My thoughts on Hydrogen

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For sometime this was supposed to be the future alternative fuel for cars/trucks. As with anything it has it's drawbacks. 1 being it's very volitale(sp?) Second, it's very expensive, especially if your going to use it in your vehicle.

Now on the other side of the coin, hydrogen burns very clean. H20 is about the only thing that comes out of your pipe which is completely safe eliminating the need for a catalytic converter. With that said, I can just imagine how clean an engine would be if it were running on Hydrogen, synthetic oil and bypass filter. Is it safe to say that the oil would stay clean all the time as in never turn black?? My thinking tells me yes. There's no carbon deposits to worry about. Something else is a vehicle would get superior gas mileage than compared to a car that runs on everyday 87octane fuel. How much more improvement would it be?? Here again, I don't know this for certain.

A cool thing is hydrogen is in the air we breathe, it's a natural resource of god's creation. Now this is bad for crude oil refineries and plants of course so that's another drawback to hydrogen. I see it all the time on TV that Hydrogen will someday be the future gas for todays daily drivers and anything else that runs on gas currently. I wouldn't be even the least bit suprised if I found out someone out there is not letting this hydrogen thing happen. IF that's all true, I don't know? I'm only saying what I know in this thread. Any thoughts, comments or anything else please feel free to reply. I am anxious to see what everyone has to say. Thanks,,,,,,,AR
 
I believe the major downside to hydrogen, is that it takes more energy to produce, than you net, so you end up in the negative.

Crude oil is one of God's creations, too
nono.gif

It is somewhat biodegradable, but impatient humans lead you to believe otherwise.

See this website to view the area in Pennsylvania where oil was first discovered, during the late 1800's.

http://www.venangoil.com
 
It is my understanding that currently all the resources for hydrogen technology are directed on extracting H2 from crude, not from the water. To me it makes very little sense, but I guess the big guns in the industry are OK with that.
 
Iceland is probably the leader in switching over to hydrogen. With their extensive geothermal energy, they are able to convert water into hydrogen and oxygen, through electrical processes. They are working to set up refueling centers, each of which will generate its own hydrogen. All they need is a water source, and a powerline in. That will eliminate trucking/shipping/safety costs. The vehicles then convert the hydrogen back to water. Could almost be a complete loop, so to speak. The obvious key is cheap electrical energy.

Iceland can do this as they import 100% of their oil, and are cohesive enough as a population, to realize their strengths and weaknesses to work together toward energy independence. Would be nice to see the US be that cohesive. Heres a link for more detail:

http://www.pbs.org/saf/1506/

I am very optimistic about our future with hydrogen, or whatever we will use. Oil will always be around and used for fuel. But with the recent advances and ideas toward generation and storage, the bulk of our energy/transportation could be by something other than oil. Then, I feel, oil will be sold at a discount when the market goes away on it. Probably not drastically cheaper, but without the supply problems. Check some of the recent threads on oil prices, ANWR, etc. for more on these subjects.
 
simple solution: reformation of liquid HC fuels into a reformate gas, which can be shifted, separated, etc., with very high efficiency. This gas is then sent to something like a fuel cell, which has a high efficiency, and as a result, you have a process which is pushing 40% efficient, or higher with high-temperature systems. Sure you still have the carbon byproducts, and youll need to re-condensate water, but the use of fuels drops.

I have seen h2 IC engines, but they have a subset of issues in and of themselves - they arent the answer. If you want an IC engine, get the refiners to further de-sulfurize the diesel fuels and get the high efficiency diesels with pollution controls and catalysts, which will give you 50 mpg on a moderate size car.

At the end of the day, proper hydrogen storage, even metal-hydride based storage is bulky, heavy, and wont find its way onto small vehicles, without a significant change in vehicle design, IMO.

The DOE gave a no-go to the reformation of liquid (or even natural gas) fuels for transportation, stating that they wanted H2 to be an infrastructure availability item. IMO we get back to the 'big, bulky and heavy' point, since someone would have to lug a lot of compressed hydrogen around, and so, as I said, it wont happen until a major re-design of sutos occurs, for the adaptation of fuel cells, etc.

JMH
 
quote:

Originally posted by yugrus:
It is my understanding that currently all the resources for hydrogen technology are directed on extracting H2 from crude, not from the water. To me it makes very little sense, but I guess the big guns in the industry are OK with that.

Reformation (pulling H2 from crude) can give extremely high production rates, effectively freeing 90% or more of the hydrogen in the hydrocarbons as H2 (trace is methane, etc). The bad part is you need to separate thius reformate gas to give you pure hydrogen. But, all in all, it is more efficient to do it this way than to split water.

Splitting water to produce H2/O2 is ighly inefficient. Not much better than 30% efficiency in getting H2 from water. Even using solar cells for free electricity has its problems, as they arent all that great for producing electricity (though I think solar cells should be used to scavenge free electricity, especially in high-sun areas), and so all-in-all your production isnt that great. SOme studies have shown ways to electrolyze water and get near 50% efficiency, but they are not something that could be done outside of a chemical plant.

I do think that where there can be lots of free energy (sunlight and space), there should be electrolyzer farms. What a good way to make hydrogen! Problem is, those areas, where there actuially is a lot of space AND sunlight tend to be sparsely populated, and then you have to pump or transport your H2 elsewhere, not use it locally. This reduces overall process efficiency and is a tough thing with H2.

JMH
 
Photovoltaic, windmill wind farms, nuclear, ocean wave motion could all be used to eventually split H2O into hydrogen and oxygen. But isnt hydrogen just H (or H1) and not H2, after separation? Not wanting to inflame, just wondering. I am far from knowing chemistry. I would like to learn more about getting H (or if its H2) from hydrocarbons (HC). Any good links with info?
 
Good post Pick. I grew up in Grove City Pennsylvania, close enough that Franklin and Oil City were our big football rivals. You can go to the Drake museum and look at pictures of the desolation of the oil boom, and look out the window at the same hillsides now covered with trees. I have spent many hours tramping old oil fields. Oil does degrade eventually.

As for hydrogen, cheap energy like Iceland has, must come first. I wonder if they would be better off buying crud, using their energy to refine it, and selling the refined products.
 
quote:

Originally posted by Airborne Ranger:
I wouldn't be even the least bit suprised if I found out someone out there is not letting this hydrogen thing happen.

There are many people not letting it happen, including everyone that understands it is nowhere close to being an efficient or economically feasible way of storing and using energy. For it to become a reality would require our whole energy infrastructure to change, and would also require development of new technology to create it efficiently and without the use of fossil fuels. It may happen, but not in the near future.
 
As MAJA posted the key to Icelands sucess is they large geothermal resouces base if you can utilize something like that then hydrogen becomes viable.
Also it is not nearly as volitile as most people think and if there is a leak that ignites hydrogen is lighter than air so instead of a burning pool like you get with liquid fuels you get a burning plume. The Hindenburg freaks everyone out but think what do petrolium storage tank fires look like? No worse as as I already said liquid fuel spread along the ground instead of just verically.
 
There are certain schemes that allow the production of hydrogen and its related use, at effective efficiencies superior to what is currently in use. The ability to implement same is reliant on large amounts of funds being available, and flexibility in the actual demands on the equipment while in a relatively infant stage.

I agree that for widespread use and to actually make a real difference, infrastructure, storage, design, etc. will need to change.

JMH
 
quote:

Originally posted by DJ:
................The Hindenburg freaks everyone out but think what do petrolium storage tank fires look like.........

How big was the Hindenburg, and what would the fire have been like if that fire was gasoline instead of hydrogen, in that volume. If I remember right, the fire from the Hindenburg burned itself out in a relatively short period of time. Hydrogen explosions/fires in a car may be a bit overblown. I dont know, and am trying to learn.

Also, how did the Germans create hydrogen back then? I could search, but am feeling lazy today........
 
quote:

Originally posted by MAJA:
Photovoltaic, windmill wind farms, nuclear, ocean wave motion could all be used to eventually split H2O into hydrogen and oxygen. But isnt hydrogen just H (or H1) and not H2, after separation? Not wanting to inflame, just wondering. I am far from knowing chemistry. I would like to learn more about getting H (or if its H2) from hydrocarbons (HC). Any good links with info?

Hydrogen in its standard state is H2. When passing through, say a palladium membrane or PEM fuel cell, it dissociates to H(1), but then either re-combines or is reacted into a new molecule (H2O for example).

JMH
 
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