pressure gas, the instructions for locking and unlocking are usually posted on the pump. But invariably there are folks who don't check, and some of the pumps would keep breaking down! Couple of times, when we saw the car ahead of us struggling with the nozzle, my husband will go and help the person.

I could go on and on, clearly not a fan of the technology!

 

[renim]

Once they choose 700bar H2, None of modern fuel cell cars (japanese and korean) ever had any chance. As I said the infrastructure cost to go from 350 to 700 bar is sufficient to increase a lithium ion battery from 2kwh to 60kwh. It was and still is lunacy.

Foshan china just commisioned 200 h2 buses (from yunnan), we will see how that works out, they are pretty much literally accross the rivers from BYD, its not like they lacked options.

200 hydrogen-powered buses roll off assembly line in Yunnan - China.org.cn

Point is, the route is totally captive. The recharging and refuelling will be totally inhouse. Very different to private family car ownership.