I don’t understand how hydrogen didn’t win the race. Transports and explodes just like gasoline. Make car go fast. Doesn’t degrade like lithium. Can be “mined” by throwing electricity at water during times of excess generation by renewables. When you burn it, it turns into water. Has none of the national security concerns of distribution of lithium mining and production in other countries.
Hydrogen for cars is a nonsense. It is so inefficient. Unless you are making it from oil, which why the oil companies are pushing it, you lose loads of energy making it. Then it has to storages and transported, which is hard. Then the car use of it is inefficient too.
So ignoring the oil industries’ “blue hydrogen”, and looking only at “green hydrogen”, you are looking at about 22% of the energy generated ending up pushing the car forward! With an EV it is about 73%. So hydrogen car are over 3 times more expensive to run.
Plus you can just plug in an EV anywhere. With an EV, if need be, you can charge, slowly, off a normal home socket. Of course, normally, you fit faster charging at home.
To be fair, i think it may have some use for fleet vehicles like taxis and long range buses because these are applications where being able to refill in minutes at a fuel depo you already run actually matters as compared to the stress you would put on a large battery fast charging day in day out. I also believe that Japan has a nuclear plant that is being built with the capacity to efficacy generate hydrogen directly. That being said, for personal vehicles I can’t really see the market of people who need that fast of a refil being large enough to reach the economies of scale necessary to be practical.
Afaik it has a higher energy density than common batteries, so it could be useful in things like aviation where this is the main concern and you can build special infrastructure to support it.
The frustrating thing is that a car running on hydrogen works really well, has a pretty long range and can be refueled quickly, so it looks like a good alternative. It’s only when you ask how that hydrogen was made and how it arrived at the refueling station that things start to fall appart.
Yes, but turning electricity into hydrogen doesn’t have 100% efficiency, during transport, storage and filling the car with hydrogen you lose some of it and only then you get to the fuel cell, which isn’t very efficient in itself.
And then you lose a bit more (although very little) in the electric motor.
All this amounts to the 22% of the guy above (didn’t check the number btw, but it sounds plausible)
It makes sense for long haul trucking and aviation vs batteries, at least for now, but it doesn’t scale well for most common consumer vehicles. Any hydrogen vehicle needs to be a hybrid because there isn’t the fine tune fuel ratio control you get on traditional gasoline.
Hydrogen currently doesn’t produce, store or transport well. This means it is not as economical as gasoline.
Not really a fan of lithium batts either. We’re going to end up with some environmental problems down the line but its the most economically viable tech we have at present if we’re intending on living the way we currently live.
probably because of infrastructure. electric charging stations were one of the first around and if you ask a new car buyer to choose between two renewable fuel sources, they’ll chose the one with the most stations. In the US at lease, hydrogen stations have always been few and far between, and often quite pricey.
I don’t understand how hydrogen didn’t win the race. Transports and explodes just like gasoline. Make car go fast. Doesn’t degrade like lithium. Can be “mined” by throwing electricity at water during times of excess generation by renewables. When you burn it, it turns into water. Has none of the national security concerns of distribution of lithium mining and production in other countries.
Hydrogen for cars is a nonsense. It is so inefficient. Unless you are making it from oil, which why the oil companies are pushing it, you lose loads of energy making it. Then it has to storages and transported, which is hard. Then the car use of it is inefficient too.
So ignoring the oil industries’ “blue hydrogen”, and looking only at “green hydrogen”, you are looking at about 22% of the energy generated ending up pushing the car forward! With an EV it is about 73%. So hydrogen car are over 3 times more expensive to run.
Plus you can just plug in an EV anywhere. With an EV, if need be, you can charge, slowly, off a normal home socket. Of course, normally, you fit faster charging at home.
Hydrogen cars is lie pushed by big oil.
To be fair, i think it may have some use for fleet vehicles like taxis and long range buses because these are applications where being able to refill in minutes at a fuel depo you already run actually matters as compared to the stress you would put on a large battery fast charging day in day out. I also believe that Japan has a nuclear plant that is being built with the capacity to efficacy generate hydrogen directly. That being said, for personal vehicles I can’t really see the market of people who need that fast of a refil being large enough to reach the economies of scale necessary to be practical.
Afaik it has a higher energy density than common batteries, so it could be useful in things like aviation where this is the main concern and you can build special infrastructure to support it.
The frustrating thing is that a car running on hydrogen works really well, has a pretty long range and can be refueled quickly, so it looks like a good alternative. It’s only when you ask how that hydrogen was made and how it arrived at the refueling station that things start to fall appart.
What about hydrogen fuel cells? They got 79% efficiency and can replace batteries of EVs right?
Yes, but turning electricity into hydrogen doesn’t have 100% efficiency, during transport, storage and filling the car with hydrogen you lose some of it and only then you get to the fuel cell, which isn’t very efficient in itself. And then you lose a bit more (although very little) in the electric motor. All this amounts to the 22% of the guy above (didn’t check the number btw, but it sounds plausible)
Toyota bet on this and it didn’t go anywhere in the US. They’re pivoting to battery EVs.
Even countries that invested heavily in hydrogen are pulling back - like Denmark eliminating all hydrogen stations. https://energywatch.com/EnergyNews/Renewables/article16432608.ece
It makes sense for long haul trucking and aviation vs batteries, at least for now, but it doesn’t scale well for most common consumer vehicles. Any hydrogen vehicle needs to be a hybrid because there isn’t the fine tune fuel ratio control you get on traditional gasoline.
Hydrogen currently doesn’t produce, store or transport well. This means it is not as economical as gasoline.
Not really a fan of lithium batts either. We’re going to end up with some environmental problems down the line but its the most economically viable tech we have at present if we’re intending on living the way we currently live.
As I understand it, the big issue is energy density? A tank of gasoline takes you quite far compared to an equivalent tank of hydrogen.
And don’t get me wrong, lithium batteries are super bad at this too, but I do think that has been a limiting factor for H cars.
And then there’s the whole tire dust issue which is definitely a conversation worth having.
Hydrogen might get more prominent in the heavy vehicles, with few more innovation.
probably because of infrastructure. electric charging stations were one of the first around and if you ask a new car buyer to choose between two renewable fuel sources, they’ll chose the one with the most stations. In the US at lease, hydrogen stations have always been few and far between, and often quite pricey.