Chasing Unicorns: The Last Exhale of Hydrogen Fuel Cell Vehicles

[stopcrazypp]

Heating brown coal seems to add CO2 issue to hydrogen production. Brown, not green technology. the brown coal was burned in the dirtiest power plant in Australia that recently shut down. Austraila get the CO2 and japan gets "clean" energy. We all get global climate change.

It's a way to greenwash a very dirty source of energy.

 

[SageBrush]

It's a way to greenwash a very dirty source of energy.

I fully expect to hear hydrogen advocates say that hydrogen is clean, and getting cleaner every day.

 

[iwannam3]

It could be clean if you use it as a storage medium for wind & solar energy AND have a use (and value) for the pure O2 produced.

 

[roblab]

OK, I'm puzzled. The talk is of burning coal to make hydrogen. Where does the oxygen come from? Are we using steam reformation? Then the oxygen goes straight to CO2.

So then, the talk of using "it" (hydrogen?) for wind and solar energy storage. Huh? Are we talking of splitting water? That's not usually done because steam reformation is so much cheaper. And with air all around, hydrogen burns without saving the O2, so why the comment about saving O2?

Splitting water is clean, but expensive. Steam reformation is dirty. Fuel cells don't make much sense unless you have a cheap source of hydrogen, and even then, a battery electric vehicle is far simpler and cheaper to run. It's pretty plain to me why fuel cells will die, except maybe in Toyota land.

 

[Rockster]

Wow, that is quite a word!
"Sycophant synonyms: yes-man, bootlicker, brown-noser, toady, lickspittle, flatterer, flunky, lackey, spaniel, doormat, stooge, cringer, suck, suck-up"

During a period of professional discontent, I once listed my occupation as "boot-licking sycophant" on my federal tax return.

 

[RubberToe]

Wednesday, January 11, 08:07
Japan, Australia set hydrogen transport standards
View attachment 210784

Japan and Australia have agreed on safety standards to transport liquid hydrogen by sea.

Government officials from both countries struck a deal in the Australian capital of Canberra on Wednesday.

Hydrogen produced in Australia by heating brown coal will be shipped in liquid form by tanker to Japan for use as energy.

The safety standards require that storage tanks be made of materials that can withstand the low temperature extreme of liquid hydrogen, at minus 253 degrees Celsius. They also cover fire extinguishing equipment.

Both governments will set domestic safety standards ahead of a pilot project planned for 2020.

Japan's Kawasaki Heavy Industries will build a dedicated tanker for the project.

Senior company official Yukichi Takaoka says technical challenges remain, as liquid hydrogen has never been shipped. But he says the tanker will be ready on time.

Japan, Australia set hydrogen transport standards- News - NHK WORLD - English

Best not let the "bad guys" know about this. One RPG or drone collision and the Hindenburg disaster will look like a children's bedtime story by comparison. So, let's keep this quiet...

RT

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

OK, I'm puzzled. The talk is of burning coal to make hydrogen. Where does the oxygen come from? Are we using steam reformation? Then the oxygen goes straight to CO2.

So then, the talk of using "it" (hydrogen?) for wind and solar energy storage. Huh? Are we talking of splitting water? That's not usually done because steam reformation is so much cheaper. And with air all around, hydrogen burns without saving the O2, so why the comment about saving O2?

Splitting water is clean, but expensive. Steam reformation is dirty. Fuel cells don't make much sense unless you have a cheap source of hydrogen, and even then, a battery electric vehicle is far simpler and cheaper to run. It's pretty plain to me why fuel cells will die, except maybe in Toyota land.

I'd assume that they aren't burning coal to make hydrogen. They'd be coal gasification which uses controlled oxidation instead of combustion.

The talk of using it for energy storage is because 100% renewable would need some kind of storage, and hydrogen is the easiest thing to synthesize.

 

[3Victoria]

Seems pretty obvious that H2 vs EV gives EV the advantage:

 

[Electric700]

Yes, it's definitely more efficient to use solar/wind/hydro power for storing energy directly in batteries (e.g. Tesla's Powerpack). I'd also much prefer to charge at home than go to a hydrogen fuel station as would many other EV owners. Instead of wasting money on hydrogen cars and the related infrastructure, those funds should be put toward EVs and related technologies such as wireless charging.

 

[SageBrush]

Solar thermal combined with high temperature hydrogen synthesis is a promising approach for a liquid fuel, if you care about stuff like that.
It makes me not discount the hydrogen story entirely, but the infrastructure cost always gives me pause.

 

[JohnSnowNW]

Hydrogen can only work in stationary storage as a means of storing excess renewable energy. There is a small chance that it could work for commercial trucking, but costs would have to come down dramatically...and then there's always the infrastructure issue.

H2 is not meant for light-duty vehicles, full stop.

 

[Bangor Bob]

Best not let the "bad guys" know about this. One RPG or drone collision and the Hindenburg disaster will look like a children's bedtime story by comparison. So, let's keep this quiet...

RT

Probably no worse than an LNG or crude tanker, really, in terms of photo-op/propaganda potential.

 

[SpiceWare]

Seems pretty obvious that H2 vs EV gives EV the advantage:
View attachment 210904

Nice, though very hard to read. The original appears to be from this PDF - Does a Hydrogen Economy Make Sense?:

 

[Patrick0101]

H2 "at minus 253 degrees Celsius"

That sounds energy efficient /sarcasm

 

[roblab]

I'd assume that they aren't burning coal to make hydrogen. They'd be coal gasification which uses controlled oxidation instead of combustion.

The talk of using it for energy storage is because 100% renewable would need some kind of storage, and hydrogen is the easiest thing to synthesize.

Coal gasification is still "burning" coal. Oxidation. Makes a gas, CO2. I don't know how one would burn coal to make hydrogen. One would burn coal to make heat.

The easiest energy storage would be batteries. Hydrogen storage would require combining H2 with something (oxygen?) and then splitting it apart to get hydrogen again. The physics on that is not efficient at all. I don't know who is pushing for hydrogen storage, but it doesn't work, even with splitting water with "renewable energy". It's expensive, wasteful, etc.

It is interesting that there are large solar farms (I'm talking Hawai'i) which use batteries for load balancing. I know that PG&E looked at hydrogen briefly a few years ago, and dropped it immediately.

 

[iwannam3]

Ammonia could be used to store H2 at a low pressure. From Wikipedia: Ammonia (NH3) releases H2 in an appropriate catalytic reformer. Ammonia provides high hydrogen storage densities as a liquid with mild pressurization and cryogenic constraints: It can also be stored as a liquid at room temperature and pressure when mixed with water. Ammonia is the second most commonly produced chemical in the world and a large infrastructure for making, transporting, and distributing ammonia exists. Ammonia can be reformed to produce hydrogen with no harmful waste, or can mix with existing fuels and under the right conditions burn efficiently.

 

[techmaven]

Ammonia could be used to store H2 at a low pressure. From Wikipedia: Ammonia (NH3) releases H2 in an appropriate catalytic reformer. Ammonia provides high hydrogen storage densities as a liquid with mild pressurization and cryogenic constraints: It can also be stored as a liquid at room temperature and pressure when mixed with water. Ammonia is the second most commonly produced chemical in the world and a large infrastructure for making, transporting, and distributing ammonia exists. Ammonia can be reformed to produce hydrogen with no harmful waste, or can mix with existing fuels and under the right conditions burn efficiently.

So... if this pathway worked, then we'd be hearing a lot more about it. From https://www.hydrogen.energy.gov/pdfs/nh3_paper.pdf

Given the state of the art in ‘cracking’ ammonia to produce hydrogen, there are many issues in the on-board use of ammonia similar to those identified for on-board fuel processors. Specifically, these include: high operating temperature (>500° C); longevity and reliability of catalysts and other components (at high temperatures and in the presence of impurities); start-up time (to get the system up to operating temperature); purification requirements (to prevent ammonia poisoning of fuel cells); complexity of the overall system; energy efficiency (on-board ammonia would have to be burned in the cracking process); cost (currently ~$100K for 1-3 g H2/s stationary units); and reactor weight and volume (commercial units with sufficient throughput currently weigh about 2000-5000 kg and are about 3000-6000 liters in size). Simply stated, most of the performance parameters of ammonia reactors would need at least two orders- of-magnitude improvements in order to be used on-board commercially viable hydrogen- powered fuel cell vehicles.

Due to the above reasons, DOE does not plan to fund R&D to improve ammonia fuel processing technologies for use on board light weight vehicles at the present time.

Even if you only use ammonia as a transport medium, getting to hydrogen its still problematic. That's all before the problem of the hydrogen efficiency as compared to BEVs in the vehicle itself.

 

[iwannam3]

A ruptured ammonia line would be a major hazard in an accident.

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

Coal gasification is still "burning" coal. Oxidation. Makes a gas, CO2. I don't know how one would burn coal to make hydrogen. One would burn coal to make heat.

The easiest energy storage would be batteries. Hydrogen storage would require combining H2 with something (oxygen?) and then splitting it apart to get hydrogen again. The physics on that is not efficient at all. I don't know who is pushing for hydrogen storage, but it doesn't work, even with splitting water with "renewable energy". It's expensive, wasteful, etc.

It is interesting that there are large solar farms (I'm talking Hawai'i) which use batteries for load balancing. I know that PG&E looked at hydrogen briefly a few years ago, and dropped it immediately.

When iron rusts it is not burning. Same principle.

Hawai'i is a warm, sunny and/or windy archipelago at a relatively low latitude. It's a great place to use a combination of renewable generation and batteries. But most locations have much more challenging climates and energy needs than Hawai'i.

Batteries are becoming cheaper and more energy dense, but they are neither cheap nor energy dense. (Yet.) As long as that's the case, the research on alternatives will continue. I think we might end up using methanation. More lossy, but methane is so much easier to store and use.

 

[3Victoria]

When iron rusts it is not burning. Same principle.

Hawai'i is a warm, sunny and/or windy archipelago at a relatively low latitude. It's a great place to use a combination of renewable generation and batteries. But most locations have much more challenging climates and energy needs than Hawai'i.

Batteries are becoming cheaper and more energy dense, but they are neither cheap nor energy dense. (Yet.) As long as that's the case, the research on alternatives will continue. I think we might end up using methanation. More lossy, but methane is so much easier to store and use.

Batteries are very close to being cheaper than other tech. Just a matter of time.