Forums

Posted: 29-01-2011 20:04 Post subject:

That does sound like a step forward.
Micro-encapsulation has been around for a long time, and I did wonder whether it could be made into a viable storage method for hydrogen.
However, contrary to what it says in the article, I would say it would require some form of modification to existing engines - you'd need to add a chamber that would release the hydrogen from the capsules, and another chamber to store the waste by-products. Presumably the waste could be recycled? I hope so.

Posted: 29-01-2011 22:36 Post subject:

It doesn't matter if it works, people will come out of the woodwork saying it doesn't deliver enough power, it damages your engine, it doesn't sound right, and that they miss the smell of petrol.

At least, that's what happened when they started adding ethanol to the petrol here. And it's why the most that can be added to petrol in 10%.

Posted: 01-08-2012 07:28 Post subject:

Olympic taxis make 130-mile round trip to fill up in Swindon

Hydrogen-fuelled taxis, introduced in London for the Olympic Games, are being transported on a 130-mile round trip to Swindon to refuel.
The fleet of three low-emission cabs was introduced to ferry VIPs and officials during the Games.

But the hydrogen fuelling station, at Lea Interchange near the Olympic Park, has had to close for security reasons.
The consortium HYTEC, which provided the taxis, said a new station was expected to open at Heathrow soon.

In the meantime, the taxis are loaded on a transporter to make the trip to the nearest filling station at car manufacturer Honda's plant in Swindon. Shocked

Diana Raine, co-ordinator of the HYTEC (Hydrogen Transport for European Cities) project, said: "Groundbreaking fuel cell electric taxis are running in London as part of a two year project to develop hydrogen technology.
"While arrangements for a hydrogen fuelling station at Heathrow are being completed we are using an alternative fuelling site in Swindon.
"However we expect a new fuelling station at Heathrow to be operational very soon and certainly before the end of the London Olympics."

Richard Kemp-Harper, from the government-run Technology Strategy Board, said the situation was "short term".
"The benefits for those taxis - apart from showing off some great British technology to the rest of the world - is actually that they produce water out of their tail pipes," he said.
"So the particulates and air quality - it's a big difference for London even if there's a small carbon problem with having to ship them up to Swindon to pick up hydrogen at the moment."

The fuel cell centre at Honda's South Marston plant was opened in September.
It is the UK's first commercial hydrogen filling station and is operated by industrial gases group BOC.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-wiltshire-19049209

Posted: 15-10-2013 10:28 Post subject:

Is hydrogen the car fuel of the future?
Katsuhiko Hirose, Toyota's fuel-cell development head, gives his opinion of the UK's preparedness for hydrogen-fuelled cars
Andrew English
6:30AM BST 15 Oct 2013

There's a cadre of smart-alec journalists who are wont to observe that fuel-cell vehicles have been 10 years away for the last 20 years, but they are going to have to change their tune because the future is closing fast.

Daimler, Honda, Toyota, General Motors and Hyundai among others are committed to putting hydrogen-fuelled fuel-cell cars on limited sale in Europe by 2015 and the recent partnership between leading fuel-cell proponents General Motors and Honda, as well as the similar two-year-old deal between Toyota and BMW shows that car makers, if not analysts and the press, are taking this zero-tail-pipe emissions technology seriously.

Even Steven Chu, Noble-prize winning physicist, US secretary of energy between 2009 and 2013 and noted fuel-cell sceptic, was recently moved to observe that hydrogen reforming advances and lower natural gas prices have made a fuel-cell future more likely and less far away.
"It was his parting gift to the [US] department of energy," observes Katsuhiko Hirose, Toyota's fuel-cell development chief.

Toyota is preparing the ground for the introduction of its FCV-R fuel-cell saloon concept first introduced at the Tokyo show two years ago. An updated example of the saloon was presented at the Frankfurt Show, with two 700 Bar (10,000psi) tanks replacing four 350 Bar examples, a smaller and more efficient (3kW per litre of volume) fuel-cell stack, using Toyota's off-the-shelf hybrid parts and with a claimed 500-mile cruising range and minus 30-degree Centigrade starting capability.

But if Europe and particularly Germany is preparing the ground for a hydrogen infrastructure, the UK is lagging behind. There is only one UK commercial filling station, at Honda's Swindon plant, and that has held back the testing of fuel-cell prototypes on UK roads.

The UK H2 Mobility Group has estimated that demand for fuel-cell cars is unlikely to be greater than 30,000 a year by 2023 but, according to its road map, by 2030 there will be 1.6 million fuel-cell vehicles in the UK, with annual sales of over 300,000.
According to UK H2 Mobility a key determinate of fuel-cell take up is access to more than one hydrogen filling station close to each customer and a recent report indicates that a minimum of 65 filling stations is enough to "start the market".

Hirose has been spending a large amount of time in the UK recently, trying to convince politicians and legislators of the need for a hydrogen infrastructure in order for the UK not to lag behind the technology. There are 15 stations operating in Germany, with an additional 20 opening in the next two years and a total of between 30 and 40 planned for the following years.

"We are close to the start of infrastructure development," says Hirose. "Now is the time to pay the cheques. The UK Government is willing to support a hydrogen infrastructure, but the trouble is that time is running out."

Hirose says that 20 stations is the workable minimum to introduce the technology and also to instill confidence in buyers that the fuel won't simply disappear. He agrees that the eventual price for the Toyota FCV-R (slated to be about £50,000) is a marketing construct, but that "if you have a big gap between cost and price you need a big budget. We don't need to do this, we want to reduce that gap."

In spite of news reports last year that Toyota has developed an artificial platinum catalyst substitute, Hirose says that the company hasn't managed that, but is working on the technology. He says that the main thrust of research is into reducing the platinum content per car, which is currently down to just 10 grams per vehicle, "which is equivalent to that of a Euro VI-compliant diesel. Diesels need a lot of platinum," he says.

As to why Toyota is pursuing fuel cells so avidly, Hirose is clear about the competitive advantage they offer. "Fuel-cell research is not so easy, but it cannot be copied so easily, either," he says. He also claims that in some respects fuel-cell vehicles are simpler to make than electric cars with a commonly agreed world-wide standard for fuel standards and refuelling, whereas electric recharging facilities are different even within countries.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/news/10372670/Is-hydrogen-the-car-fuel-of-the-future.html

Posted: 15-10-2013 21:21 Post subject:

It's a good point - cars are already using a lot of platinum, so using it in fuel cells won't change that side of things. However, hydrogen fuel cells are simpler and probably less destructive of the world's resources (to make and run) than lithium-based battery cars.
I think hydrogen fuel cells might be the way forward, but there's been a lot more support for the alternatives...which may all be technological dead-ends.