Hydrogen and FCEVs discussion thread

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WetEV said:
GRA said:
Obviously, any such ramp up will be dependent on lowering the cost of sustainably-produced H2 (and/or raising the cost of fossil-fuels through carbon or other taxes).

Notice that the ratio between sustainably produced electric power and H2 isn't mentioned.

Not in that article. but as Japan is one of the countries pushing them, and they have no fossil-fuels to speak of, do you think that the need for sustainably-produced H2 isn't obvious to them?

WetEV said:
Hydrogen has a future, but it's not vehicles. Oh, maybe some exceptions. Rocket launches, almost for sure. Medium range aircraft, perhaps. Maybe even long range trucking. And cars are a cheap test platform for development. But put the hydrogen car up there with the flying car. You can build a few, but not practical.


H2 FCEVs are practical; what they're not at the moment is affordable. The Nexo, with a 380 mile range all of which can be routinely used without degradation, is certainly as practical as an ICE, given a similar level of fueling infrastructure and affordable fuel. But it and its fuel are still too expensive. FCEVs will continue to see price reductions due to economies of scale and technical advances, so the main hold-up to making FCEVs practical is making the cost of sustainably-produced H2 competitive, then providing it in the necessary amounts.
 
Wind and solar provide nearly 3% of all the energy used by the United States as of 2017.
Gasoline alone provides nearly 20% of the energy used in the United States.
If in 2017 37% of the US energy was provided by petroleum and 19 to 20 gallons of every barrel ends up as gasoline.

Maybe use wind and solar to displace most of coals 2017 14% energy market share first?
At least for electricity production.

So it's got a really long ways to go before anyone can even think about using electricity for hydrogen production.
Or hell just replace some of the millions of pounds of hydrogen made from oil and natural gas used to hydrocrack petroleum or for ammonia production with renewable hydrogen.
 
Oilpan4 said:
Wind and solar provide nearly 3% of all the energy used by the United States as of 2017.
Gasoline alone provides nearly 20% of the energy used in the United States.
If in 2017 37% of the US energy was provided by petroleum and 19 to 20 gallons of every barrel ends up as gasoline.

Maybe use wind and solar to displace most of coals 2017 14% energy market share first?
At least for electricity production.

So it's got a really long ways to go before anyone can even think about using electricity for hydrogen production.
Or hell just replace some of the millions of pounds of hydrogen made from oil and natural gas used to hydrocrack petroleum or for ammonia production with renewable hydrogen.


I'm fully on board with replacing coal-fired electricity as quickly as possible with renewables/nukes, and replacing fossil-fuel H2 for industrial processes is already being done on a small scale. As it will take some time yet for H2/FCEVs to scale, the issue of how/where it makes the most sense to allocate sustainable H2 beyond electricity isn't upon us yet. OTOH, some of that excess electricity can be used to make H2 which can then be used to generate electricity at some later time, and as bulk storage by batteries (weeks/months) is currently both un-affordable and maybe not even possible given resource constraints, it will probably still be worth using H2 for that purpose despite the conversion losses both ways, unless we're willing to accept nukes in a much bigger way.

Here's an example of sustainable H2 intended for both FCEVs and industrial use:
GCC:
Queensland-first renewable hydrogen project commences at BOC production facility in Bulwer Island
https://www.greencarcongress.com/2019/09/20190925-boc.html


220kW electrolyser powered by 100kW PV (so presumably some outside power in addition). Can produce up to 2,400 kg. of H2/month, used for FCEVs and industrial customers. They'll also build a fueling station somewhere in Brisbane. Completion planned for mid-2020


Whatever happens, as the last sentence of my sig implies it will take a mix of technologies and methods rather than one single 'answer'.
 
GCC:
SA Government releases Hydrogen Action Plan
https://www.greencarcongress.com/2019/09/20190925-sa.html


That's South Australia, not South Africa. Early days, includes $1M for study to determine best location for renewable H2 production and export facilities. If there's two things Australia has in abundance, it's lots of sun and unoccupied (by humans) land.
 
I passed by the H2 fueling station near my work at about 11:15 pm and oddly, I saw 1 FCEV fueling up and 2 in line behind him. I think one of them had to wait out into the street. There's only 1 H2 dispenser.

Too bad I didn't feel like going back and asking them if there's an actual shortage as has been semi-recently reported.

This is the first time I've noticed 3 FCEVs there. I think I saw two, semi-recently: one fueling and another waiting.
 
The notion that renewable energy is not available for H2 production is at best way too simplistic. Demand sinks take time to form due e.g. to contracts, lobbying, production rate and politics; TOU leaves windows of excess that are already being curtailed; and most importantly, replacement of fossils for transport is about a 6:1 kWh:kWh endeavor.

As one example: the world is currently installing about 200 GW a year of clean energy with a capacity factor of ~ 34% averaged between PV and wind. That works out to ~ 600 TWh of new electricity energy a year. If we presume a personal transport vehicle consumes 300 Wh/mile then the new generation would be able to replace one trillion miles every year. Presuming 10,000 miles per car per year, that is production of 2 * 10^8 (200 million) EVs annually to sop up the new electricity production.**

EV production is no where near that level so once the available for replacement dirty/nuclear electricity is covered, clean energy will seek other replacement opportunities besides transport.

Oil-y comes up with goofy numbers because he has not yet understood that a PV/wind economy is much more efficient than a fossil one. For transport e.g., ~ 12% - 15% of source energy turns into mechanical work compared to ~ 80% of PV/Wind.

** Perhaps an easier way to calculate is to start with 1 kW to fuel an average EV.
200 GW / kW = 200 million cars
 
Let's say that virtually all of gasolines energy is replaced with say an increase of around 6% more electrical demand (it could be less), assuming almost all gasoline is used to power cars and suvs and could be replaced with electric.
Lets say electric vehicles will be around 3x more efficient than gasoline, efficiency will likely be higher but we can say people are likely to drive more and faster since it costs almost nothing with electric.
That's still double all of the wind and solar that's been installed in the US as of 2018.


https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quad_(unit)

Wind and solar for 2018 make about 3 quads or about 879,213,000,000kwh of what the United States uses.
Effectively replace all on road gasoline vehicles with electric with some where in the neighborhood of 1,758,426,000,000 kwh of electricity.
But shouldn't coals electricity market share be wiped out first?
Would probably require around 3 quads?
Then natural gas?
Would probably require 5 quads just to replace natural gas electricity generation?
So replace coal and power all cars, just need about 4 times the wind and solar we have now.
I'm assuming we don't want to charge very many of these new electric vehicles with coal or natural gas power, correct?
So replace coal and natural gas power generation, gasoline for cars, probably some where around 13 quads. Then several more quads to replace most of the natural gas direct heating applications.
Look how fast we built our first 3 quads.
So fossil fuels are not going away any time soon.
 
Oilpan4 said:
Let's say ...
When you pile one lousy assumption on top of another, and then another, you end up with nonsense.

Try this instead:
The US consumes 20 * 10^6 barrels of oil a day
20% of energy is lost to refining
Clean energy to wheels is about 4x the efficiency of the equivalent ICE pathway
>> A full electric conversion therefore requires 4 * 10^6 barrels of oil equivalent

A barrel of oil is about 40*40 kWh
A kW of utility scale clean energy produces about 8 kWh a day
>> A barrel of oil daily is replaced by (40*40)/8 = 200 kW

>>> Total replacement requires 4 * 10^6 * 200 kW
= 800 * 10^6 kW
= 800 * 10^3 MW
= 800 GW

------
Which completely misses the point that clean energy coming on line even at the snails's pace due to the retarded Trumpers far outpaces EV production.
 
There you go talking about generation capacity when the problem is in total units of power. I can do it your way.

Any way in 2018 it looks like the US has 62gw of solar and 97gw of wind.
Solar had 2/3 the name plate capacity of wind but only made 1/4 the kwh.
That's the flaw in saying "we only need 700gw more" . More what?
700gw of hydroelectric would be way more than enough. 700gw of solar, not even close.

If it's 700gw of 3 parts wind to 2 parts solar like we have now it replaces coal power generation, provides enough power to replace gasoline vehicles and natural gas power generation.
That leaves nothing to replace natural gas direct heating applications.
So it looks like you will still be heating your home with natural gas.

It took 10 years to build most of the 160gw we have now. So best case scenario it takes at least 30 years to build 700gw.
Based on my observations I don't think these lazy millennials like my sister or phone and video game addicted Gen z have what it takes to repower the country.
 
Oilpan4 said:
There you go talking about generation capacity when the problem is in total units of power. I can do it your way.
You do not understand the calculation. Read it again
 
Oilpan4 said:
It took 10 years to build most of the 160gw we have now.
.
That sort of extrapolation is nonsensical because the build-out is far, far from linear.
Try calculating with a growth curve of 20% a year, 50% a year if people with brains run the government instead of Trumper monkeys.
 
1/3 utilization on 700gw works.
About the only way it's not going to take 30 years is if lots of large off shore wind projects could be built fast.
NJ has 3.5gw proposed, NY has 2.4gw proposed, MA has 1.6, VA proposed 2gw, MD 1gw. Not a bad start but it will still take at least 5 years and up to 10 years to build all that.
Actually the trump admin doesn't seem to care about holding up off shore wind farms with ridiculous "environmental worries" proposed by the nimbys. Not over worrying about the environment seems to be helping the environment. Out of All the off shore wind farms proposed between 2008 and 2016 only 1 has been built. A single 30mw farm in DE. That tells you all you need to know.
 
GCC:
Hyundai Hydrogen Mobility and Hydrospider partner to promote green hydrogen ecosystem; Hyundai H2 Xcient fuel cell electric truck
https://www.greencarcongress.com/2019/09/20190927-hhm.html


Going to use an existing Swiss hydro plant to power a 2MW electrolyser and produce H2, planned in service for the end of the year. Linde is a partner. Also details of Hyundai's FCEV commercial truck.
 
Oilpan4 said:
Actually the trump admin doesn't seem to care about holding up off shore wind farms with ridiculous "environmental worries" proposed by the nimbys. Not over worrying about the environment seems to be helping the environment. Out of All the off shore wind farms proposed between 2008 and 2016 only 1 has been built. A single 30mw farm in DE. That tells you all you need to know.
.
As usual you are uninformed. The Trumpers just put on hold approval the largest off-shore wind project on the East coast to study bird concerns some more. It is classic Trumper: use regulation to hamper whatever Trump feels like using for political gain. Years and years are obviously not enough. Your conclusion based on review of wind farm approvals from 2008 - 2016 compared to afterwards is lousy. New tech often has a slow go for the first cases and then grows exponentially as confidence in it grows from the initial small scale experience.
 
My idea of a bird study would be build it and study how many and what kinds of birds it kills.
 
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