Great advance for the fuel-cell car, no explosive gas on board

Either is still uber expensive - Honda will only lease them.

Hydrogen still has to be produced if it goes that way and electrolysis is prob the best way, so we will just move the pollution to a series of new central power stations and take it off the highways. Problem not solved, just rearranged.

If they can truly manage to efficiently and safely (we don't want to be driving around in bombs) split water on the fly to generate hydrogen, that would be the way to go. Ultimate green transportation!!

[TexasSP]

Originally Posted by Duster_360

Either is still uber expensive - Honda will only lease them.

Hydrogen still has to be produced if it goes that way and electrolysis is prob the best way, so we will just move the pollution to a series of new central power stations and take it off the highways. Problem not solved, just rearranged.

If they can truly manage to efficiently and safely (we don't want to be driving around in bombs) split water on the fly to generate hydrogen, that would be the way to go. Ultimate green transportation!!

Then you have to worry about an overabundance of oxygen in the air.........

Too much is poison you know...........

But seriously, it's good to see solutions that don't involve raiding our food sources to produce fuel. We just need to remember that there is no miracle cure all for energy and there will always be unwanted effects.

[What's_nitro?]

Originally Posted by TexasSP

Then you have to worry about an overabundance of oxygen in the air.........

Too much is poison you know...........

But seriously, it's good to see solutions that don't involve raiding our food sources to produce fuel. We just need to remember that there is no miracle cure all for energy and there will always be unwanted effects.

Actually, if you were burning the hydrogen in an ICE the oxygen would be burned as well. The holy grail of FCV is creating such a system which can recycle the water from the exhaust and split it back into HHO fast enough to sustain combustion. In effect a "closed-system" powerplant. Imagine NEVER having to put any type of fuel into your car again.

Originally Posted by What's_nitro?

Actually, if you were burning the hydrogen in an ICE the oxygen would be burned as well. The holy grail of FCV is creating such a system which can recycle the water from the exhaust and split it back into HHO fast enough to sustain combustion. In effect a "closed-system" powerplant. Imagine NEVER having to put any type of fuel into your car again.

imagine coming up with that invention..people would be saying "Thomas Edison who"...I saw a documentry on Edison and he was so over the top with inventions it came to just over as thousand

[crazyjr]

Originally Posted by What's_nitro?

Actually, if you were burning the hydrogen in an ICE the oxygen would be burned as well. The holy grail of FCV is creating such a system which can recycle the water from the exhaust and split it back into HHO fast enough to sustain combustion. In effect a "closed-system" powerplant. Imagine NEVER having to put any type of fuel into your car again.

The split process in my link is through the membrane, of the fuel cell. If you could catch and resplit as you mentioned, you could possibly power a car as a hybrid, with using the same molecules two times. Not only would you be getting something for free, but you'd do it twice .

I have actually been thinking, that someone needed to figure out, how to split water for fuel cell purposes, to eliminate the one thing holding up fuel cell power from becoming mainstream. Hydrogen is dangerous, if accidentaly ignited like in a crash. There is also the hydrogen pump infrastructure, that needs to be built. With the water powered fuel cell, that kills two birds with one stone. Now to slim down to fit in one of these cars

[Sammus]

Originally Posted by What's_nitro?

Actually, if you were burning the hydrogen in an ICE the oxygen would be burned as well. The holy grail of FCV is creating such a system which can recycle the water from the exhaust and split it back into HHO fast enough to sustain combustion. In effect a "closed-system" powerplant. Imagine NEVER having to put any type of fuel into your car again.

We obey the laws of thermodynamics in this house! So unless you can make it 100% efficient it ain't gunna happen :P

Sad fact of reality in this dimension - there is no free anything, everything comes with a price. Nothing can be or will be 100% efficient.

There are no perpetual motions machines allowed in this dimension.

I read somewhere last year or maybe real early this year that somewhere in Japan they were powering homes with fuel cells - something about the size of a water heater/sm refrigerator. Su[pposed to run a house for a few months. No costs given, no discussion if it was for 12v DC system or inverted AC or any details. This is what its going to take - mass usage, mass production to make costs affordable. I'd hate to think what the fuel cells flying in the Shuttle cost.

I am sorry, but the plan is to take water, split it, recombine it and harness the energy?
If they found a way to split water with less overall cost (energy) then the amount of energy that can be harnessed from a FCV then they just revolutionized the world.
Being as I do not believe that they overcame the problem of the Law of Conservation I think that they are hiding something. If their chemical reaction to produce hydrogen from water uses less energy then you get back from the hydrogen/oxygen reaction to power the car then that energy is coming from somewhere. How often does this chemical need to be replaced? how expensive is it? how toxic is it?

I worked for an automotive company in their fuel cell facility, I think the technology is applicable. But it is not ready yet. Those Honda's will probably spend 10-20% of the time at the shop.
Additionally the lease Honda is charging will not even cover a quarter of the cost of the car, probably much less (when I left the facility I was at the cars would cost 50k if mass produced, but were running around 200k in the quantities being produced at the time).
Also,
Where is the hydrogen going to come from?
The statement that hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe is true but misleading. Almost all of the hydrogen in the universe is in the stars. On our planet the easiest ways to get hydrogen is either cracking natural gas (methane) or electrolysis of water. Both of which are very energy intensive, where is that energy going to come from?

Oh, btw hydrogen is not that dangerous, if the tank is pierced the hydrogen will dissipate quickly. In anything expect the worst accident, a hydrogen car would be safer then a gasoline powered car.
The technology is coming, it will work, I am just sick of all these gimmick to make people think it is viable now and/or it solves all of the problems. The only problem is solves is you do not need gasoline. But you will need electricity to create the hydrogen, and to increase demand for electricity by the amount that would be required you would need coal/natural gas/nuclear. The enviro energies (wind/solar) would require way to much of a footprint.
Honestly an electric car or plug in fuel cell (with larger batteries) would be better suited to fix the transportation issues.

[What's_nitro?]

Originally Posted by Sammus

We obey the laws of thermodynamics in this house! So unless you can make it 100% efficient it ain't gunna happen :P

Ok, ok. I know there would be SOME losses so I'll change it to "very rarely having to put any fuel into your car".

Originally Posted by Duster_360

Either is still uber expensive - Honda will only lease them.

Hydrogen still has to be produced if it goes that way and electrolysis is prob the best way, so we will just move the pollution to a series of new central power stations and take it off the highways. Problem not solved, just rearranged.

If they can truly manage to efficiently and safely (we don't want to be driving around in bombs) split water on the fly to generate hydrogen, that would be the way to go. Ultimate green transportation!!

using electricty to remove elements you want from a common material is nothing new to me...I have a salt swimming pool that has a generator connected to the filter that uses electricity to remove chloride ions from salt that was poured in the pool at startup and turns that into chlorine and as the chlorine kills the bacteria it returns to the sodiumchloride molecule where it repeats the process and you only have to add more salt if it physically gets removed due to draining or excessive splashing..and the water feels softer on your skin versus a traditional pool