Hydrogen Cars

GM is releasing a couple hundred fuel cell vehicles in an effort to test them in the real world.. they are running radio commercials that say "you can't buy one, yet".

So I know nothing of these or hydrogen for that matter... Is this a "renewable" energy? I know they claim it only produces water as a by product.. anything they are leaving out?

I'd posted a couple of links in that drilling ANWR thread about hydrogen.

Honda has a hydrogen powered car.

http://automobiles.honda.com/fcx-clarity/

I think they are only available in California right now.

Right now there is not a huge infrastructure for the production of hydrogen. The electricity it takes to produce it is more valuable than that hydrogen it produces. It's one of the most abundant elements in the universe, I'm not sure how to answer the "renewable". The most promising hydrogren production method is to remove the oxygen from water via electrolysis.

I think Honda's hydrogen vehicle has hydrogen entering the cell from one end, and oxygen from another, and they combine to water, and generate heat (energy).

pez wrote:Right now there is not a huge infrastructure for the production of hydrogen. The electricity it takes to produce it is more valuable than that hydrogen it produces. It's one of the most abundant elements in the universe, I'm not sure how to answer the "renewable". The most promising hydrogren production method is to remove the oxygen from water via electrolysis.

I think Honda's hydrogen vehicle has hydrogen entering the cell from one end, and oxygen from another, and they combine to water, and generate heat (energy).

I've been reading up on this stuff for the past few weeks or so, but I'm no expert.

There are a few different methods to produce Hydrogen. All of them vary in methodology, and efficiency. Iceland has a solar array that powers an electrolysis system that produces hydrogen. They claim that this will be how most hydrogen is delivered to the "gas pumps" when the time comes, there will be very efficient solar array's on-site that produce the hydrogen right there. I mean what delivery person wants to drive around a truck with a 5000 psi tank AKA a Hydrogen bomb strapped to his back? Iceland also can use hot magma to heat water and by some magical process at a specific temperature, split it into Hydrogen and Oxygen.

Hydrogen is not a "renewable" resource unless you can say that the Geothermal, Wind, Water, and Solar energy was used to make it. It produces very little or no greenhouse gas when burned. It could be burned, but using it to generate electricity in the fuel cell is safer.

That's what I didn't know... how we got the hydrogen. It uses electricity to get it, so it'd create a bigger draw for electricity which would create another issue.. but it looks like Iceland has the right idea by using Solar.

I think there is a lot of fear about the whole hydrogen idea.. are you going to blow up link the Hindenburg driving down I-69 one day? Is a hydrogen tanker more dangerous than a gas tanker? I know very little of either one of their chemical properties or what makes them go boom other than fire.

cardinal5150 wrote:That's what I didn't know... how we got the hydrogen. It uses electricity to get it, so it'd create a bigger draw for electricity which would create another issue.. but it looks like Iceland has the right idea by using Solar.

I think there is a lot of fear about the whole hydrogen idea.. are you going to blow up link the Hindenburg driving down I-69 one day? Is a hydrogen tanker more dangerous than a gas tanker? I know very little of either one of their chemical properties or what makes them go boom other than fire.

Yes, you would blow up like the hindenberg x3000. Hydrogen under pressure would be much worse than the Hindenberg which would have been at much lower pressure. My high school earth science teacher told us that Hydrogen burns clear, or nearly clear. It has a slight yellowish tint to the flame when you view it burning in a dark room, but in sunlight it would not be seen easily. It is very volatile, and explosive, like gasoline vapors. This is one of the concerns for having on-board hydrogen tanks in automobiles.