Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

carbuzz.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 520 posts

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#31

Post by hannob »

bombcar wrote: post #15
BadBadJellyBean wrote: post #10

I don't think hydrogen will ever be a thing for personal cars. Apart from the abysmal "well to wheel" efficiency it's also just such a hassle to create a fuel network for it. Gasoline is bad enough but a gas that will just leak away whatever you do seems like a stretch. It is just so much simpler with electricity. Pretty much every gas station already has it. No driving it around with trucks. Just maybe once install…

My understanding is most hydrogen fueling stations produce the hydrogen onsite via electrolysis of water. EDIT: My understanding was wrong - it's produced locally onsite but via steam-methane reforming: https://www.energy.gov/eere/fuelcells/hydrogen-production-na...

Your understanding is entirely wrong.

Most hydrogen fueling stations receive it from the next steam reformer, which will make it from fossil gas.

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#32

Post by MBCook »

BadBadJellyBean wrote: post #26
bombcar wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding is most hydrogen fueling stations produce the hydrogen onsite via electrolysis of water. EDIT: My understanding was wrong - it's produced locally onsite but via steam-methane reforming: https://www.energy.gov/eere/fuelcells/hydrogen-production-na...

Okay not driving it around then. But somehow it's worse. You still have to build the special tank and the special pump and also get an electrolysis device that is big enough to create enough hydrogen and also you have to get heaps of power somewhere that could instead be just straight put into a battery in a car. Make it make sense. What's the point? Who is willing to do that?

Don’t forget keeping everything cold enough.

On the vehicle side, you can make a gasoline tank in pretty much any shape you want. We have lots of experience making batteries in different shapes thanks to cell phones.

High-pressure tanks only want to be in one shape. And it’s not especially convenient.

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#33

Post by BadBadJellyBean »

buckle8017 wrote: post #27
BadBadJellyBean wrote: post #10

I don't think hydrogen will ever be a thing for personal cars. Apart from the abysmal "well to wheel" efficiency it's also just such a hassle to create a fuel network for it. Gasoline is bad enough but a gas that will just leak away whatever you do seems like a stretch. It is just so much simpler with electricity. Pretty much every gas station already has it. No driving it around with trucks. Just maybe once install…

> Pretty much every gas station already has [electricity]. Sure but they don't have electric vehicle recharging electricity. They have run the pumps and power the lights electricity.

Still seems like a smaller investment to get a bigger cable than H2 infrastructure (Tanks, Pumps, maybe even electrolysis system).

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#34

Post by Tade0 »

b112 wrote: post #25
blibble wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this is the case while they're in the hype building phase, when people are paying attention if hydrogen even gained widespread adoption, it would be mass produced via steam reforming of natural gas (which is why the oil majors are the ones desperately pushing it)

That makes no sense. If the oil companies were pushing H2, every car would be H2 by now. H2 can be generated anywhere there is power. Any power that can be used to charge a car's battery, can be used to make H2. Yes, I'm sure you have 1000 reasons, but I don't really care, it's just not reasonable to discredit h2 because of made up paranoia. We should embrace any way to get a clean running car on the road.

There's no point. EVs go 50% further on the same amount of energy, are easier to charge and are, of course, cheaper.

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#35

Post by helterskelter »

BadBadJellyBean wrote: post #10

I don't think hydrogen will ever be a thing for personal cars. Apart from the abysmal "well to wheel" efficiency it's also just such a hassle to create a fuel network for it. Gasoline is bad enough but a gas that will just leak away whatever you do seems like a stretch. It is just so much simpler with electricity. Pretty much every gas station already has it. No driving it around with trucks. Just maybe once install…

I always figured it would make more sense for hydrogen to be an option for renewable infra if the problems with leaking and embrittlement could be solved. Currently, moving renewable power over very long distances and storing it at scale is a non-trivial issue which hydrogen could help solve.

This way, for example, Alaska in the winter could conceivably get solar power from panels in Arizona.

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#36

Post by MBCook »

buckle8017 wrote: post #27
BadBadJellyBean wrote: post #10

I don't think hydrogen will ever be a thing for personal cars. Apart from the abysmal "well to wheel" efficiency it's also just such a hassle to create a fuel network for it. Gasoline is bad enough but a gas that will just leak away whatever you do seems like a stretch. It is just so much simpler with electricity. Pretty much every gas station already has it. No driving it around with trucks. Just maybe once install…

> Pretty much every gas station already has [electricity]. Sure but they don't have electric vehicle recharging electricity. They have run the pumps and power the lights electricity.

True, but they already exist.

Hydrogen stations don’t. If you have to build new ones, especially if you have to supply them with enough power to create their own hydrogen for water, what’s the difference from just building EV chargers?

And if you’re going to add hydrogen to existing gasoline stations then same question.

If hydrogen was somehow able to use existing gasoline infrastructure it would make a lot more sense. But it’s not.

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#37

Post by BadBadJellyBean »

MBCook wrote: post #32
BadBadJellyBean wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay not driving it around then. But somehow it's worse. You still have to build the special tank and the special pump and also get an electrolysis device that is big enough to create enough hydrogen and also you have to get heaps of power somewhere that could instead be just straight put into a battery in a car. Make it make sense. What's the point? Who is willing to do that?

Don’t forget keeping everything cold enough. On the vehicle side, you can make a gasoline tank in pretty much any shape you want. We have lots of experience making batteries in different shapes thanks to cell phones. High-pressure tanks only want to be in one shape. And it’s not especially convenient.

Is the shape round? I bet it's round.

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#38

Post by matthewdgreen »

b112 wrote: post #25
blibble wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this is the case while they're in the hype building phase, when people are paying attention if hydrogen even gained widespread adoption, it would be mass produced via steam reforming of natural gas (which is why the oil majors are the ones desperately pushing it)

That makes no sense. If the oil companies were pushing H2, every car would be H2 by now. H2 can be generated anywhere there is power. Any power that can be used to charge a car's battery, can be used to make H2. Yes, I'm sure you have 1000 reasons, but I don't really care, it's just not reasonable to discredit h2 because of made up paranoia. We should embrace any way to get a clean running car on the road.

H2 from electrolysis is wildly expensive. H2 from natural gas is more affordable. Both are alternatives to BEVs, which are the better approach to electrifying transport. If Toyota had gone all in on BEVs when it began its H2 strategy, it would be selling more EVs than Tesla. Instead it entirely ceded the field to others, first Tesla and BYD.

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#39

Post by blibble »

b112 wrote: post #25
blibble wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this is the case while they're in the hype building phase, when people are paying attention if hydrogen even gained widespread adoption, it would be mass produced via steam reforming of natural gas (which is why the oil majors are the ones desperately pushing it)

That makes no sense. If the oil companies were pushing H2, every car would be H2 by now. H2 can be generated anywhere there is power. Any power that can be used to charge a car's battery, can be used to make H2. Yes, I'm sure you have 1000 reasons, but I don't really care, it's just not reasonable to discredit h2 because of made up paranoia. We should embrace any way to get a clean running car on the road.

say you're Shell

you are vertically integrated, you have billions invested in oilfields, refineries, distribution, and the retail channel ("gas stations")

if transport switches to electric, what's your role?

answer: there isn't one, you are completely redundant

but what if hydrogen took off instead?

if you produce via electrolysis, you only keep the retail channel

but if you can get H2 established, then you can do a switcheroo and feed in H2 produced from your existing natural gas infrastructure, and massively undercut everyone's electrolysis business

at which point you're back to the old days, just instead of selling gasoline from your oilfields, you're supplying hydrogen produced from their gas

... and that's exactly what they're trying to do

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#40

Post by pfdietz »

helterskelter wrote: post #35
BadBadJellyBean wrote: post #10

I don't think hydrogen will ever be a thing for personal cars. Apart from the abysmal "well to wheel" efficiency it's also just such a hassle to create a fuel network for it. Gasoline is bad enough but a gas that will just leak away whatever you do seems like a stretch. It is just so much simpler with electricity. Pretty much every gas station already has it. No driving it around with trucks. Just maybe once install…

I always figured it would make more sense for hydrogen to be an option for renewable infra if the problems with leaking and embrittlement could be solved. Currently, moving renewable power over very long distances and storing it at scale is a non-trivial issue which hydrogen could help solve. This way, for example, Alaska in the winter could conceivably get solar power from panels in Arizona.

Storage is the bigger problem, specifically very long duration or rarely used storage (to cover Dunkelflauten, for example) for which batteries are poorly suited. Hydrogen (or more generally e-fuels) is one way to do that, but another very attractive one is very low capex thermal storage. Personally, I feel the latter would beat hydrogen: the round trip efficiency is similar or better, the complexity is very low, power-related capex should be lower, and there's no need for possibly locally unavailable geology (salt formations) for hydrogen storage.

With this sort of storage, Alaska in winter gets its energy from Alaska in summer.

Post reply on HN