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The Hydrogen Truck Problem Isn't the Truck

mikeayles.com

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Re: The Hydrogen Truck Problem Isn't the Truck

#11

Post by akamaka »

This is a very poor analysis, since it doesn’t account for the capital costs. Even if hydrogen is inefficient compared to batteries, it could win if the upfront investment was low enough to offset the additional fuel cost. This is quite obvious, since that’s why diesel trucks are winning today — the upfront cost of a diesel engine is cheap enough that it offsets the higher lifetime fuel costs.

I do think that batteries will win, but the correct argument is one that shows that capital costs of batteries are going down faster than the cost of hydrogen production.

Re: The Hydrogen Truck Problem Isn't the Truck

#12

Post by rglullis »

okanat wrote: post #10

Or -hear me out- we can put these long I beams on the ground and put some cables above. Then tie 50 trucks to each other and they can get whatever kind of electricity from anything you can make electricity out of.

Any sufficiently method of ground transportation contains an ad hoc, informally-specified, bug-ridden, slow implementation of half of a rail network.

Re: The Hydrogen Truck Problem Isn't the Truck

#13

Post by nerdsniper »

dirk94018 wrote: post #8

Hydrogen has been the future as long as I have been paying attention to electric cars. There are many problems with it, including Hydrogen is the smallest molecule. It leaks through seals, embrittles metals, and has terrible energy density by volume. You either compress it to 700 bar (heavy tanks), liquefy it at -253°C (energy-intensive), or store it in metal hydrides (heavy, slow release). Solid state batteries are…

Compressed hydrogen and cryogenic liquefaction also present explosive/BLEVE risks. Metal-hydride is probably the only reasonably safe-ish option. Other issues (like hydrogen embrittlement, leaking, slower flow-rate) are all very real challenges, but 'solvable'. Solving all of them at a price that consumers/businesses can stomach is quite debatable.

Batteries are just too good nowadays to expect hydrogen to receive the level of R&D and infrastructure investment to become at all competitive.

Re: The Hydrogen Truck Problem Isn't the Truck

#14

Post by adolph »

okanat wrote: post #10

Or -hear me out- we can put these long I beams on the ground and put some cables above. Then tie 50 trucks to each other and they can get whatever kind of electricity from anything you can make electricity out of.

Truely rail-fans are transportation equivalent to vegans in food or cross-fit in exercise. I've spent many an hour on the Isle of Sodor and appreciate how useful those engines are in so many contexts. Yet still, there are buses that move alongside Percy, and pick up stranded passengers, and the Fat Controller (aka Sir Topham Hat) still has a sedan. It's a multi-modal world out there and the tractor trailer still has a place in it.

Re: The Hydrogen Truck Problem Isn't the Truck

#15

Post by numpad0 »

As much as I find H2 fuel cell technology - which is a type of a gas based electric battery with no moving parts - fascinating, I can't help but wonder if we would be better off just running hybrids on e-fuels.

e-fuels are just low quality gasoline, IIUC, made by (waves hands) ethical means from thin air using electricity. They still generate NOx gases, but ICEs just take them as is, and they're much more energy dense compared to long range batteries.

The only real problem is that there don't seem to be many green and scalable means to produce them, but if we could, I think it can be an overall better alternative to seemingly unworkable hydrogen based EVs and/or unrecyclable battery based EVs.

Re: The Hydrogen Truck Problem Isn't the Truck

#16

Post by nradov »

okanat wrote: post #10

Or -hear me out- we can put these long I beams on the ground and put some cables above. Then tie 50 trucks to each other and they can get whatever kind of electricity from anything you can make electricity out of.

Well we already have a lot of those, at least in North America (best freight rail system in the world), and it might make sense to build even more tracks in some areas. But rail will never be practical for time-sensitive cargo. It just takes too long to assemble a train and move cars through switching yards. We're always going to need a lot of trucks no matter what.

Re: The Hydrogen Truck Problem Isn't the Truck

#17

Post by credit_guy »

This analysis does not account for side benefit of the oxygen. If you split water to get hydrogen, then for every kilogram of hydrogen you get, you also get 8 kg of oxygen. Liquid oxygen is not an expensive commodity, its market price is about $1/kg, but in this context this makes a difference. For example, in the first infographic, the cost of green hydrogen produced today is listed as £16.97 which is about $23. If you can recoup $8 from this by selling the oxygen, or even only $5, then this makes a difference. If you select green H2 with 2030 assumptions, you get £7.67, or about $10s. If you sell the oxygen at $5, you basically get the hydrogen at half price, and this makes the hydrogen powered truck slightly more economical than the battery powered one.

Re: The Hydrogen Truck Problem Isn't the Truck

#18

Post by defrost »

dirk94018 wrote: post #8

Hydrogen has been the future as long as I have been paying attention to electric cars. There are many problems with it, including Hydrogen is the smallest molecule. It leaks through seals, embrittles metals, and has terrible energy density by volume. You either compress it to 700 bar (heavy tanks), liquefy it at -253°C (energy-intensive), or store it in metal hydrides (heavy, slow release). Solid state batteries are…

The path of most interest to many is Renewables -> bulk hydrogen as storage -> electricity grid.

The bulk storage method of interest is dissolved salt caverns: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47160599

Re: The Hydrogen Truck Problem Isn't the Truck

#19

Post by lbourdages »

credit_guy wrote: post #17

This analysis does not account for side benefit of the oxygen. If you split water to get hydrogen, then for every kilogram of hydrogen you get, you also get 8 kg of oxygen. Liquid oxygen is not an expensive commodity, its market price is about $1/kg, but in this context this makes a difference. For example, in the first infographic, the cost of green hydrogen produced today is listed as £16.97 which is about $23. If…

Except you can make oxygen for pretty cheap using oxygen concentrators. The technology is simple enough that home versions exist for patients with lung problems can lug one around at all times to have a feed of oxygen rich air. Oxygen is almost 21% of the air we breathe, it's trivial to capture. Hydrogen counts for only 0.000055%.
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