Just an interesting study for H2 production.
 

Quite heavy on the technical stuff.

Making the hydrogen evolution reaction in polymer electrolyte membrane electrolysers even faster : Nature Communications : Nature Publishing Group

As I've pointed out in other thread discussions, the continued research into catalyst production and performance is moving in leaps and bounds.

This paper simply shows a path to produce a platinum/copper catalyst with twice the activity of plain platinum for the evolution of hydrogen in the electrolysis process.

And why exactly do we want to use hydrogen as a ground vehicle propulsion fuel?

I have argued this point with you in other threads.
 

This forum is full of "experts" who stray from their base of knowledge.

Hydrogen production is simply a pathway. It is an energy carrier. It can store that energy indefinitely and allow transport to other locations with ease.

This paper simply shows the use of modeling and nano/molecular engineering and imaging, to improve tremendously the ability to split water with less energy waste.

Anything that improves the efficiency of hydrogen production is welcome, as the current methods are prohibitively wasteful.
Even so, there is no magic; there will never be a method that needs less energy to produce hydrogen than the same amount of hydrogen can provide by getting burned (I have hopes for nuclear fusion, but not for directly powering cars).

As a carrier of energy hydrogen is troublesome. Its containers outweigh their contents many times and need to be treated as highly explosive devices, which they are after all.

Hydrogen does not need to be stored as a pure gas.
 

I have mentioned metal hydride storage schemes, complex hydrated polymers and hydro-carbon liquids with carbon from the biosphere.

None are widespread in use, but all are viable storage schemes.

One idea is to extend the work of a company called Hythane. Basically they are mixing 10% hydrogen gas by volume with methane (though a much higher percentage of hydrogen could be used). The affinity of hydrogen to the carbon atom through the weak molecular bond keeps the hydrogen from migrating into the metal containers. The methane could be composed of producer hydrogen with the carbon from biosphere sources. The mixture is easily transported, as now, in the natural gas pipelines we have in existence. The energy can be used in both natural gas vehicles and stationary uses.

Some 16 years ago I used to think Hydrogen would become viable in 20 or 30 years, but now I'm not so optimistic about it.

The same could be said for electric cars.
 

But, it is not that electric drive is a non-starter, it is just that it needed an improvement in battery capabilities to make them viable. Now, they should become the front runner for moving people and goods short distances. With improvements in rapid charging, longer ranges become plausible. The underlying problem is still battery cost.

Hydrogen is not really competing against electricity, it is competing against batteries. It is not as efficient to produce green hydrogen as simply using electricity in a battery. However, hydrogen has some advantages that batteries cannot compete with. Energy density and storage are the biggest ones. Thus, I have preached capture of stranded energy. This is energy that is thrown away or lost because it is not useful locally and is too distant to bring to market.

Hydrogen can use electrical energy as well as heat energy in its production. It can be stored and, if bonded to a carbon atom, it can be a dense energy source with indefinitely long storage life.

The public view of the hydrogen industry as well as the industry itself has been narrow. Recently, a much more open look at what hydrogen has to offer is allowing companies to compete in certain markets that batteries simply cannot fill. The drastic reduction in fossil fuel prices puts a damper on things, but we all know it cannot last forever, whether in our lifetimes or that of our children.

Hydrogen is by far the plentiful element in the universe, but it is not that plentiful on Earth. Probably a good thing because it seems really hot where the big stores of hydrogen lie. The best methods for Hydrogen production on Earth to me look like in new specially designed nuclear power plants, with electrolysis in the steam cycle. Not only do you get clean electricity to power the grid, you can get efficient hydrogen production for powering the mobile things, Cars, trains, and trucks cleanly. Hydrogen being generated inside a nuclear reactor, what could possibly go wrong?

Basically that's what happens with CNG, 4 atoms of Hydrogen bonded to a carbon atom, and it can be sourced from renewable feedstocks too, eventually integrated with ethanol and biodiesel production. When I was more optimistic about Hydrogen, and mostly influenced by the marketing around BMW experiences with Hydrogen in internal-combustion engines, I used to see it as an easy replacement for the CNG imported from Bolivia. Anyway, I didn't see Hydrogen exactly as a competitor to EVs, mostly due to the cost and weight of the greater amount of batteries they have in comparison to a Hydrogen-powered FCEV.

Yes, so what?
My argument that the container outweighs the gas still stands, whether it is hypercompressed, hypercooled, bound with palladium or methane.

Natural gas pipelines are in use to transport natural gas. In Holland almost all houses are connected to the natural gas network.
The pipelines, shutters, controllers etc are designed to work with the gas composition from our giant well in Slochteren. Nowadays gas from other sources gets used too, which meant we needed vast adaptations to our network to keep it safe. Just closing a valve on a main transport line causes a violent bang as the flow of a vast amount of gas is suddenly stopped. So the shutters have a shock absorber to cushion the blow. A different composure of the gas means those need to be redesigned. And so do the sniffers that test for leakage, pumps, etc.

Our gas network could not be used for transporting hydrogen, not even if it were not in use for natural gas anymore, but definitely not within a few years.

If hydrogen becomes economically viable, then the infrastructure for it will be built up, either piece by piece or by a vast investment scheme. In fact it would be hard to stop it from happening. Until then, it won't. Nobody wants to lose money until it is certain the investment will pay back.
Hydrogen needs to be cheap or it won't be a thing.

Your discussion shows you missed my point.
 

The energy density of hydrogen does not have to be equal to that of a tin container holding a few dozen liters of gasoline. It is competing against batteries. And with that in mind, it far exceeds battery energy density. It does not need to be hyper cooled/compressed. Metal hydride tanks can be purchases from industrial suppliers that hold 500 liters of hydrogen gas in a 5 Kg stainless steel bottle at 10-20 bar at standard temperatures. That is about the same energy found in about 15 Kg of lithium-ion batteries. In another thread, I mentioned complex hydrated plastic polymers that act as a recyclable carrier of hydrogen and it can be carried in hand at room temperatures and pressures. 5 Kg of the plastic far exceeds the energy found in many kilograms of the average lithium-ion battery. I use the example of natural gas pipelines as infrastructure that can be used to transport hydrogen gas long distances. If the "carrier methane gas" is from a biosphere source the substitution of an -OH for an H on a bonding sight gives you methanol which is even far more energy dense than Li-ion batteries.

The point of mixing natural gas and hydrogen gas is just this - the hydrogen can be carried with the methane with little to no change in the piping system. If the you didn't catch it, the hydrogen IS part of the methane. Your equipment will function the same.

And as far as price, hydrogen just needs to be cheap enough - cheap enough to beat Li-ion batteries in high density energy applications. This is enough of a market that companies have already started into it with solutions.

I'm not sure you got what I wrote either.
 

There are two ways to look at hydrogen; as a competitor against electric cars and against conventional cars.

It may be possible to store a higher energy content of hydrogen than electricity for the same weight. But where the electricity can be used directly to power a relatively light motor, the hydrogen needs either a fuel cell in addition to that or an engine to conventionally produce motion; that seems to outweigh the system.
The end result is at best comparable. But hydrogen is nowhere near as cheap as electricity yet.

Compared to gas cars the weight, limited range, cost and complexity are prohibitive; only if the environmental argument carries more weight than that will it ever compete. The argument would need to be funded substantially. I doubt any economy could sustain its widespread use any time soon, even if it wants to.

As I explained in my previous post, the gas network can NOT be used to transport hydrogen unless it is freed of its current application and amended substantially.

Here I am discussing just cons of hydrogen, while I would rather have a more balanced story. You tip me off balance as you seem to hold an onesided story too, triggering me with statements I cannot support like the gas network.
I bet you'd rather see me write that hydrogen is the ideal power source.

Well, it is! But its application has some problems. They may well be solved one day, but they need all be recognized and dealt with. Stating that will happen is not the same as actually making it happen.

What nags me most is the competing with electric aspect.
I cannot escape the thought that traditional auto makers deliberately set up hydrogen fuel projects not because they believe it is the power source for future cars but because it challenges the main threat for the conventional car industry; pure electric cars.
By scooping up subsidies labled for green tech they dilute the funds flowing towards electric car developers. And they trouble the view over what technology is to supersede current gas cars.
Divide and conquer.

If hydrogen car development never reaches the stage where a substantial amount of cars effectively use it all the effort has gone for naught, and we might still be driving mostly gas powered cars where electric would have played a bigger part if the hydrogen distraction would not be there.

In that light hydrogen may be the clean energy solution that indirectly creates more pollution than anyone could have envisioned.

I understand perfectly what you wrote.
 

Please look up my posts on the Rasa and others. You still envision hydrogen competing against electricity. It is not. It is competing against batteries. If you do not understand that salient concept, we will speak in circles.

And I understand fully that hydrogen is expensive at the moment and will be for the foreseeable future. But, my caveat has always been the primary power source. Nuclear is the only solution for an industrial world. Multiple energy carriers will be needed to transport this energy. Batteries have their limits. Hydrogen can be transformed into other than pure gas. To be exact, it can be formed into the analogs of the very hydrocarbons we use right now. Thus, we can use nuclear energy in the everyday without a huge shift in infrastructure. Can you do that with electric batteries alone? Not a chance.

I always meant battery powered electric cars. A hydrogen fuel cell car uses electricity just as a mediator. It is a series hybrid. Not an electric car that takes electricity as a primary power source.

Batteries have been improved massively in the last two decades. They will probably improve some more in the coming decades, especially considering charge time, longevity and cost.

So by the time nuclear power plants have regained a major position in the energy market, if that is to happen, batteries will be much better than they are today.

And I can see you have the media view of things.
 

Hydrogen IS a form of energy storage as is a battery. But battery storage is limited by the chemistries available. There are no more chemistries that will allow a doubling or tripling of energy densities. All that is left to "improve" batteries is to lower cost and improve their ability to accept fast charge without undue degradation of lifetime. Capacity improvements are now incremental. If you have any links showing me a battery chemistry that that will double energy density of batteries, please inform me. I'm all for it. But, I am confident you will not find it.

I am confident you will find hydrogen storage schemes that will improve density by leaps and bounds.

And I am not a proponent of a hydrogen for an everything solution. I support batteries where they do the most good. But, can you design me a long range battery pack that will compete in the trucking industry or the air transport? I can do that with a fuel cell or with analog hydrocarbons.

And as I have noted in the Rasa posts, there are areas of energy where the energy is so cheap it is thrown away. Why not store that throw away energy and transport it to a place where it can do good? Batteries are not long term storage and they are too costly to ship as energy transport media.

There is a place for hydrogen now and in the near future.

Beyond the safety hazard, Hydrogen processing and storage are still too energy-intensive, thus becoming expensive. Even if photovoltaic or wind power were used to provide the energy required for those processes, it becomes wasted, and the power generation devices are going to need maintenance sometime.

I can see ethanol getting used for planes and trucks, as its energy density per weight (contemplating the full system; fuel, tank, lines, engine) is not far off the current systems.
Neither batteries nor hydrogen comes near.

Planes have the advantage of only using airports and generally fixed routes so the fueling infrastructure could be set up relatively easy, but planes have very limited considering the extra space and weight the system would have.
Trucks are less limited on weight and space but need to go anywhere.
Batteries would be out of the question, except for short range (city) delivery trucks if they can get charged where they get loaded in - especially if 'emission free' zones are going to be a thing.

I still don't see hydrogen being used to directly power vehicles.

If hydrogen can be produced so easily then it would more easily be produced by the oil companies and used to hydro form liquid fuels that are more energy dense, less hazardous, less reactive, less volatile and all around easier and safer to handle.

Bingo!
 

Now you get it. Was it that hard?

If you had read my posts in the Rasa thread, you would have seen that this is exactly what I was proposing. We already use hydrogen from the sun stored in the form of hydrocarbons. No need for new, extensive infrastructure.

Now, as far as oil companies controlling the fuel output, it will not be easy for them. Nuclear power or excess renewables will be needed. So will a carbon stream such as a municipal waste stream. These resources are far more diffused and easily set up. A country could run totally off of fossil fuels if they chose to. I used Iceland as an extreme example for the now.

And if you wanted a long range, high performance electric car, it is going to cost you Tesla money with batteries as your storage. But, use a smaller battery pack and a smallish fuel cell and you can get the price down to that of a Lexus sedan. Fuel cells are coming down in price. My favored solid-oxide fuel cells are now able to run below 600 deg C, down from the 900 deg C of a decade ago. Current work has improved the rapidity of cycling starts to seconds instead of minutes and new material applications are eliminating the failure prone silicone matrix used in Anode/Cathode construction. They still need a burst of pure H2 and a few mg/cc of platinum to fast start, but those problems are not insurmountable as catalyst research is going like gangbusters compared to battery gains. Now, I can drive 80 Km on electricity and then tap the fuel cell powered by methanol for the rest of the drive giving me hundreds of Km range . You can't do that with pure batteries.

Yes, hydrogen is expensive in comparison to fossil fuels and straight renewable electricity. But my example of excess renewables being thrown away is where a company can set up shop producing synthetic methanol from this waste electricity storing this electrical energy in a dense, easily stored and transported form. As I have mentioned, the wind farms here in Palm Springs are capable of producing far more electrical energy than what can be used locally. This time of year is the windiest time and most of the wind turbines are feathered for reduced output or idled all together. Only one local company is producing H2 from this cheap electricity for industrial as well as transport use. A small addition to their process could yield methanol. Albeit, current catalysts need an acid step to produce the methanol, but a few lab solutions provide the possibility of a solid catalyst that can take H2 and CO2 under pressure and produce liquid methanol.

Once you get to liquid methanol, you can of course move to produce octane and JP8 analogs.

Once you wrap your mind around the concept that hydrogen is nothing more than a form of battery to be stored and transported, you start seeing the possibilities. Straight electricity to batteries is more efficient. But, hydrogen allows you storage and density advantages that will fit markets that batteries cannot fill.

The oil companies are the only ones that know anything about making, moving large volumes of hydrogen, hydroforming colossal amounts of substances, dispose of or reuse the waste and they are the best at moving tons of flammable liquid fuel and not to mention they already have pretty much everything needed to do all the above mentioned.
So even when liquid fuels are made from hydrogen split from water we will still rely heavily on the oil companies.

This is true.
 

But that won't stop people such as myself, from making fuel. To be exact, it becomes a cottage industry of sorts. What is to stop me from setting up an electrolysis unit powered by sun or wind and run the resulting gas into a catalytic reactor along with partially oxidized farm clippings and using the resultant fuel to run my tractors and other farm implements? What if I have excess? I can register as a fuel producer and sell my product. I tally my sales and pay my taxes. No oil company involved. Have I done this before? Yes, with biodiesel. No, the oil companies couldn't do a thing about it. The only thing is my limited supply of waste vegetable oil limits me to a few thousand gallons a year and it would not be worth it for me. But quite a few local producers do far better with waste streams coming from large food producers. Once easy oil is gone and fossil fuels creep back up to 5 USD/gallon, this sort of thing becomes plausible and a diffused fuel production base will grow. It doesn't depend on a location with the correct geological formations and deposits. I just need cheap enough electricity and a carbon stream.

Carbonaceous trash is going to become a commodity.

Just another bit of news.
 

This is a Toyota partnered test scheme involving wind>hydrogen>fuel cells. Powering forklifts at local yards. Yes, an argument could be made that powering the forklifts with electricity directly would be more efficient.

Public-Private Partnership to Test End-to-End Hydrogen Supply Chain | TOYOTA Global Newsroom

Well - it ain't all as shiny as it seems.
From that link:
Using hydrogen generated by windmill electricity generates less CO2 than using electricity straight from the grid.
Who could have guessed.
A bogus comparison means deliberate disinformation. It should make all the signs flare red.

The forklifts are compared to lead acid battery forklifts, which have a similar operating time but take 6 to 8 hours to charge.
Lithium iron phosphate battery forklifts would be lighter, last longer, charge faster, but also be more expensive than their lead acid counterparts.
I bet they'd still be cheaper than the hydrogen ones.

So, Toyota. Run your comparison to windmill fed LiFePO4 battery forklifts for a change.

The assumption that hydrogen is part of some conspiracy theory is becoming tedious.
 

There are problems with the study, but there is certainly no disinformation. Only lack of understanding on your part.

First of all, you cannot build a "light weight forklift" as mass is stability for payload lift. This is why lead acid batteries have dominated for decades. They provide both power and ballast. Lighter propane powered lifts often have heavy steel ballast plates. Using Li-FePO4 batteries instead of the lead acid is logical and has already been tried. The problem becomes charging times for the cost. 30 minutes or more is a loss of productivity. A few minutes for a tank switch out means a hydrogen forklift is back to work being productive while the pure battery lift is charging. This doesn't mean you can't have battery change schemes, but now you have increased the cost of your battery pack reserves. The comparison to lead-acid battery powered lifts is logical as that is the overwhelming standard currently. They are ubiquitous and cheap enough to have more than enough on hand to provide service while some are on charge times.

And this is just a study. It is meant to find failure points and areas of improvement. Cost is not an immediate goal but it is understood. You are comparing common industry tech to cutting edge developments. This would be like me deriding all the electric powered cars on this forum for being way too expensive and finicky and hard to charge in comparison to my bio-fueled diesels which cost pennies per mile to run and are a proven long ranging transportation solution.

My biggest criticism of the study is the use of battery power for storage. This battery storage is to bridge over dead wind days and produce hydrogen at a constant rate. Producing hydrogen and storing that for bridge days would be far more logical and cost effective. Electrolysers are common and not expensive. So are metal hydride storage tanks.

The disinformation I was pointing out was not about the hydrogen itself, but with portraying it as a low carbon technology as it was fed by windmills while the comparison was with grid powered electric forklifts.
Add the same windmills to that side of the equasion, have them feed their surplus power to the grid; no way that it would have a larger carbon footprint then.

Low carbon had nothing to do with hydrogen in that example.
It had everything to do with windmills.
Toyota proved windmills reduce carbon output. But that was not the purpose of their press release.

I am not against hydrogen technology. But I want to keep the numbers straight. Comparisons fair and realistic.
I was not the one starting a comparison between cutting edge and standard technology, rather I tried to even the scale somewhat.

Low (battery) weight is not a problem in forklifts as it obviously can be compensated with ballast weights, lowering the center of gravity etc. Also a lighter pack makes it easier to swap, and the charge time is much less than lead acid anyway. Would work even without swapping batteries unless you need round the clock operation.

I call for civility. Your use of post titles, terms like tedious, lack of understanding etc. appear unpleasant to me. You would not want to be called such either. So let's not do that.

No one is saying you cant make fuel at home, the point is people are not going to be able to make a meaning full amount that can power society with out large industrial complex.
In 2010 something like 14 quadrillion BTUs of oil were burned.
Best case scenario 0.001% was not a fossil liquid fuel, did not involve the oil companies and did not involve government.

So far the best way to provide traction power a vehicle with out the oil company is solar to a battery powered car, as long as the solar panels weren't made by BP, hahaha.
Even with bio diesel production one still relies heavily on the petrochemical industry.
Methanol used in the process comes from natural gas, the sodium hydroxide also made in a gigantic petrochemical facility where the bi-products of lye production (hydrogen and choline gas) can be utilized.

It seems we view the same information differently.
 

It is clear to me they are making a BEFORE and AFTER comparison. It is a comparison of what IS and what COULD be. That seems very clear.

The current local power grid was listed as only 80% green and fed into the current lifts would only be so clean. This is in contrast to the possibility of a totally renewable power grid providing not just electric power, but motive power via stored hydrogen. It is an example in microcosm of what a larger system could be. It is not a perfect system, but one to study. The unfortunate derailment of the Icelandic attempt at a totally renewable power society leaves us with no large scale models.

And if my direct and blunt manner has made you uncomfortable, I apologize.

I will not remark on the biodiesel industry.
 

I brought it up as an outlandish example to compare with battery vehicles.

I will say this, if you cannot control the primary electrical generators, or the hydrogen generators that run on them or the numerous carbon sources, you cannot control the production of synthetic hydrocarbons. And that is the beauty of this. The oil companies may have distribution resources, but they don't own the hydro-power, wind-power or nuclear power. And the carbon sources are far too diffuse to coral a controlling interest. Personal fuel production aside, there is nothing stopping entrepreneurial endeavors from making enough fuel and marketing in a locality if not nationally. One can purchase or contract with tanker truckers to move the hydrocarbons. Many are independents and not beholden to any single oil company. Sales can then go through the numerous independent fueling stations.

The staggering amount of energy used world wide is just another reason to take the first steps to economize and cut back where at all possible. And, I emphasize again, use the best energy source for the niche it is best suited for. A hydrogen pathway is not going to be the solution for every energy need.

You continually use the example of NOW and deride a very plausible future. Electric cars make up a very few percent of the current vehicular mix. The current low cost of fossil fuel has dampened growth. But even with high fuel costs, the battery electric car cannot fulfill the needs of every segment of the current transportation market.

And I stopped making biodiesel and run my personal car directly on waste vegetable oil. So, my BioBenz still trumps your electric car in range and carbon footprint.

I'd still not hold my breath for that, as it would be likely easier and less energy-intensive to turn celullosic residues into biofuels through the Fischer-Tropsch process like it was done by the Nazis during WW2 and was implemented commercially in South Africa after the war.

My favorite effort is Cool Planet. They are carbon negative. I just looked, they had 3 press releases in Feb and Mar, so they're still kicking.

Insofar as hydrogen is concerned; I think it should be used in a composite semirigid airship for lift and thrust. The core would be a limp bag of hot hydrogen—in vacuum. That would be surrounded by ballonettes of steam. It has lift similar to helium as steam, but remove the (hydrogen-provided) heat and it condenses for dynamic control.

The hydrogen combution engines are the least interesting part to me. Oh—also Aeromodeller2

http://fablab.hylas.be/testsite/wp-c...-1024x1523.jpg

Sorry, Frank, it a big 'un. It buffers the hydrogen with nitrogen gas.

How about search?q=electricity+from+synthetic+photosynthesis. Big developments there in the last year.