V-10 Hydrogen Engines from Ford

[ScottB]

Ford Launches Production Of Hydrogen-Fueled V-10 Engines
Dow Jones
DOW JONES NEWSWIRES

Ford Motor Co. (F) said Monday it has begun production of dedicated hydrogen- fueled V-10 engines.

The Detroit company said it is the first automaker to begin making the engines, which will be used in its E-450 hydrogen-fueled shuttle buses.

The buses are scheduled to be delivered to customers later this year, the company said.

This would rock in a new Focus, no?

Scott

 

[Shannow]

If you are going to energy wasteful hydrogen, it makes perfect sense to burn it in a V-10.

 

[Al]

Exactly-there are reasons that Ford is going out of business.

 

[JHZR2]

ford made hydrogen burning 300 I-6s way back... or so Ive heard.

If you use something like reformed non-nutritious carbohydrate (which there is a lo of in this world), there is nothing inefficient about it.

Localized production is the key, whatis energy inefficient is turning the whole countryside into farmland... be smart about it and dont immediately shun hydrogen without thinking it through.

JMH

 

[Shannow]

JHZR2, I agree that if we use wastes to do the job, then it's of benefit, but currently, most research appears to be thermal or electrolytic cracking of water...that's inefficient.

 

[JHZR2]

for sure. SOFC based electrolysis helps some, but not much.

Reformation of diesel can yield >40% efficiency in the 500 kWe systems I have modeled and designed. thats at 100% load - off load is even higher.

You have to be willing to spend the $$$ to get the efficiency though. Most arent willing to pay more than a diesel genset.

JMH

 

[oilyriser]

Thanks for the reminder to never invest in Ford Motor Company. If you have hydrogen, the last thing you want to do with it is burn it in an Otto cycle engine. sheesh.

 

[H2GURU]

JHZR2,
Try this link!

http://www.energybulletin.net/11963.html

 

[H2GURU]

JHZR2,
Well, the whole story behind hydrogen is everyone thinks it is so readily available and that it will also be easy to aquire and use. In fact , it is tricky to use. Many companys here need H2 for their processes and some have tried to generate it themselves, all without success. There is quite a bit of risk with this stuff. The generators all work, but sooner or later there is a fire or explosion and the customers decide to have it supplied for saftey's sake. I would totally agree with you that since all of our great R. & D. produced as a by-product of the "SPACE RACE" seems to have vanished, we are languishing, letting others make our stuff as we watch idlly by. We do need something to come along and give us a spark, but the "Hydrogen Economy" won't be coming to a store near you soon! Because of the unbending "Laws of Theremodynamics it can never work.

 

[JHZR2]

Al: In the systems we design, the hydrogen is used directly. We want to minimize inventory - as I said, our systems are atypical. Our compression is done in the liquid phase and considered as parasitics in our efficiency calculations.

H2GURU: exactly right about the misinformation - not even getting the point where compression is necessary, per Al's question. This is also the reason for direct use, no inventory systems, like I have mentioned. I agree that the global hydrogen economy is not a solution other than for loaclized solutions... but to discount all systems for all applications, is not the reality either.

JMH

 

[H2GURU]

JHZR2
By giving the history of the fuel cell it should be noted that many smart people have come and left this planet since these were devised. I can tell you that these vehicles that are in deveolopment use pressures NORTH of 5,000 PSI and you can surmise the controls in place to handle that potential energy.Seeing as you already know all this I will post a link to those who may want to know more. For the record I'm not a LUDITE, I just realize that there will be no substitute for gasoline and that "THEY" (WHOEVER they is?)have no solution for PEAK OIL.

http://americanhistory.si.edu/fuelcells/origins/origins.htm

 

[JHZR2]

Im not making FC systems for cars... I never said vehicles

we store fuel, liquid phase, and use it as necessary - no need to store any hydrogen at pressure. Heck, were also designing SOFC systems - you just slug the methane rich reformate in...

these are BIG systems... not your everyday Honda FCX or GM FC car (both of which Ive driven and are actually decent!)

Unfortunately there is no solution (in my case too, with the application of fuel cells) or substitute for various liquid fuels - diesel, jet and gas... I agree with you there. IMO the stupidest thing DOE did regarding the hydrogen economy was the no-go on onboard reforming of fuel for FC powerplants in small cars. Withthe low sulfur fuels we get today, a reforming plant could last the life of the car.

We might adapt fuel cells in our applications, but if we run out of diesel and jet fuel, chances are we will make it ourselves. Once again, my applications are far different from a passenger car.

JMH

 

[H2GURU]

I also drove the FCX but found it rather small. The on- board reforming died on the vine because it kept fouling the fuel cell ( @ $ 1,000,000 per ). I was holding out hope for an at home fuel cell set-up that would power your home and charge your vehicle on off hours but battery technologies are still pretty primitive. The on-board deal was closely watched as Shell bought in but there was also a proplem with the by-products.

 

[JHZR2]

Ive seen all that stuff... there are lots of people that are blindly for, and lots that are blindly against, because someone tells them to be, or because they have spun analyses. Sure, hydrogen has a spotless recognition to some of the uninformed 'go green' masses... but it also has a super high wrap by people who have their alternate agendas too. Neither side is clean r balanced.

lines like this: "Overall, there is about a 60% energy loss in this process." regarding the reformation of NG to H2 is an example of a setup where all the numbers are not considered - its a spin statement. Would there be no energy recovery, no recouperation, no thermal transfer in a real, industrial, integrated process? come on! And if thereis... what happens to the energy lost as heat in the process? it goes back into the system. Even with an endothermic reformation reaction, the inefficiencies of the the rest of the system can produce sufficient heat to maintain thermal balance.

Nothing is 100% efficient, not even close. But if were at 32% for a good IC engine, and can best it by 10%, is that not good? Is that not useful in some applications, even if the cost is higher?

We have done our own internal analyses, which I cannot comment upon, but needless to say, for our applications, high efficiency reformer-based logistic fuel operated generators make sense for many reasons, efficiency being an important factor, but only one of many reasons why they are attractive.

anything above 60% LHV in to power out efficiency is B$, IMO. However, besting a diesel or gas turbine is quite doable. The cost is greater, yes, but in some applications the benefits outweigh the costs.

Hydrogen economy? not sure... maybe yet another localzed solution. Unfortunately the reality is that there are going to hae to be a lot of local solutions depending on what is abundant and cheaply available in the local area. Synfuels, IMO will remain the global solution, FWIW.

People trying to shoot things down before they can even be allowed to develop and fail hurt the ingenuity of this country. Yes, fuel cell shave been looked at in detail since the 60s (dont give me that crap about fuel cells being invented in 1838 or whatever), however anyone knowledgable in the chemical industry would know that the real advances have only come about in the last 10 years or so.

We are falling behind China and other places in terms of engineering knowledge and skill. R&D is nearly nonexistant here in the US, but this is one area that it does exist. R&D is 95+% failure, and while that is no excuse, frankly, we are turning into a nation of idiots if we do not embrace high cost, high risk, high reward programs. We already farm most industrial R&D to China in the interest of making items cheaper at wal-mart. How much junk can we buy without advancement of engineering and sciencein the US, whether in the studies of fuels, synthetic fuels, reformation of fuels, production of power with high efficiency, portable power, high power density systems, etc., etc. It seems that with the spin youre giving, youd like to abandon it all... lets just farm it all out to China?!? Youre going to have a lot of useless idiots on your hands here in the USA if that keeps going on...

JMH

 

[Al]

JMH..what is the overall efficiency, including the energy used to extract and compress the Hydrogen. Also the pollution/greenhouse gas emmision due to production/compression.

 

[jmacmaster]

So JMH, have you done enough research on the question to give us an informed opinion on whether hydrogen fuel can be made cost-efficient for motor vehicles? I know we need a lot more R&D and would have to develope a nationwide distribution system. But, down the line, what's your opinion on whether its a viable alternative to gasoline?

 

[JHZR2]

My research is for ship systems. However, I can extrapolate from that.

IMO, we will need some liquid-phase energy carrier, hydrogen might be a costly and relatively inefficient step to get there, thus why I never dismiss its utility in the short term, however for a widespread solution, I for one cant see far enough out of the box to see how it can be an effective, efficient, safe method of storing the hydrogen to get the job done for billions of people.

synfuels, ammonia, alcohols, and a variety of other methods seem to have more promise - their energy costs might not be great either, compared to what were used to, but they will likely be better in application and operation than compressed hydrogen. Yet, the technology is not quite there yet at the small scale levels of passenger cars. I will still say that the dumbest thing that DOE did was their no-go decision for onboard reformation for FC applications. They picked the easy way out for a short term success, sacrificing long term realities, and shifting most all of the cost of such systems onto the SECA type projects and to the DoD type projects. There is a LOT less money from those pots to be had.. so obviously things will move slower, and often be less wide-ranging and academic/learning based, and more application based - not optimal for widespread commodity solutions.

There is no doubt to me that high efficiency FC applciations will come to be the norm, hopefully even in some passenger cars. However, given the current direction, their utility will be limited a la the battery EV1 cars and similar stuff.

JMH

 

[rpn453]

Hopefully there's a real market for those engines. Saskatoon bought hybrid buses even though it was a money-losing decision. Oh, the irony of wasting energy and resources for public perception that you're doing the opposite!

 

[JavaMan]

quote:

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Originally posted by rpn453:
Hopefully there's a real market for those engines. Saskatoon bought hybrid buses even though it was a money-losing decision. Oh, the irony of wasting energy and resources for public perception that you're doing the opposite!

---

Maybe there is in crowded cities where pollution friendly fuel vehicle would help air quality. As the population continues to grow, I first can see mass transit moving to a more environmentally friendly means of fueling transportation. In the beginning there may have to be subsidies to encourage the fuels use. As improved technology increases the efficiency of these fuels and the prices of traditional fuels continue to increase, I can foresee traditional vehicles powered by the use of a more environmentally friendly fuel available at a competitive price. The leader in this technology will reap the financial benefits.

 

[rpn453]

quote:

---

Originally posted by JavaMan:
Maybe there is in crowded cities where pollution friendly fuel vehicle would help air quality. As the population continues to grow, I first can see mass transit moving to a more environmentally friendly means of fueling transportation. In the beginning there may have to be subsidies to encourage the fuels use. As improved technology increases the efficiency of these fuels and the prices of traditional fuels continue to increase, I can foresee traditional vehicles powered by the use of a more environmentally friendly fuel available at a competitive price. The leader in this technology will reap the financial benefits.

---

I suppose it may make sense if it could actually make a measurable difference in local air quality. Up here, I sometimes forget that there are places with a high enough population density to have local air quality problems due to automobiles!
I don't agree with subsidies, but I do agree with the use of regulations to limit pollution to acceptable levels.