AutoblogGreen

1. I don't think the level of competition is inappropriate at all. The fuel cell side is responsible for much of it, when for instance they convinced CARB to stop the EV program, since hydrogen was just around the corner. The fact that the head of CARB at the time was also on the board of a hydrogen fuel cell consortium didn't help suppress the conspirosy theorists.

I am convinced that pratical hydrogen fuel cell technology will always be 10 to 20 years away, and serves mainly to stall progress on other alternatives, mainly BEVs.

Also, when the DOE spends money on fuel cells that means less money is available to go into battery technology. The amount of crossover technology is really not that big, and consists mostly of batteries that fuel cell vehicles need to recover energy when braking. Those batteries are similar to what is required for hybrids, but not so much to the ones required to implement BEVs.

Posted at 9:20PM on Apr 19th 2008 by BlackbirdHighway

2. The biggest problem with fuel cells is that using hydrogen as an automobile fuel is insanely stupid, due to some fundamental laws of chemistry and physics which cannot be either wished or legislated away.

Posted at 9:58PM on Apr 19th 2008 by TX CHL Instructor

3. If someone insists to you that the efficiency problem of fuel cells will be solved just around the corner, just tell them, "Gibbs free energy" and leave it at that. The maximum efficiency of a fuel cell at realistic temperatures is lower than the combination of power tranmission, rectifier losses, and battery losses for li-ion and its variants combined. So even if your hydrogen was generated with no losses, not even rectifier losses, you'd *still* be saving energy with a BEV. And not like "lossless hydrogen" is even remotely realistic.

Posted at 11:02PM on Apr 19th 2008 by meme

4. The problem with fuelcell is that nobody know how to commercialize something that is free to produce but require some machinery and some investment and that don't have any customers.

Posted at 12:00AM on Apr 20th 2008 by A.Brien

5. While I have to say that currently I’m more in favor of Plug-in Hybrids, and would put the likelihood of hydrogen paying a significant role without our future transportation infrastructure at less that 25%. But the EV proponents have taken the discussion to a level of divisiveness that I fail to understand.

In one discussion on Plug-in hybrids and EVs a few EV proponents seems to only be happy If a vehicle didn’t burn a drop of gasoline, 150 mpg just wasn’t good enough for them. Talk about making the perfect the enemy of the good.

The reality is that both EVs and Hydrogen vehicles suffer from downsides that need to be address.

Both (batteries and fuel cells) cost too much to be widely implemented as of now, and at the end of the day until one side delivers on price, the debate between the two is one of semantics only.

The problem with EVs is that to get a decent range (250 miles) you need a big, heavy, and expensive battery pack. The Tesla’s batter pack weights 900 pounds. The problem is that statistically speaking in >80% of your driving you’ll likely only use a small fraction of that storage capacity (ie driving to-from work). In other words: most of the time EVs will be hauling around 700 pounds of expensive dead weight.


The problem with Hydrogen is it faces three separate issues, fuel storage (the best hydrogen storage medium we currently have is carbon), fuel cell cost, and hydrogen infrastructure. The good is that fuel cells, while relying on some precious metals does have a great deal of theoretical price downward potential if new membrane technologies emerge. Additionally, Hydrogen is still a hell of a lot more efficient than any internal combustion engine today and has the benefit of being able to extend range at a much smaller weight and cost penalty than an EV. On the other hand, it’s unlikely that hydrogen will ever deliver a cheaper fuel-cost-per-mile than an EV.

The reality is that EVs and Hydrogen Fuel Cells are both good at two very separate things, EVs for high efficiency short driving periods (ie commuting) while fuel cells offer the possibility to provide power for extended range driving without a lot of dead weight during short driving.

That leads me to see that will likely see extended range electrical vehicles that rely on a fuel cell to provide energy beyond, say 40 miles as in the Volt. That way you get the advantage of cheap operating costs for most driving, without having to a haul around a large battery pack that is only used occasionally. Because hydrogen will only be used for freeway driving, the need for fueling infrastructure is reduced significantly.

But that’s just my two cents.

Posted at 12:09AM on Apr 20th 2008 by Mike Z

6. "That leads me to see that will likely see extended range electrical vehicles that rely on a fuel cell to provide energy beyond, say 40 miles as in the Volt."

How you can you complain about unused deadweight for most trips in one breath, then turn around and advocate adding in several hundred pounds worth of engine, generator, pollution controls, tank, and fuel as though it's weightless?

Personally, I find the ideal solution for those obsessed with range (which I think is the wrong focus, personally) is a Long Hauler-style trailer. Take it when you need it, leave it when you don't.

Posted at 1:44AM on Apr 20th 2008 by meme

7. Unlike fossil fuels, hydrogen is not an energy source; it is an energy distribution mechanism. We need to produce the hydrogen gas from fossil materials (the one exception is water electrolysis) compress it into a liquid, store it, distribute it and pump it under high pressure into a car's container system. This is in itself a very difficult problem to solve. In the car we currently have two choices: burn it in an internal combustion engine at a loss of 70 to 80% or run it through a very very expensive fuel cell. The best we can hope for is to recover 25% of the original energy needed to produce the hydrogen fuel. It is an inefficient process that is not close to being ready for prime time in the mass market.

The real question is will the auto industry and the oil industry continue to use the hydrogen car as weapon to lobby against plug in electric cars or will they follow the lead of Israeli and Denmark and embrace plug in technology so our country can once again move to the head of the economic line. The electric car is a disruptive technology that threatens the control of the energy market by the oil companies. Will they continue to delay this new technology by predatory lobbying or will they decide to support the inevitable change?

As an aside: The solution for extending low range, slow charging batteries in BEVs is initially carrying a range extender as suggest above and as the battery ranges are increased by a simply swap out of the battery with a robot battery service station as will be done in Israel and Denmark.

Posted at 2:19AM on Apr 20th 2008 by Lad

8. I'd like to make sure here that everyone knows that there are two types of Hydrogen vehicles. There are the Fuel Cell type which are really a battery replacement for an electric car, and then there is say the BMW Hydrogen 7 which is an internal combustion engine running hydrogen. The later must be excluded from this article and discussion as powering a car this way (BMW) is on a whole other level, and a very intelligent level at that. I hope people here and the writers of this article will grasp this understanding.

Posted at 2:41AM on Apr 20th 2008 by Eric

9. @meme
That is true, but most people, esp. Americans, don't like making sacrifices in convience unless absolutely necessary. So though I'm a BEV advocate, PHEVs are a fairly good middle road alternative that can get people used to running a car on electricity, aiding acceptance of BEVs. Also they should be cheaper than BEVs esp for same range.
But back on topic, as long as government money is spread evenly over the various types of technologies, I'm okay with it, & the only way that will happen is if the various technologies compete. Also, I think fuel cells will benefit a lot more from battery tech than the other way around. This is because BEVs are primarily focused on improving batteries (or other storage like ultracaps) & fuel cell vehicles also rely on this. Unique tech from fuel cells on the other hand doesn't seem to apply much on BEVs.
A special note is that the hydrogen proponents have been fairly silent or gone from Autobloggreen lately it seems, and I want to at least hear some opinions from the other side.
But as always, as long as most of hydrogen development is funded privately (seems like it is to me so far) doesn't matter much to me if they want to dump money into this as long as it doesn't stunt parallel development of other technologies, since they might still have a chance of making some kind of breakthrough.

Posted at 2:47AM on Apr 20th 2008 by jake

10. @Eric
This is Autobloggreen, so I'm fairly sure people here are well aware of the differences. But though H2 ICE is different, it's not to say it doesn't have a lot of the same hurdles that fuel cells face. Mike Z mentioned three hurdles: fuel storage, fuel cell cost, and hydrogen infrastructure. Two still apply to H2 ICE. And there's another one that more unique to H2 ICE so far, and that's efficiency (ie like the previous 260hp Hydrogen 7 getting only around 17mpge while the 134hp Clarity gets 68; hopefully the mono-fuel 7 does better).

Posted at 3:00AM on Apr 20th 2008 by jake

11. One reason FCV research got so much funding is that EPA and CARB are chartered only with reducing tailpipe criteria emissions. California is now trying to expand that mandate to include responsibility for energy use in the transportation sector, but it is doing so by redefining CO2 as an air quality issue. This goes well beyond the intent of the Clean Air act and should therefore require brand-new legislation. That won't happen while W is President and even his successor will likely fight to retain energy policy at the federal level. It's also worth asking if any environmental agency is equipped to handle the trade-offs between economic activity and its negative impacts.

Note that while BEVs now appear a more realistic prospect that they did just a few years ago, they too are no panacea. For full-featured autonomous vehicle applications, range remains the biggest Achilles heel - exactly the issue that allowed the dirty, noisy ICE to dominate the market for the last century.

Also, battery production is a fairly dirty business, even if recycling greatly reduces mining activity related to primary metals. Moreover, driving around on electricity produced by coal-fired power plants generates plenty of CO2. One big advantage of BEVs is that electricity a common energy currency, allowing advances in vehicle design to be divorced from advances in power generation and distribution.

However, in this whole discussion, one thing should not be forgotten: we already have extremely fast, reliable, safe and affordable electric vehicles. They are called trains, trams, trolley buses and trolley trucks (now used mostly in open cast mining operations). Instead of using batteries, these are fed by third rail or overhead catenary.

The Fraunhofer Institute developed a half-way house between a bus and light rail called an autotram. One of the drivetrain alternatives consists of a large gimbal-mounted flywheel on board the vehicle and curb-mounted recharge stations at the stops. Those are supported by cabinets containing banks of ultracapacitors to permit rapid charge transfer.

http://www.ivi.fraunhofer.de/frames/images/autotram/Autotram_RollOut.pdf

Other drivetrain options have been explored, combining on-board batteries with that flywheel would be yet another.

Moreover, there are now electric bicycles - even foldable ones that you can take along on a train. These also use batteries but the light weight of the vehicle means the solution is actually affordable for the average commuter.

http://www.greenedgebikes.com/002_electric.php
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=864746300296652367&q=nano+brompton&ei=Y18LSNlpk5bZAt_FwbsM

In other words, the problem isn't that affordable EV technology does not yet exist. It's that many of us are not prepared to change our modes of transportation and invest in the associated infrastructure.

Congress has already approved $500+ billion for the war in Iraq - which has a lot to do with oil - but only $60 billion is available for high-speed trains. Funding for regional and local rail and ZEV bus services is even lower and there is no tax break on electric bicycles - only on hybrid cars. What's wrong with these priorities?

Posted at 11:30AM on Apr 20th 2008 by rgseidl

12. If the fuel cell industry can ever make the fuel cells CHEAP enough maybe they could build small trailers (as someone above mentioned) with the fuel cell in it that BEV (or even E-REV) owners could RENT for long trips ... like at Avis, Hertz, etc.

They could have these rental centers all over the place. The rental centers could make the hydrogen on site ... inexpensively maybe ... from water preferably instead of natural gas. Maybe the solar technology will be good enough soon so that cracking hydrogen from water will get cheap. I hear there are several new ways to get the hydrogen actually. Solid hydrides, using bacteria that make it, etc. Who knows which method will be ideal. Whichever one is cheapest will probably be used.

I bet hydrogen fuel cells start being used first in truck and car FLEETS. Companies like Wal Mart, UPS, Fedex and those guys might be the first ones to get fuel cells .... that is, IF the fuel cell industry can make their stuff cheap enough. They could have their own networks of hydrogen pumping stations with other companies. A lot of utility trucks go on very regular routes so it probably wouldn't be a big deal for them to only have a dozen or so hydrogen pumps in each city at first.

They could build "recharging trucks" (or "hydrogen refueling trucks" if that is safe) to help with the people who run out of hydrogen if they get stuck in traffic or something. They should make hydrogen fuel cell trucks and cars have PLUG-IN capability like the Volt. A recharging truck could juice them up quick (or pump a little hydrogen) to get them to the nearest hydrogen pump.

I think it's a good idea for fuel cells to be rolled out first with the company fleets to prove to the general public that hydrogen vehicles will be safe and reliable enough. Even though they are expensive now, I would like them to at least TRY to make hydrogen fuel cells work. We won't know what's possible until we do a bunch of "pilot tests" to find out.

I think E-REVs (series hybrids) like the Volt are going to dominate for the next 10+ years. If the fuel cells, the hydrogen itself and infrastructure gets in place, it would probably be pretty easy for GM to simply yank out the IC engine in the Volt and drop in a fuel cell. Maybe GM will design the Volt to be so modular that this is a very easy to do.

Drive your Volt til 2020 and then it's "out with the old, in with the new" time ... with a shiny, new fuel cell. Then you REALLY have "street cred" with the environmental folks. More bragging rights. Just water vapor coming out of your car then. Hot looking environmentalist chicks at Earth Day might even give you a big hug for it. :)

Who knows what could happen by 2020 with the battery technology though. We might not even need fuel cells at all if some company comes up with a SUPER energy concentrated, lightweight battery that is quick charging and goes 300+ miles. That would THE ideal thing to happen. That would change everything. No doubt.

Posted at 1:13PM on Apr 20th 2008 by Kermit

13. @Seidl:
At the risk of telling you something you already know I offer the following: The cost of BEV batteries is predicted to follow pretty much an equation of 50% price per kWh improvement every 5 years. This is somewhat of a modified Moore's Law where the price decreases 50% every 18 months for chip production. so the price will decrease as research brings improvements to the market; currently ranges of 100 miles are commonly attainable and the idea of tailoring the amount of battery weight to cover the daily drive are a good start to making the BEVs more feasible. Range extension using an on-board light-weight genset and portable trailer gensets are all possible today to solve the range problem while we wait for the cost of batteries o decrease and their performance to increase. Automated Robot battery exchange stations is an idea that is taking root to solve the range problem also.

The currently active project "Better Place" has addressed many of the problems of changing a country over to solar power and battery cars. Among the plans are to implement a country-wide grid of electrical receptacles; where ever there is a parking place, there will be a near by plug to charge the BEVs battery. The plans also include the idea of exchanging batteries by robotic stations and the basic ongoing idea of improving the battery technology by free upgrades. The batteries are rented and the cars are purchased with the cost of the cars varying based on a subscription rate; just like the cell phone model in use today.

I invite you to jump to :http://www.projectbetterplace.com/

Posted at 3:07PM on Apr 20th 2008 by Lad

14. I fail to see consumers ever embracing genset trailers or battery swapping--I don't see the public ever accepting it.

EVs will need to be at least equal to our current GAS-and-go ICE cars. The point is to make things better, not make a product that is less convenient that what is replaces.

Posted at 4:11PM on Apr 20th 2008 by Mike Z

15. @Mike:
Ideally, out of the box we would have a car that weights less than the cars of today with a battery capable of 300 miles and a 5 minute quick charge to emulate the convenience we have today with ICEs. And, I expect that will be the case in the future. However, with the price of fossil fuels hitting all time highs and the world-wide demand for oil driving the price higher each month, our foreign oil dependent economy will drag down our standard of living. Add to the mix the health problems and expenses to clean up the toxins and GHGs that ICEs produce, and the current war, and you have three large forces trying to push our economy under water.

So it may be necessary for many of us to enter the market place and purchase BEVs that initially fall short of our ideal auto. But all this begs the question: Can we wait any longer to start the transition from fossil fuels?
There are many stakeholders in our current oil energy economy and powerful lobbying forces trying to slow this transition. Indeed, look how long the advance of battery technology has been stalled. The trouble is this short sighted view by our politicians and influence by professional lobbyists might very well bring down our nation over time.

Posted at 5:33PM on Apr 20th 2008 by Lad

16. @Lad
"Indeed, look how long the advance of battery technology has been stalled."
I want to say that's true of auto-grade batteries, but for consumer based battery the development has been moving along in a steady pace, though not anywhere near as fast as the other tech (like Moore's law for transistors, for example). But development of auto-grade batteries have really only been continued these recent years. Again 2010 is a year to look out for, b/c supposedly that's the year when lots of these new PHEVs/BEVs are supposed to come out or have already come out, and we can see how the various electrical energy storage technologies fare.

Posted at 6:11PM on Apr 20th 2008 by jake

17. "purchase BEVs that initially fall short of our ideal auto"

I absolutely refuse to accept that.

If you look at nations where gasoline is over $7/gallon for over a decade, BEVs have failed to catch on. In other words, the argument that higher fuel prices alone will cause a move towards BEVs has yet to be proven in any real world scenario.

“Can we wait any longer to start the transition from fossil fuels?”

Even if we assume that fuel prices go to $10/gallon, with a 35 mpg car, the annual fuel cost is only $3,500--or about 12% of median income. Buy a Prius and even with $10/gal gas you will spend more each month on dinning out or apparel than on gas.

Tesla motors nailed the issue facing BEVs, the people that promote them generally hate cars to begin with and therefore they produce ‘penalty box’ cars that are more about targeting their own guilt than producing a better product—which is a shame because as Tesla proves BEVs CAN be better than an ICE car if you put the effort into it.

The reality is that gasoline is still very cheap, and BEVs have to create a product that people WANT to drive, because if England is any example, people will drive a Ford KA before they drive a G-Wiz. BEVs have a lot of advantages, but let’s remember the key to great businesses: Increase Customer Value and Reduce Costs. Those that only do one are doomed to fail.

Posted at 6:23PM on Apr 20th 2008 by Mike Z

18. @Mike:
"If you look at nations where gasoline is over $7/gallon for over a decade, BEVs have failed to catch on. In other words, the argument that higher fuel prices alone will cause a move towards BEVs has yet to be proven in any real world scenario."

A decade ago, battery technology was lead acid and NiMH, with the NiMH under control of Cobasys. NiMH EVs could have been possible at the time had Cobasys not taken companies to court who attempted to build large format NiMH batteries. Even Toyota has been limited by not being able to build large format NiMH power units. Google "Cobasys' and do a little research for an interesting story of oil company control of NiMH batteries.

"Even if we assume that fuel prices go to $10/gallon, with a 35 mpg car, the annual fuel cost is only $3,500--or about 12% of median income. Buy a Prius and even with $10/gal gas you will spend more each month on dinning out or apparel than on gas."

Don't I wish I had this budget! I'm still a middle-class person moving further toward becoming a peon because of the Bush policies; but that's another story. I would like to refer you to the following web site and ask that you read the white paper as an information source: http://www.projectbetterplace.com/

"Tesla motors nailed the issue facing BEVs, the people that promote them generally hate cars to begin with and therefore they produce ‘penalty box’ cars that are more about targeting their own guilt than producing a better product—which is a shame because as Tesla proves BEVs CAN be better than an ICE car if you put the effort into it."

Another budget issue for me and I suspect many others in that their roadster costs $100,000 USD and their whitestar sedan product is expected to cost $50,000 USD. I still drive a '97 Volvo that cost $20,000 used off lease 1n 1999.

"The reality is that gasoline is still very cheap, and BEVs have to create a product that people WANT to drive, because if England is any example, people will drive a Ford KA before they drive a G-Wiz. BEVs have a lot of advantages, but let’s remember the key to great businesses: Increase Customer Value and Reduce Costs. Those that only do one are doomed to fail."

I hate to repeat myself; but, I live on a fixed income and have a problem with $4 bread; there are others that do also, and with the price of fuel at $4 per gallon, I must concern myself with every gallon I use. $10 gasoline and you would force me to consider a three wheel ZAP!

I think I can safely say that you and I are in different tax rate brackets and that we can agree to disagree.

Posted at 7:58PM on Apr 20th 2008 by Lad

19. I don’t subscribe to any of this Cobasys conspiracy stuff:

After all, if we look at the time of the so-called Cobasys conspiracy, the owner Texaco controlled a whopping 5% of oil reserves and posted a 4% profit margin in 2001. So apparently they decided to suppress a technology that they had exclusive rights--and therefore could reap massive profits from—and instead decided to stick with pumping oil at a time when it was selling for $23/barrel, having layoffs, and post a terrible return for investors. Yeah, I’m sure it was a conspiracy.

Posted at 8:33PM on Apr 20th 2008 by Mike Z