Hydrogen power cars
Discussion
With the demise of Britishvolt, it prompts the question as to why hydrogen power vehicles are not seeing the investment. OK the fuel is more expensive then gas but the system proving forward motion seems on the surface a much better system then battery electric power. Add that lithium batteries are not being recycled? the cost of the lithium and the massive shortage electric vehicle recharging points all seem to make hydrogen a miles 
better bet.
better bet. There is already a long running thread on hydrogen.
- it doesn’t make sense spending energy to convert to hydrogen to then convert this to energy at point of consumption.
- no one is investing in the filling infrastructure
- I think there’s a use case for converting ICE to run on Hydrogen to keep older cars running. Looking at the Hydrogen AE86 Toyota recently showed off seemed like there were minimal changes to get it running H.
BritishVolt is an odd one. Burning through VC cash with seemingly no customers lined up. Had an interview for a Buyers position with them once and they were very full of themselves.
- it doesn’t make sense spending energy to convert to hydrogen to then convert this to energy at point of consumption.
- no one is investing in the filling infrastructure
- I think there’s a use case for converting ICE to run on Hydrogen to keep older cars running. Looking at the Hydrogen AE86 Toyota recently showed off seemed like there were minimal changes to get it running H.
BritishVolt is an odd one. Burning through VC cash with seemingly no customers lined up. Had an interview for a Buyers position with them once and they were very full of themselves.
JCB are heavily investing in Hydrogen, impossible to build and run heavy plant with batteries and they've already converted an engine which works well.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19Q7nAYjAJY&t=...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19Q7nAYjAJY&t=...
Discussed at length
The thread is dominated by a few posters who appear to be saying that Hydrogen has no place at all. However even they do concede that it has potential applications in heavy industry.
The thread is dominated by a few posters who appear to be saying that Hydrogen has no place at all. However even they do concede that it has potential applications in heavy industry.
Batteries will never be the answer for most transport. Busses,aeroplanes and ships should benefit though.
Not the rubbish lies of saudi blue hydrogen though. Just use the oil you burnt making it.
IS my face red. I meant Hydrogen is not the answer for a lot of applications. But following poster made all the educated points.
Not the rubbish lies of saudi blue hydrogen though. Just use the oil you burnt making it.
IS my face red. I meant Hydrogen is not the answer for a lot of applications. But following poster made all the educated points.
Edited by Fundoreen on Wednesday 18th January 16:22
Quick summary from the other thread:
Lithium batteries are 95% recyclable and all major manufacturers are investing in capability to do this.
Conversely, the carbon fibre tanks required to store hydrogen in cars are not typically recyclable, are sourced almost entirely from fossil fuel, and are life-limited due to the incredibly high pressure that is necessary to store enough hydrogen onboard these vehicles. The amount of carbon fibre required per car is significant and there is no production capability yet that would satisfy anything other than a niche market. The same carbon fibre that would probably be require for all the extra wind turbines needed to fuel the cars. Over and above what there equivalent EV requires....
Note that the tanks also consume so much valuable real estate in the car that it makes for a large car outside that feels like a compact one inside, which is the opposite to what the skateboard battery typically offers.
Hydrogen fuel cell cars require between 2.5 times to 3 times the source electricity to travel the same distance as an EV, because of the multiple conversion steps and all of the energy lost along the way. Which will result in significantly higher running costs to pay for the extra source electricity and the specialised conversion steps.
Given we have zero existing infrastructure to generate any of the additional electricity required, and zero existing infrastructure to convert it to green hydrogen, the carbon footprint of a hydrogen-powered car, including infrastructure requirements, is significantly worse than an equivalent EV. So much so, that if you attempt to decarbonise the UK's passenger car fleet, which is the transport industry's single biggest energy consumer, it will screw up all decarbonisation efforts in the smaller sectors that can't decarbonise with batteries, usually because the are too heavy or bulky. The net result will be a categoric failure to decarbonise any of our transportation sectors, at which point we may as well just give up and stick to burning fossil fuels.
But we probably wouldn't even get to that, because the cost of producing green hydrogen is higher than producing it from natural gas, which means that when push comes to shove all we will end up doing anyway is running cars on a fossil fuel with the carbon pre-released into the atmosphere at huge expense to the end user, the perfect outcome for the oil and gas industry but not great for everyone else. Converting methane to hydrogen not only releases CO2 but there is also methane escape that makes the greenhouse gas thing a bit of an issue. And yes I know all about the different 'colours' of hydrogen, but I also know which colour is the most profitable, and it's grey by a long way.
Finally, there are also very acute safety challenges with pressurised hydrogen, particularly if multiple vehicles are involved, and presently the cars are not allowed in enclosed spaces such as the channel tunnel.
Basically, because electric cars exist, hydrogen cars intend to run from electricity-sourced green hydrogen, make almost zero sense. Bar a few niche applications, the only vehicles where it should be used are the ones where batteries aren't an option.
Lithium batteries are 95% recyclable and all major manufacturers are investing in capability to do this.
Conversely, the carbon fibre tanks required to store hydrogen in cars are not typically recyclable, are sourced almost entirely from fossil fuel, and are life-limited due to the incredibly high pressure that is necessary to store enough hydrogen onboard these vehicles. The amount of carbon fibre required per car is significant and there is no production capability yet that would satisfy anything other than a niche market. The same carbon fibre that would probably be require for all the extra wind turbines needed to fuel the cars. Over and above what there equivalent EV requires....
Note that the tanks also consume so much valuable real estate in the car that it makes for a large car outside that feels like a compact one inside, which is the opposite to what the skateboard battery typically offers.
Hydrogen fuel cell cars require between 2.5 times to 3 times the source electricity to travel the same distance as an EV, because of the multiple conversion steps and all of the energy lost along the way. Which will result in significantly higher running costs to pay for the extra source electricity and the specialised conversion steps.
Given we have zero existing infrastructure to generate any of the additional electricity required, and zero existing infrastructure to convert it to green hydrogen, the carbon footprint of a hydrogen-powered car, including infrastructure requirements, is significantly worse than an equivalent EV. So much so, that if you attempt to decarbonise the UK's passenger car fleet, which is the transport industry's single biggest energy consumer, it will screw up all decarbonisation efforts in the smaller sectors that can't decarbonise with batteries, usually because the are too heavy or bulky. The net result will be a categoric failure to decarbonise any of our transportation sectors, at which point we may as well just give up and stick to burning fossil fuels.
But we probably wouldn't even get to that, because the cost of producing green hydrogen is higher than producing it from natural gas, which means that when push comes to shove all we will end up doing anyway is running cars on a fossil fuel with the carbon pre-released into the atmosphere at huge expense to the end user, the perfect outcome for the oil and gas industry but not great for everyone else. Converting methane to hydrogen not only releases CO2 but there is also methane escape that makes the greenhouse gas thing a bit of an issue. And yes I know all about the different 'colours' of hydrogen, but I also know which colour is the most profitable, and it's grey by a long way.
Finally, there are also very acute safety challenges with pressurised hydrogen, particularly if multiple vehicles are involved, and presently the cars are not allowed in enclosed spaces such as the channel tunnel.
Basically, because electric cars exist, hydrogen cars intend to run from electricity-sourced green hydrogen, make almost zero sense. Bar a few niche applications, the only vehicles where it should be used are the ones where batteries aren't an option.
Freakuk said:
JCB are heavily investing in Hydrogen, impossible to build and run heavy plant with batteries and they've already converted an engine which works well.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19Q7nAYjAJY&t=...
Whilst probably true, this school of thought is rapidly not looking as certain as it was just one year ago:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19Q7nAYjAJY&t=...
https://www.volvoce.com/global/en/our-offer/emobil...
https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/automotive-and...
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2290944-how-e...
https://www.caterpillar.com/en/news/corporate-pres...
crankedup5 said:
With the demise of Britishvolt, it prompts the question as to why hydrogen power vehicles are not seeing the investment. OK the fuel is more expensive then gas but the system proving forward motion seems on the surface a much better system then battery electric power. Add that lithium batteries are not being recycled? the cost of the lithium and the massive shortage electric vehicle recharging points all seem to make hydrogen a miles better bet.
Why would it prompt that question? It is just a sign that the UK is failing in this market, many other countries will happily supply batteries and EVs to the UK if we cannot manufacture them ourselves. better bet. Hydrogen is dead in the water for passenger vehicles in most countries. This is because it either uses fossil fuels (erm...) or it is 2-3 times less efficient per mile compared to using a battery.
Hydrogen got a lot of traction from Japan so people started to extrapolate from that. They forget that Japan, pre Fukushima, had an abundance of electricity so lots of weird and wonderful projects went ahead on that basis in Japan. I work in renewables so I saw some of these, things which would never see the light of day in the UK due to our limit power network. It isn't a coincidence that post-Fukushima the hydrogen fuel cell has disappeared from the mainstream.
Lots of money going into hydrogen at the moment but not for passenger car usage.
GT9 said:
Quick summary from the other thread:
...
Basically, because electric cars exist, hydrogen cars intend to run from electricity-sourced green hydrogen, make almost zero sense. Bar a few niche applications, the only vehicles where it should be used are the ones where batteries aren't an option.
aaaaaand on top of all this an FCEV still needs a small to mid size battery pack on board anyway in order to have anything remotely resembling good driveability due to the very slow transient response of fuel cells to a demand for more power, and to allow active regeneration during deceleration. ...
Basically, because electric cars exist, hydrogen cars intend to run from electricity-sourced green hydrogen, make almost zero sense. Bar a few niche applications, the only vehicles where it should be used are the ones where batteries aren't an option.
Remember when bio-diesel was getting a lot of hype, that one sort of died a death. Wonder what happened to it?
I do think ICE engines will be around for a good while in industrial applications where workload is king (trucks, generators, aircraft and shipping for example) but whether this will drive innovation or simply push governments into an exemption for industrial uses of conventional fuels I don’t know.
I do think ICE engines will be around for a good while in industrial applications where workload is king (trucks, generators, aircraft and shipping for example) but whether this will drive innovation or simply push governments into an exemption for industrial uses of conventional fuels I don’t know.
As a Brit now living in Australia, I can see this thread demonstrates nicely that many people dont consider the world outside their country.
An Ev simply doesn't work in many applications outside Europe.
Imagine a Ford Ranger on a mine site in Western Australia where the temperature is 42 degrees all day. The air con is going to be running all day, it's driving around laden with tools and equipment close to it's Gross vehicle weight. The power consumption far exceeds what an EV can do.
On that same mine site it's very sunny and often very windy so there is a plentiful supply of renewables.
There are companies developing hydrogen generators that will run off on-site renewables to feed the cars as needed.
Then consider an army of EV drivers taking their family on holiday. Here it's not a two hour trip to a cottage in to Cotswolds, it's a 4 to 6 hour trip to the south coast or a 10-14 hour trip up north. The petrol stations to the south and north of major cities are positioned just right so that people get to about 1/4 tank and stop for 5 minutes to fill up. The forecourts are huge and there must be 20+ pumps there. Despite there is normally a queue at peak times (start of school holidays).
How are people going to go on holiday if they have to stop for 30-60 minutes to recharge their EV? Currently there are 20+ petrol pumps to cope with demand, how many fast chargers do they need to install to keep the traffic flowing, even if it takes 20 minutes to recharge an EV?
These are just a couple of the EV issues in my tiny corner of the world but they will be the same in any large country - USA, Canada, Australia, China, India, all of Africa, Brazil.....
I dont have a solution to the infrastructure problem, but the EV is not the solution to everything.
An Ev simply doesn't work in many applications outside Europe.
Imagine a Ford Ranger on a mine site in Western Australia where the temperature is 42 degrees all day. The air con is going to be running all day, it's driving around laden with tools and equipment close to it's Gross vehicle weight. The power consumption far exceeds what an EV can do.
On that same mine site it's very sunny and often very windy so there is a plentiful supply of renewables.
There are companies developing hydrogen generators that will run off on-site renewables to feed the cars as needed.
Then consider an army of EV drivers taking their family on holiday. Here it's not a two hour trip to a cottage in to Cotswolds, it's a 4 to 6 hour trip to the south coast or a 10-14 hour trip up north. The petrol stations to the south and north of major cities are positioned just right so that people get to about 1/4 tank and stop for 5 minutes to fill up. The forecourts are huge and there must be 20+ pumps there. Despite there is normally a queue at peak times (start of school holidays).
How are people going to go on holiday if they have to stop for 30-60 minutes to recharge their EV? Currently there are 20+ petrol pumps to cope with demand, how many fast chargers do they need to install to keep the traffic flowing, even if it takes 20 minutes to recharge an EV?
These are just a couple of the EV issues in my tiny corner of the world but they will be the same in any large country - USA, Canada, Australia, China, India, all of Africa, Brazil.....
I dont have a solution to the infrastructure problem, but the EV is not the solution to everything.
foxbody-87 said:
Remember when bio-diesel was getting a lot of hype, that one sort of died a death. Wonder what happened to it?
Bio-diesel is still diesel, which is bad. Also the costs to make it outweigh the financial benefits. Plus, fuel for land is a big red NOPE for environmentalists and governments.On that note, has anyone seen the price of vegetable oil! It's triple what it used to be.
200bhp said:
As a Brit now living in Australia, I can see this thread demonstrates nicely that many people dont consider the world outside their country.
An Ev simply doesn't work in many applications outside Europe.
Imagine a Ford Ranger on a mine site in Western Australia where the temperature is 42 degrees all day. The air con is going to be running all day, it's driving around laden with tools and equipment close to it's Gross vehicle weight. The power consumption far exceeds what an EV can do.
On that same mine site it's very sunny and often very windy so there is a plentiful supply of renewables.
There are companies developing hydrogen generators that will run off on-site renewables to feed the cars as needed.
Then consider an army of EV drivers taking their family on holiday. Here it's not a two hour trip to a cottage in to Cotswolds, it's a 4 to 6 hour trip to the south coast or a 10-14 hour trip up north. The petrol stations to the south and north of major cities are positioned just right so that people get to about 1/4 tank and stop for 5 minutes to fill up. The forecourts are huge and there must be 20+ pumps there. Despite there is normally a queue at peak times (start of school holidays).
How are people going to go on holiday if they have to stop for 30-60 minutes to recharge their EV? Currently there are 20+ petrol pumps to cope with demand, how many fast chargers do they need to install to keep the traffic flowing, even if it takes 20 minutes to recharge an EV?
These are just a couple of the EV issues in my tiny corner of the world but they will be the same in any large country - USA, Canada, Australia, China, India, all of Africa, Brazil.....
I dont have a solution to the infrastructure problem, but the EV is not the solution to everything.
It’s not difficult. Just carry on using fossil fuels until EV tech is suitable for the handful of niche use case users in your tiny corner of the World.An Ev simply doesn't work in many applications outside Europe.
Imagine a Ford Ranger on a mine site in Western Australia where the temperature is 42 degrees all day. The air con is going to be running all day, it's driving around laden with tools and equipment close to it's Gross vehicle weight. The power consumption far exceeds what an EV can do.
On that same mine site it's very sunny and often very windy so there is a plentiful supply of renewables.
There are companies developing hydrogen generators that will run off on-site renewables to feed the cars as needed.
Then consider an army of EV drivers taking their family on holiday. Here it's not a two hour trip to a cottage in to Cotswolds, it's a 4 to 6 hour trip to the south coast or a 10-14 hour trip up north. The petrol stations to the south and north of major cities are positioned just right so that people get to about 1/4 tank and stop for 5 minutes to fill up. The forecourts are huge and there must be 20+ pumps there. Despite there is normally a queue at peak times (start of school holidays).
How are people going to go on holiday if they have to stop for 30-60 minutes to recharge their EV? Currently there are 20+ petrol pumps to cope with demand, how many fast chargers do they need to install to keep the traffic flowing, even if it takes 20 minutes to recharge an EV?
These are just a couple of the EV issues in my tiny corner of the world but they will be the same in any large country - USA, Canada, Australia, China, India, all of Africa, Brazil.....
I dont have a solution to the infrastructure problem, but the EV is not the solution to everything.
GT9 said:
Hydrogen fuel cell cars require between 2.5 times to 3 times the source electricity to travel the same distance as an EV, because of the multiple conversion steps and all of the energy lost along the way. Which will result in significantly higher running costs to pay for the extra source electricity and the specialised conversion steps.
Given we have zero existing infrastructure to generate any of the additional electricity required, and zero existing infrastructure to convert it to green hydrogen, the carbon footprint of a hydrogen-powered car, including infrastructure requirements, is significantly worse than an equivalent EV. So much so, that if you attempt to decarbonise the UK's passenger car fleet, which is the transport industry's single biggest energy consumer, it will screw up all decarbonisation efforts in the smaller sectors that can't decarbonise with batteries, usually because the are too heavy or bulky. The net result will be a categoric failure to decarbonise any of our transportation sectors, at which point we may as well just give up and stick to burning fossil fuels.
Interesting stuffGiven we have zero existing infrastructure to generate any of the additional electricity required, and zero existing infrastructure to convert it to green hydrogen, the carbon footprint of a hydrogen-powered car, including infrastructure requirements, is significantly worse than an equivalent EV. So much so, that if you attempt to decarbonise the UK's passenger car fleet, which is the transport industry's single biggest energy consumer, it will screw up all decarbonisation efforts in the smaller sectors that can't decarbonise with batteries, usually because the are too heavy or bulky. The net result will be a categoric failure to decarbonise any of our transportation sectors, at which point we may as well just give up and stick to burning fossil fuels.
I would however point out that if we had Nuclear providing the majority of baseload power and then renewables providing as much as possible of the rest then there might well be a surfeit of electricity that could potentially be used to generate hydrogen when the wind is high. So if it doesn't make sense now it might make more sense in the future.
Edited by JagLover on Thursday 19th January 07:44
dvs_dave said:
It’s not difficult. Just carry on using fossil fuels until EV tech is suitable for the handful of niche use case users in your tiny corner of the World.
Agreed, although I see an awful lot of EVs on my trips to California and British Columbia and have a feeling the Chinese are increasing their uptake. I can see how highly depopulated areas would struggle but guess at some point the technology will find an answer, in comparative terms EV is still very much in its infancy.A few years ago I was involved in a funding project for running Hydrogen taxis in central Paris, it was a strange one, but ultimately the numbers and logistical problems just didn’t add up, despite potential tax breaks and state aid. I don’t think the failure of a poorly run and funded battery business in the north of England heralds a new dawn for Hydrogen, any more than it puts a nail in the EV coffin.
dvs_dave said:
200bhp said:
As a Brit now living in Australia, I can see this thread demonstrates nicely that many people dont consider the world outside their country.
An Ev simply doesn't work in many applications outside Europe.
Imagine a Ford Ranger on a mine site in Western Australia where the temperature is 42 degrees all day. The air con is going to be running all day, it's driving around laden with tools and equipment close to it's Gross vehicle weight. The power consumption far exceeds what an EV can do.
On that same mine site it's very sunny and often very windy so there is a plentiful supply of renewables.
There are companies developing hydrogen generators that will run off on-site renewables to feed the cars as needed.
Then consider an army of EV drivers taking their family on holiday. Here it's not a two hour trip to a cottage in to Cotswolds, it's a 4 to 6 hour trip to the south coast or a 10-14 hour trip up north. The petrol stations to the south and north of major cities are positioned just right so that people get to about 1/4 tank and stop for 5 minutes to fill up. The forecourts are huge and there must be 20+ pumps there. Despite there is normally a queue at peak times (start of school holidays).
How are people going to go on holiday if they have to stop for 30-60 minutes to recharge their EV? Currently there are 20+ petrol pumps to cope with demand, how many fast chargers do they need to install to keep the traffic flowing, even if it takes 20 minutes to recharge an EV?
These are just a couple of the EV issues in my tiny corner of the world but they will be the same in any large country - USA, Canada, Australia, China, India, all of Africa, Brazil.....
I dont have a solution to the infrastructure problem, but the EV is not the solution to everything.
It’s not difficult. Just carry on using fossil fuels until EV tech is suitable for the handful of niche use case users in your tiny corner of the World.An Ev simply doesn't work in many applications outside Europe.
Imagine a Ford Ranger on a mine site in Western Australia where the temperature is 42 degrees all day. The air con is going to be running all day, it's driving around laden with tools and equipment close to it's Gross vehicle weight. The power consumption far exceeds what an EV can do.
On that same mine site it's very sunny and often very windy so there is a plentiful supply of renewables.
There are companies developing hydrogen generators that will run off on-site renewables to feed the cars as needed.
Then consider an army of EV drivers taking their family on holiday. Here it's not a two hour trip to a cottage in to Cotswolds, it's a 4 to 6 hour trip to the south coast or a 10-14 hour trip up north. The petrol stations to the south and north of major cities are positioned just right so that people get to about 1/4 tank and stop for 5 minutes to fill up. The forecourts are huge and there must be 20+ pumps there. Despite there is normally a queue at peak times (start of school holidays).
How are people going to go on holiday if they have to stop for 30-60 minutes to recharge their EV? Currently there are 20+ petrol pumps to cope with demand, how many fast chargers do they need to install to keep the traffic flowing, even if it takes 20 minutes to recharge an EV?
These are just a couple of the EV issues in my tiny corner of the world but they will be the same in any large country - USA, Canada, Australia, China, India, all of Africa, Brazil.....
I dont have a solution to the infrastructure problem, but the EV is not the solution to everything.
Also, isn’t Toyota developing a car with hydrogen tech?
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