# hydrogen vehicles **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 18, 2005, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-vehicles/322189 "2005-09-18T04:26:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![googlybear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/7cd45c/32.png) [@googlybear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/googlybear)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-vehicles/322189/1 "2005-09-18T04:26:55Z")
when will hydrogen vehicles takeover and we wont have to worry about gas ? hydrogen vehicles are the future ! when will I be seeing those on the freeway? ---
**Author:** ![FlyingRamenMonster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@FlyingRamenMonster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FlyingRamenMonster)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 4:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-vehicles/322189/2 "2005-09-18T04:34:00Z")
What I seem to remember: the problem with hydrogen as a fuel is that even though hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe, most of it exists as some sort of hydrogen compound and not elemental hydrogen. Hydrogen cars (I _think_) run on water but it takes lots of energy to separate the hydrogen from the water. Cars powered entirely by hydrogen also have max speeds that hover close to the _minimum_ speeds allowed on freeways. Until those two issues can be address I don’t think we’ll be seeing completely hydrogen-fueled cars any time soon. ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 5:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-vehicles/322189/3 "2005-09-18T05:51:17Z")
> [@googlybear](#): > > hydrogen vehicles are the future ! I don’t mean to rain on your parade, but I seriously doubt it. Hydrogen is easy enough to get. All you need to do is seperate water into hydrogen and oxygen. The only problem with using the hydrogen as a fuel is that when you burn hydrogen (which just recombines it with oxygen) you get pretty much the same amount of energy out of it as it took to seperate the hydrogen in the first place. In other words, unlike fossil fuels, hydrogen isn’t so much a fuel as it is an energy storage medium. You still have to have someplace else generating the energy to get the hydrogen in the first place. Once you solve the problem of where do you get the energy you need to produce hydrogen, your next problem is going to be how to store it efficiently and safely. The third problem you are likely to run into is the Hindenberg. Even though I think they’ve pretty well established that the reason it burned so well was its skin and not the hydrogen inside, there are still a lot of people who equate hydrogen with a big big big ugly fireball. Until they change their mind, they aren’t likely to rush out any buy some new fangled car that they are sure is going to blow up spectacularly once they get it out of their driveway. The fourth problem is that any fuel that replaces gas is going to have a HUGE expense in setting up a usable infrastructure. That alone is going to make it almost impossible for any fuel to replace gasoline until the cost of gasoline goes through the roof. ---
**Author:** ![CynicalGabe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3e96dc/32.png) [@CynicalGabe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CynicalGabe)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 7:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-vehicles/322189/4 "2005-09-18T07:00:51Z")
> [@](#): > > hydrogen cars run on water False. Hydrogen cars run on compressed hydrogen gas (usually), or some sort of hydrogen solid. > [@](#): > > hydrogen cars have max speeds close to the _minimum_ False. Most hydrogen vehicles have speeds roughly equal to gasoline powered vehicles. The Toyota Highlander FCV even has a faster acceleration than the V8 model. You may be thinking of electric cars for your information. Toyota will begin mass production of the Highlander FCV in 2007. Fleet production began this year. My undergrad school (UC Davis) got one as a testbed over 2 years ago. The main obstace preventing them from being on the highways _en masse_ is the lack of infrastructure. For those who argue that splitting water or air mining to make the hydrogen to power the cars takes up even more fossil fuels: BS. Use solar or wind power. ---
**Author:** ![FlyingRamenMonster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@FlyingRamenMonster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FlyingRamenMonster)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 7:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-vehicles/322189/5 "2005-09-18T07:24:33Z")
All I know is that the hybrid buses in our city’s fleet have a max speed considerable lower than normal buses. So it’s not hard to imagine all-hydrogen buses going even slower. ---
**Author:** ![snailboy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/97f17d/32.png) [@snailboy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/snailboy)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 7:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-vehicles/322189/6 "2005-09-18T07:32:29Z")
> [@CynicalGabe](#): > > For those who argue that splitting water or air mining to make the hydrogen to power the cars takes up even more fossil fuels: BS. Use solar or wind power. Solar and wind power just isn’t plentiful enough to make hydrogen for hundreds of millions of cars. I think if anything can do it, it’ll be nuclear power, but the United States doesn’t have many nuclear plants. > [@csharpmajor](#): > > All I know is that the hybrid buses in our city’s fleet have a max speed considerable lower than normal buses. So it’s not hard to imagine all-hydrogen buses going even slower. Hybrid as in gasoline/diesel and electric, right? Hydrogen engines are internal combustion engines, much like gasoline engines. A hydrogen engine would probably be most comparable to a propane engine as found in many fork trucks. ---
**Author:** ![FlyingRamenMonster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@FlyingRamenMonster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FlyingRamenMonster)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 7:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-vehicles/322189/7 "2005-09-18T07:40:38Z")
> [@snailboy](#): > > Hybrid as in gasoline/diesel and electric, right? Hydrogen engines are internal combustion engines, much like gasoline engines. A hydrogen engine would probably be most comparable to a propane engine as found in many fork trucks. Uh… :smack: I suck. Disregard everything I said. ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 7:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-vehicles/322189/8 "2005-09-18T07:59:31Z")
> [@engineer\_comp\_geek](#): > > In other words, unlike fossil fuels, hydrogen isn’t so much a fuel as it is an energy storage medium. You still have to have someplace else generating the energy to get the hydrogen in the first place. In other words, a combination of fossil fuels & other less polluting resources can be used, with a long-term trend towards the latter. I see no problem here. > [@](#): > > your next problem is going to be how to store it efficiently and safely. Exactly the same problem exists, and is solved, with petrol. > [@](#): > > there are still a lot of people who equate hydrogen with a big big big ugly fireball. People also associate petrol with big ugly fireballs, thanks to Hollywood, but this doesn’t stop them filling up their cars. > [@](#): > > until the cost of gasoline goes through the roof. I’d be interested to know at what point you regard this to be? ---
**Author:** ![FlyingRamenMonster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@FlyingRamenMonster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FlyingRamenMonster)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 7:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-vehicles/322189/9 "2005-09-18T07:59:44Z")
Wait, I found the newspaper article I saw about it, and it describes the buses as hydrogen hybrids. Do those exist, or did the journos stuff up as well? It _was_ a community newspaper. ---
**Author:** ![Catalyst](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e47774/32.png) [@Catalyst](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Catalyst)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 9:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-vehicles/322189/10 "2005-09-18T09:52:27Z")
> [@GorillaMan](#): > > > [@engineer\_comp\_geek](#): > > > > until the cost of gasoline goes through the roof. > > I’d be interested to know at what point you regard this to be? Not to speak for **engineer\_comp\_geek** , but I’d place it at the point where oil companies’ extraction and refinement costs exceed their income, or the point where it becomes obvious that this will happen soon. I would say that it’s the point where gasoline becomes more expensive than alternatives for the end-user, but I think that the power of consumers is pretty limited here. Of course, increasingly high gas prices will make consumers more receptive to alternatives, but (in the US, anyway) one can only cut back so much on gas consumption, and if alternatives don’t have the corporate backing necessary to establish infrastructure comparable to what gasoline already has, then the average consumer doesn’t have much choice but to pay whatever’s being charged for gas. ---
**Author:** ![Stan\_Doubt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/53a042/32.png) [@Stan\_Doubt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stan_Doubt)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-vehicles/322189/11 "2005-09-18T19:19:04Z")
**Engineer Comp Geek** wrote: > [@](#): > > The only problem with using the hydrogen as a fuel is that when you burn hydrogen (which just recombines it with oxygen) you get pretty much the same amount of energy out of it as it took to seperate the hydrogen in the first place. Wrong. This is one of the most popular misconceptions about hydrogen. It is not like a super efficient battery or energy storage medium. The electrolysis process is only about 70% efficient. Then, when you consider the energy that must be expended to compress the hydrogen enough to make it a practical automotive fuel, you lose about 15-20% of the energy yield to compress it to 4000psi on the low end, and liquefying hydrogen costs about 40% on the high end. We’re not done yet. The best fuel cells are themselves only about 70% efficient. Right now, the U.S. gets a lot of it’s electricity from coal, which is about 40% efficient, so when you start with 100 units of energy in coal and use it to produce and process hydrogen, and then burn that hydrogen in a fuel cell car, you net about 12 units of energy at the wheels. Obviously there are other greener and more efficient sources of energy to produce hydrogen, but there are problems with all those sources that must be overcome. In fact, most of the compressed hydrogen gas produced nowadays is produced from methane, which is only about 30% efficient getting to hydrogen, so the total process is less efficient than if you just burned the methane in an internal combustion engine. [Cite](http://www.heartland.org/Article.cfm?artId=16636) ---
**Author:** ![Dog80](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/6bbea6/32.png) [@Dog80](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dog80)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-vehicles/322189/12 "2005-09-18T21:53:48Z")
> [@GorillaMan](#): > > > [@](#): > > > > your next problem is going to be how to store it efficiently and safely. > > Exactly the same problem exists, and is solved, with petrol. Not really. Petrol is stored unpressurized, in plain old plastic tanks with an embedded electric fuel pump and simple rubber hoses. Hydrogen on the other hand, requires a huge 10,000 psi (690 bar) carbon-fiber tank that needs regular inspection and will need to be changed during the lifetime of the car. [http://www.eere.energy.gov/hydrogenandfuelcells/storage/hydrogen\_storage.html](http://www.eere.energy.gov/hydrogenandfuelcells/storage/hydrogen_storage.html) ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-vehicles/322189/13 "2005-09-18T21:55:40Z")
> [@Dog80](#): > > Not really. Petrol is stored unpressurized, in plain old plastic tanks with an embedded electric fuel pump and simple rubber hoses. Hydrogen on the other hand, requires a huge 10,000 psi (690 bar) carbon-fiber tank that needs regular inspection and will need to be changed during the lifetime of the car. [http://www.eere.energy.gov/hydrogenandfuelcells/storage/hydrogen\_storage.html](http://www.eere.energy.gov/hydrogenandfuelcells/storage/hydrogen_storage.html) OK, fair enough. What about LPG - isn’t that stored under pressure? ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hydrogen-vehicles/322189/14 "2005-09-18T22:31:22Z")
Sure hydrogen is expensive. Efficiency and energy density aren’t really the issue here. We can make hydrogen using nuclear power. Less than 200 reactors would provide enough energy to make all the hydrogen needed for the U.S. passenger vehicle fleet. What it boils down to right now is that we haven’t transitioned to hydrogen because cheaper alternatives are available. No one’s going to spend more money than they have to for no reason. If gas becomes more scarce such that it’s profitable to power vehicles with hydrogen, then you’ll see a massive shift to hydrogen even if it means shorter range. There are some recent developments that are in hydrogen’s favor. For example: [New Hydrogen Storage Method Developed](http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/09/050907102549.htm) > [@](#): > > Scientists at the Technical University of Denmark have invented a technology which may be an important step towards the hydrogen economy: a hydrogen tablet that effectively stores hydrogen in an inexpensive and safe material. > > Dr. Tue Johannessen. (Image courtesy of Technical University Of Denmark) > > Related News Stories > Adsorbent Materials For The Storage Of Hydrogen (June 28, 2005) – A research team from the Public University of Navarra has started a study of the design and development of absorbent materials that enable the storage of … \> full story > > Discovery Is A Step Towards Pollution-free Cars (November 3, 2004) – Scientists have made a world-first discovery which is a step towards using environmentally-friendly hydrogen to power our cars. A team from the Universities of Newcastle upon Tyne and Liverpool in … \> full story > > Researchers Examine Potential For ‘Refilling’ Hydrogen Storage Material (September 13, 2005) – Performing quantum calculations on a supercomputer, scientists at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory have characterized a material that might allow on-board refueling of hydrogen powered … \> full story > > Big Hopes For Tiny, New Hydrogen Storage Material (March 22, 2005) – Researchers at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory are taking a new approach to “filling up” a fuel cell car with a nanoscale solid, hydrogen storage … \> full story > > ## \> more related stories > > Related section: Matter & Energy > > With the new hydrogen tablet, it becomes much simpler to use the environmentally-friendly energy of hydrogen. Hydrogen is a non-polluting fuel, but since it is a light gas it occupies too much volume, and it is flammable. Consequently, effective and safe storage of hydrogen has challenged researchers world-wide for almost three decades. At the Technical University of Denmark, DTU, an interdisciplinary team has developed a hydrogen tablet which enables storage and transport of hydrogen in solid form. > > “Should you drive a car 600 km using gaseous hydrogen at normal pressure, it would require a fuel tank with a size of nine cars. With our technology, the same amount of hydrogen can be stored in a normal gasoline tank”, says Professor Claus Hviid Christensen, Department of Chemistry at DTU. And for creating hydrogen: [Zinc Powder may fuel your car](http://www.physorg.com/news6381.html) > [@](#): > > A revolutionary method of using concentrated solar energy for producing hydrogen in a clean, safe and inexpensive way was developed by a cooperation of scientists from Israel, Sweden, Switzerland and France. This new method, based on the production of pure zinc, may enable an easier and quicker move to a hydrogen-based economy thus reducing the need for the depleting petroleum and its polluting side effects. If you look at where the money is being spend in R&D in the auto and energy industries, it seems obvious to me that the cars of the future are going to converge on three technological advancements - hydrogen, new batteries, and hybrid technology. Some sort of advanced hydrogen hybrid is probably in our future. However, it’s possible that we may develop batteries good enough that we don’t even need the hydrogen. For example, [carbon nanotube batteries/capacitors](http://www.trnmag.com/Stories/2005/032305/Nanotubes_juice_super_batteries_Brief_032305.html) can provide gobs of instantaneous power and hold a huge charge. Another breakthough that has recently happened is the development of [carbon nanotube sheets](http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/003330.html). This stuff has amazing properties. It can be easily turned into a solar cell, a super-strong structural material, a light-emitting surface, or a battery. Perhaps all three. The promise of this stuff may be that we’ll be soon making cars that are lighter and stronger, and therefore more fuel efficient, and the bodies of the cars themselves may act as solar collectors, constantly trickle-charging the electric batteries. Depending on where the tradeoffs occur, it’s possible that what we’ll see in the future are cars that have a standard electric architecture with some form of pluggable flex-fuel engine module. The car without an engine at all might have enough battery power for commutes - say a range of 50-100 miles and reasonable acceleration. By adding a small fuel-powered generator to the car, you can extend the range to whatever you need. That small engine might burn gas, diesel, bio-fuel, hydrogen, or whatever. A vehicle like this might only need to turn on its gas motor once or twice a week or even less. You plug the car in at home and charge it up, and then just drive it. If it runs out of juice, the little motor starts up and charges it. A vehice like that might average 500 mpg, and with that kind of efficiiency it doesn’t really matter what we burn. We may even have enough domestic [shale oil](http://www.accesstoenergy.com/view/atearchive/s76a3668.htm) to last a long, long time. The key is to separate the car platform and infrastructure from the energy source. That’s what we do with electrical power today. The computer I’m typing on could be getting its energy from a nuclear plant, solar or wind, gas turbine generators, or whatever. It doesn’t care, because the electrical grid acts as a layer of abstraction between the production of energy and its consumption. That means we can change the power source whenever we want to without changing the distribution network or the stuff that consumes the power. Electric cars allow us the same flexibilty with the transportation infrastructure. That’s the real key to energy independence - not necessarily moving to hydrogen, but transitioning the infrastructure to a system that doesn’t rely on any particular form of primary fuel. We may find that gasoline is cheap enough that we’ll continue using it for the next 100 years. If so, that’s fine. But with an electric infrastructure, if that becomes a problem we can literally transition to an entirely new energy source in a matter of months or a few years very easily.