Hydrogen: No Super Fuel Of The Future - Vancouver Sun

[hatrack]

EDIT

"Of the two main methods for producing hydrogen, steam reformation of methane/natural gas and electrolysis of water, steam reformation is easily the cheapest. Reforming natural gas requires the natural gas feedstock, but also uses additional natural gas as fuel to create the steam that is integral to the process.

Basic thermodynamics tells us that the hydrogen coming out of the reactor will be more expensive, per unit energy, than the natural gas that went in, since any such process is less than 100-per-cent efficient. So, those waiting for a cheap, gaseous fuel that can be burned in automobiles already have one, and that fuel is called natural gas. Yet there is no significant use of natural gas in automobiles, likely because of the lack of filling infrastructure.

Some would argue that if the price of oil continues to rise, hydrogen will become economically viable. This is probably incorrect. As oil prices increase, natural gas prices will also likely rise since natural gas is a substitute, pushing up hydrogen prices as well. For those placing their wager on hydrogen from electrolysis of water, one can also count on electricity costs rising along with fossil fuel prices, since substitution is possible and the current supply of electricity is finite. The net result is that natural gas is almost certain to remain less expensive, per unit of energy, than hydrogen, at least in areas with the price structure of North America. No one talks about the viability of natural gas as a replacement for gasoline, and no one should consider hydrogen as anything but an even less likely alternative.

EDIT

Hydrogen is touted as an alternative to gasoline. However, even assuming inexpensive hydrogen, fuel cells to power vehicles are likely highly remote, despite decades of development. Power from internal combustion costs $100 to $200 per kilowatt (one kilowatt is about 1.34 horsepower.) Today's hydrogen fuel cells cost about $2,000 per kilowatt of power produced. If we need 40 kW of power in a small car, $80,000 for the power plant seems expensive.

The cost of fuel cells is strongly tied to the platinum catalysts needed to make the reactions in the cell occur at useful rates. Cutting costs means significantly reducing the use of platinum, but doing so to the required level without sacrificing the reaction rate will likely win the lucky researcher a Nobel Prize. While I can dream, setting government policy on this basis seems ill advised."

EDIT

http://www.fuelcellsworks.com/Supppage2744.html

[Salviati]

1. Here's a little thing I wrote for another thread a long time ago...

... just thought I'd throw it in here too, it would be a shame to only have used it once. This article is a little better at laying out the issues than the one I wrote this about, but it's still far from clear.




Whenever the media talks about energy, they blur the lines between energy sources, storage, and usage, thus making any real conversation really hard.

Fuel cells are like a new kind of engine, they take fuel in and convert it to effort, in this case, they take hydrogen, methanol, etc and turn it into electricity. When you see the media asking if fuel cells can solve the energy crisis, this makes about as much sense as asking if the internal combustion engine can solve it. These things are energy consumers, not energy sources.

Hydrogen. Far from what the popular press may lead you to believe, hydrogen is not the savior of the upcoming energy supply crisis. In fact hydrogen is not an energy source at all, it is just an energy storage medium, like a battery. One cannot go and "mine" molecular hydrogen on Earth any more than one can go and mine batteries. Hydrogen must be made through various processes, such as electrolysis (splitting water in to H2 + O) or stripping the hydrogen from other molecules, like methane. These processes all take more energy to use than can be extracted by using the hydrogen in a fuel cell or any other type of engine. So why do it then, if we're going to lose energy? Because it can put the energy into a form that's easy to carry around, same as why you use rechargeable batteries instead of really long extension cords.

Oil. This is what it all comes down to, energy supplies. Right now oil is one of our most important energy supplies. Why? Because for the moment it is cheap and plentiful, and it packs an incredible energy density (by carrying a little oil around, you get a lot of energy). The comparisons in the media between an oil economy and a hydrogen economy are a bit disingenuous, because you're comparing a energy source to energy storage. The real alternatives to oil and other fossil fuels like natural gas and coal are things like solar, wind power, hydro power, nuclear fission and (maybe someday) fusion, biomass, and geothermal, to name but a few. If we are going to retool our transportation to use fuel cells in order to stop suckling at the teat of oil, it is these sources that are going to make the hydrogen that will be used. And looking at the big energy picture, transportation only accounts for about 10% of the energy used in the US, the bulk of it is used in areas like industry and electrifying and heating peoples homes.

In order to stave off any crisis about the availability of petro fuels (not to mention the environmental costs of continuing to dump all that CO2 into the air), there must be a revolution in where we get our energy from, alternative energy sources must be developed, the blurring of the lines between these categories of sources, storage, and usage make having conversations about this issue very difficult.

[Maple]

2. Vancouver BC

is currently making big money from oil.

Fuel cells would stop that cold

[orwell]

3. Thanks Hat

I laugh everytime * opens his mouth about our Hydrogen future. From what I have read, this is all just another smokescreen to convince gullible voters that he is a "Conservation Conservative".

Hey, maybe that's where the gas will come from - *'s piehole!

[Up2Late]

6. No, it's more like U.S. Aid to Africa and the World, * talks like we...

...give a lot, but the "Real Aid" the U.S. gives is 0.02% of G.D.P.

<http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=116x10240>

[rfkrfk]

4. fuel cells always have major problems

either...
millions in platinum
or
limited lifetime, 200 hours PEMs,
huge, high temps unsafe, unsuitable for transportation

how many Honda FCXs were built?, maybe twenty?

Fuel cells have been studied extensively for
years and years.

If fuel cells are so great, why don't the
Germans {supposedly smarter than Americans} or
Japanese {supposedly smarter than Americans}
use them?, they don't need shrub's permission.

[Coastie for Truth]

7. A bit obsolete

Platinum is the "platinum standard" - but Belgian Chemistry Prof Henri Beer with financial backing of Dr Vittorio deNora (and his Oronzio deNora Impiatti Electrochimici business) long ago showed that it is the "electron properties" (valence band, conduction band, band gap, work function, etc. and all that "stuff" from Physical Chemistry 101) that determines electrocatalytic activity. Beer and Vittorio replaced Pt with Ruthenium suboxide doped titanium suboxide. (i.e.,TiO1.98 instead of TiO2). This is the basis for "Dimensionally Stable Anodes" and the ODN fuel cell business.

The 200 hour life time was passed over 40 years ago with the introduction of DuPont's Nafion.

I don't know what you meant by "huge" - most individual cells are about 1 to 2.5 square feet. They are assembled "electrically and mechanically in series" (the words in my patents) as a bipolar battery pack.

High temperatures refers to fused salt electrolytes. Today's fuel cells use solid polymer electrolytes with immobilized water, operate at about 100 degrees C.

I do agree that fuel cells are not practical for personal automotive applications - but that has to do with H2 infrastructure issues and the "on site" reforming of CH4 (in the case of methane fuel cells). Better as a stationary power source with an on-site reformer. Slightly more thermodynamically efficient use of CH4.

My opinion (and I built my first fuel cell almost 50 years ago for the old Westinghouse High Science Talent Search, and a more sophisticated one as my chem e senior research project, and still a fancier one for my doctoral work) - automotive fuel cells are a red herring to divert attention from raising CAFE and hybrids and pure electrics. The Germans and Japanese know that, but Cheney and Junk Bond GM don't.

BTW - CH4 fuel cells are being used for co-gen and distributed gen in Europe and even in Canada.

[rfkrfk]

8. no fuel cell, is suitable for transportation

the several different types, all have a
major 'gotcha', for use as personal transportation.

PEMs, short lifetime {plus cost}
other types, too hot, too big, etc {plus cost}

these problems, mean that there is essentially no
fuel cell for cars, that issue is in addition
to the fact of a lack of H2 infrastructure.

Stationary-use fuel cells are a microscopic niche product.

Fuel cells have been studied for years.
Note that fuel cell advocates often include
'hot water' as useful output, which is added to
the FCs output of electricity, in so-called efficiency claims.

The claim that fuelcells are 83 percent efficient is misleading.

The electric battery car is coming, and it
has nothing to do with fuel cells.

[Coastie for Truth]

9. I have to disagree

PEMs, short lifetime

DuPont NAFION and Asahi Glass FLEMION PEMs last over three years in the chlorine gas and concentrated brine (anode side), concentrated NaOH (cathode side), 125 degree C environment of a chlorine electrolysis cell.

lack of H2 infrastructure.

We agree there.

Note that fuel cell advocates often include 'hot water' as useful output, which is added to the FCs output of electricity, in so-called efficiency claims.

Real engineers do not "include 'hot water' as useful output". Altho, you can use the hot water to "preheat" and "humidify" the H2 feed. This increases the output voltage a bit (decrease the internal I2R losses at the H2 electrode and across the PEM).

Stationary-use fuel cells are a microscopic niche product.

I think the jury is still out -- Spokane WA's Avista is selling stationary use cells through it's ReliOn business, , and Ballard's and even GE through .

But to say that stationary fuel cells are a "a microscopic niche product" sounds like Junk Bond GM's non-leadership, Rick Wagoner and Bob Lutz, saying that EV and hybrids are a microscopic niche product.

The claim that fuel cells are 83 percent efficient is misleading.

I always question "bare" "efficiency" claims. What's the input, what's the output. Does the calculation look at the fuel cell as the "system" - or does it include the electrolysis of the water - and the electricity to electrolyze the water, and the coal or natural gas to generate that electricity? Or the hydrocarbon (actually CH4, CH3OH or CH3CH2OH) that is fed to the reformer, the refining of the petroleum feed stock, etc.)?

I taught thermo, and I taught electrochemistry from John Newman's book, "Electrochemical Systems" - and I made up - and graded = homeworks and exams - I know how to fudge those numbers.

The electric battery car is coming, and it
has nothing to do with fuel cells.

I think that I know enough about electrochemistry to know that at a product level batteries have nothing to do with fuel cells - altho they are both covered in the same chapter of physical chemistry books, both covered in John Newman's "Electrochemical Systems" book, and both covered in the same "Electrochemical Engineering" electives, and the workers in the field belong to the same sections of the AIChE and ACS.

I also know that, notwithstanding GM's best (worst?) efforts to kill it, the electric battery car is coming.

[Up2Late]

5. Vancouver is home to a bunch of Backward Cowboys, Like Texas

Ontario is the place to be if your talking Hydrogen, Check it out:

<http://www.hydrogenics.com/>

Just think of it as one more thing Bush and the American (and I guess North American) Media is lying to you about.

The U.S. is going to wake up in 3-4 years and say, "How the hell did we get so far behind?

More links if you want them, but Toronto's Hydrogenics is awesome.