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Toyota's hydrogen fuel cell trucks put to work in Port of LA pilot

eohrnberger said:
Quite true. All the current gas stations would have to convert at least one of their storage tanks and pumps to deal with the hydrogen fuel.
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And you think that would take 'years and years and years'?
 
eohrnberger said:
The hydrogen fueling model is the same as the current fueling model, a few minutes of a stop. To recharge batteries isn't.
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Wouldn't be hard to make it possible to swap a dead battery for a charged one, though.
 
Grand Mal said:
And you think that would take 'years and years and years'?
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Unknown. Given favorable market conditions and drivers we have seen the market make dramatic and significant changes in very short times.

The benefit of this will be that its market driven rather than government mandated, I believe would accelerate this change.

Who knows?

All I know is that I'd much rather fill up with hydrogen in the same manner as I would full up a petrol power vehicle rather than charging, charging, charging for hours or days before continuing my journey.
 
Media_Truth said:
There are still a number of safety obstacles. This article is upbeat about hydrogen, but it mentions electrical safety in addition to the following:

https://dps.mn.gov/divisions/sfm/pr...e Fuels/FuelCellHydrogenFuelVehicleSafety.pdf
a) Parking of the vehicle
Parking a hydrogen vehicle or other gas-fueled vehicle in an enclosed structure is a
serious safety concern as it can lead to a buildup of the gas. Hydrogen’s tendency to rise and
disperse rapidly makes this the only situation in which small leaks can create extremely
dangerous situations.
b) Emission
As noted above, liquid hydrogen tanks always emit small quantities of hydrogen if it is
not oxidized or burned off in a controlled manner. All hydrogen-containing fuel systems have a
great propensity for at least small leaks due to the pressure of the gaseous hydrogen and the
small size of the individual molecules. Because of the high dispersion rate of hydrogen, small
leaks would likely pose a problem only in small individual garages. Safety concerns in larger
private or public parking garages will be more of an issue if and when the number of hydrogenfueled
vehicles rises dramatically. Without major changes to parking structures or installation of
continuous ventilation even in private, individual garages, hydrogen detectors will be essential to
protecting all enclosed environments in which hydrogen will be present.
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There is also on demand hydrogen system if someone can build a nice enough engine. Where you fill the car with water and have good enough coils to electrolysis the gas you need in real time and provide it to the engine. The vapor is channeled and reformed back into water after explosion. Elon Musk or someone would have to build a bad ass extractor the size of a gas tank or something though.
 
Grand Mal said:
Wouldn't be hard to make it possible to swap a dead battery for a charged one, though.
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A possibility. The battery pack would have to be standardized vehicle to vehicle, manufacturer to manufacturer, so that might be tough to be accomplish.

But if accomplished, and actually works, hell, why not?
How long to swap battery packs?
10 minutes?
Who's going to be qualified to do the work? (we are talking about deadly high voltage here) What hours are they going to be on duty?
A motorist can fill up their own tank at a self serve almost any time day or night, how's battery pack swap going to compete with that?

Yes, there are many questions and potential issues that need to be addressed, but if they can, and the market support it, why not?
 
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I wonder if they can turn these hydrogen semi-trucks into portable generators. Like during moments of crisis send in trucks with supplies then the truck stays there as a power generator for a while.
 
trblmkr said:
But won't we just use up all the seawater?
Hydrogen is dangerous. Remember that blimp thingy?
What good is 200 miles a day?
OK, I tried. Some one else will have to come up with a down side to this.
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That last seems reasonable. I regularly travel distance. And hydrogen does explode - that's why it's useful, and dangerous.

Sent from my XT1526 using Tapatalk
 
trblmkr said:
Ooh, Ooh, I thought of one. It's Toyota!
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My mom recently put her 400,000th mile on her Toyota - original engine.

Sent from my XT1526 using Tapatalk
 
eohrnberger said:
Hydrogen is the most logical fuel for transportation in the future. Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe, so much so that futurists imagine future deep space craft having scoops to collect it and use it as their rocket fuel.

The beauty of hydrogen fuel cells is that the exhaust is nothing more than pure water.
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My problem with hydrogen has to do with the physical forces required to constrain it. I consider it to be a very dangerous move, to switch to hydrogen for transportation.

Think Space Shuttle Challenger...

eohrnberger said:
Problem here on Earth is that hydrogen is always firmly stuck something else and is rather difficult to separate in an energy efficient and effective manner.
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Yes, it takes about 44 kWh of electricity to split it into the equivalent energy of 1 gallon of gasoline. At 10 cents a kWh, that's a production cost of $4.40/gal before any maintenance, profits, etc. are added to the selling price. With the AGW advocates pushing green power, we see electricity prices skyrocketing in places like Europe and Australia. This would make it very impractical.

eohrnberger said:
I can think of winter traffic jams in downtown NYC. All the hydrogen cars and trucks exhausting water vapor only to ice up the roads, causing accidents.
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OMG, yes. This issue already exists in a minimal extent with gasoline as cars make water and carbon dioxide, but all that energy needed would become H2O only, so probably much more of it.
 
Lord of Planar said:
Do you think it pisses right leaning people off to use benefits available?

No...
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No, they don't generally like subsides, "choosing sides"
especially for causes they don't believe in, can't blame 'em for that
 
eohrnberger said:
Quite true. All the current gas stations would have to convert at least one of their storage tanks and pumps to deal with the hydrogen fuel.
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There is no "convert" about it. Unlike with gas changing from leaded to unleaded, it would be a complete removal and replacement. Customer capacity would be much smaller per station as well, as hydrogen per energy content takes up far more space than gasoline as well.
 
longview said:
But it looks like the conversion cost about $1.5 million per station.
https://insideevs.com/california-ap...ng-stations-2-8-million-ev-charging-stations/
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How many independent gas station owners can foot such a cost?

Look at how much more California needs to subsidize per station, hydrogen over electricity.

$46.6 million for 28 hydrogen stations is $1.66 million average per station.

$2.8 million for 175 electric stations is $16 thousand average per station.

A 100:1 ratio of costs.
 
eohrnberger said:
The hydrogen fueling model is the same as the current fueling model, a few minutes of a stop. To recharge batteries isn't.
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Really?

Show me. To my knowledge, hydrogen fueling is a slow tedious process.
 
Lord of Planar said:
How many independent gas station owners can foot such a cost?

Look at how much more California needs to subsidize per station, hydrogen over electricity.

$46.6 million for 28 hydrogen stations is $1.66 million average per station.

$2.8 million for 175 electric stations is $16 thousand average per station.

A 100:1 ratio of costs.
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I think the technology will grow with the market, but the cost would have to be prorated over time.
There are real additional costs compared to simply switching liquid hydrocarbon fuels.
 
eohrnberger said:
A possibility. The battery pack would have to be standardized vehicle to vehicle, manufacturer to manufacturer, so that might be tough to be accomplish.

But if accomplished, and actually works, hell, why not?
How long to swap battery packs?
10 minutes?
Who's going to be qualified to do the work? (we are talking about deadly high voltage here) What hours are they going to be on duty?
A motorist can fill up their own tank at a self serve almost any time day or night, how's battery pack swap going to compete with that?

Yes, there are many questions and potential issues that need to be addressed, but if they can, and the market support it, why not?
Click to expand...

Watch this:

 
eohrnberger said:
A possibility. The battery pack would have to be standardized vehicle to vehicle, manufacturer to manufacturer, so that might be tough to be accomplish.
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Actually, with modern automation, a single End Effector of the robot could be flexible in handling many different sizes, shapes, and bolt patterns. It would be best to standardize the bolt, so the end effector doesn't need multiple types of bits.
 
Lord of Planar said:
Actually, with modern automation, a single End Effector of the robot could be flexible in handling many different sizes, shapes, and bolt patterns. It would be best to standardize the bolt, so the end effector doesn't need multiple types of bits.
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I have thought if they really wanted to be ambitious, they could try electrifying the interstates.
Electrics and hybrids would have a secondary transformer tuned to the primary running down the highway.
The car would simply extract what it needed from the interstate grid, and be metered to your home account.
A car would only need sufficient charge to get to or from the interstate.
The power lines could also carry data, and vehicle logistics, ect.
 
Lord of Planar said:
OMG...

$5.00/kg... and I'll bet that is highly subsidized. Isn't that like $14.29 per physical gallon?

Now... what are the energy differences between the two?
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I think the Toyota gets like 300 miles on 4.5 Kg, so I don't think it is an apple to apple comparison.
 
longview said:
I have thought if they really wanted to be ambitious, they could try electrifying the interstates.
Electrics and hybrids would have a secondary transformer tuned to the primary running down the highway.
The car would simply extract what it needed from the interstate grid, and be metered to your home account.
A car would only need sufficient charge to get to or from the interstate.
The power lines could also carry data, and vehicle logistics, ect.
Click to expand...

The efficiency of power transfer would be way too low to do such a thing, and direct connection of moving components would be a nightmare.
 
longview said:
I think the Toyota gets like 300 miles on 4.5 Kg, so I don't think it is an apple to apple comparison.
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But just how small is that vehicle?

And again, how much is that hydrogen being subsidized?
 
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