Hydrogen fuel cell cars (2020) • Hacker News Board

Re: Hydrogen fuel cell cars (2020)

#201

Post by Hypx_ » Tue, Jul 06, 2021, 10:09 PM UTC

dale_glass wrote: post #38

Hydrogen almost certainly won't go anywhere, in my opinion. * The efficiency compared to battery tech is horrendous. * Hydrogen is effectively a storage technology -- we have to generate it and compress it. Which combined with the above means that charging a hydrogen car will always be more expensive than putting the same amount of usable energy into a battery powered car. * Let's not forget that the cheapest way of…

Hydrogen is guaranteed to be the future of energy storage. What we're seeing now is the normal "reaction" from established business that fear being disrupted. It's so predictable that it's embarrassing to even see people try to argue it away on a website like this.

Remember, people said the same thing about electric cars and they were wrong. This is just history repeating itself. In a decade, no one will seriously try to argue against hydrogen.

Re: Hydrogen fuel cell cars (2020)

#202

Post by clouddrover » Tue, Jul 06, 2021, 11:23 PM UTC

rasz wrote: post #200

clouddrover wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course they work. Hyundai's fuel cell trucks are running well: https://www.thedrive.com/news/41389/hyundai-clocks-1-million...

I dont mean the technology, it obviously works as evidenced by prototypes 20 years ago. I mean the concept and energy generation/storage, it doesnt make sense as soon as you take more than cursory glance. Hydrogen embrittlement, electrolysis energy loss, ranges, it all falls apart.

Hydrogen production is only going to go up because there are many uses for it. If you want green steel you need to use hydrogen. It will also make sense to use that hydrogen for transportation.

You're in some strange mindset of it being batteries versus hydrogen. It isn't one or the other. It's both.

Re: Hydrogen fuel cell cars (2020)

#203

Post by clouddrover » Tue, Jul 06, 2021, 11:24 PM UTC

pfdietz wrote: post #197

clouddrover wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is the reason marketing?

No, engineering and economics.

And let's not let any embarrassing examples of real world fuel cell use get in the way:

https://www.thedrive.com/tech/41389/hyundai-clocks-1-million...

Re: Hydrogen fuel cell cars (2020)

#204

Post by pfdietz » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 6:21 AM UTC

clouddrover wrote: post #203

pfdietz wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, engineering and economics.

And let's not let any embarrassing examples of real world fuel cell use get in the way: https://www.thedrive.com/tech/41389/hyundai-clocks-1-million...

The average US truck driver goes about 20,000 km in 11 months, so 1 million km would be 50 trucks. That is hardly a sign of a thriving large scale market. It looks more like a demonstration scale money pit, and doesn't contradict Musk's negative assessment.

Re: Hydrogen fuel cell cars (2020)

#205

Post by ovi256 » Wed, Jul 07, 2021, 1:13 PM UTC

puchatek wrote: post #48

dale_glass wrote: post #38

Hydrogen almost certainly won't go anywhere, in my opinion. * The efficiency compared to battery tech is horrendous. * Hydrogen is effectively a storage technology -- we have to generate it and compress it. Which combined with the above means that charging a hydrogen car will always be more expensive than putting the same amount of usable energy into a battery powered car. * Let's not forget that the cheapest way of…

I know this article is from bmw but afaik people are interested in hydrogen for other types of vehicles than cars. Ships, for instance. Forklifts. Trains. Planes will never work well due to hydrogens low energy-to-volume ratio, unfortunately.

Switching airplanes to hydrogen has a much higher cost than replacing fossil fuel with carbon-neutral biofuels in the existing planes and engines. This is by far the easiest way forward. Still tremendously difficult - it does need electrification of bio-fuel production, something which we haven't made outside of a lab setting.

But the same tech is necessary for carbon neutral food production anyway. Today's agriculture is fully dependant on fossil fuel energy, both for running the machines and for creating the many inputs like fertilizers and pesticides.

Re: Hydrogen fuel cell cars (2020)

#206

Post by _ea1k » Thu, Jul 08, 2021, 2:21 PM UTC

drewg123 wrote: post #131

_ea1k wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know what you mean there. Destination charging is currently the biggest weakness in the EV world, IMO. I'd love for every hotel and tourist destination to have L2 charging.

The most frustrating thing is that my destination is a friend's urban condo. They share a parking garage and valet with a hotel. There are destination chargers, and the valet will charge your car for you. But only if you're a hotel guest; the chargers are not available to condo residents.

IMO, this is why it is important to make billing more common. It doesn't make sense to keep them from the condo users if they could generate revenue from them.

I feel like the risk of freeloaders keeps hotels from installing more of them too.

Re: Hydrogen fuel cell cars (2020)

#207

Post by pkphilip » Sun, Jul 11, 2021, 2:20 PM UTC

twobitshifter wrote: post #87

pkphilip wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Battery technology isn't very "green" either. Lithium and its alternatives require extensive, polluting mining operations while Hydrogen can be generated from water, water vapor, methane etc.

Hydrogen fuel cells use platinum catalysts. Platinum also must be mined and unlike lithium is very rare.

There are existing ways of generating Hydrogen using coated Nickel electrodes