Random EV thoughts.....

KCross wrote: »

I dont see alot wrong with the article in the context of what they are targeting...
...confirmed that it will initially be aimed at “captive” fleets, whereby vehicles can be refuelled at a central depot. “It’s a central hub model, for now, rather than a distributed network. Our focus is on captive fleets, and Dublin Bus and CIÉ as a whole are both part of the group, and contributing to the discussions.
Hydrogen starts to make sense for captive commercial fleets.

The grid is supposed to be going towards a much higher percentage of renewables which means there could, in time, be excess energy available which you can then use to generate hydrogen.

Certainly a hydrogen fueled Dublin bus is going to be better than what we have right now. Its really down to how the hydrogen is generated as to whether its worth doing or not.

For cars, cant see hydrogen working. The cost of putting hydrogen stations all over the country is prohibitive. They quoted €2m per station.... that aint going to happen by 2030!

The only way hydrgoen works is for large vehicles that only refuel at depots.

Some of these already use lpg/cng only vehicles.

However hydrogen is more expensive than fossil fuel to produce, it is still a fossil fuel, and the vehicles are more expensive.
I'd love a mirai but it doesnt make sense here.

Actually, I'd love a mirai with a 30kWh battery pack and a plug.

unkel wrote: »

China has about 500,000 BEV buses (and growing very quickly) and about 1,000 hydrogen buses, the latter mostly trials promoted by some heavily invested stakeholders like Toyota

Buses need to go BEV, all R&D into hydrogen for road transport is a complete waste of money

China is actually backing Hydrogen. They're pulling BEV susidies and promoting Hydrogen so I wouldnt use them as a good example of Hydrogen being a dead end. If China decides something, that means its going to happen!

There will be more BEV in the short-medium term because thats available tech today but they see Hydrogen as the long term future.

unkel wrote: »

Hydrogen fuelled back up electricity power plants (for when a jurisdiction is low on renewables and low on interconnector import), that is the main future of hydrogen

If you see it having a future for that, no reason why it cant also feed commercial vehicles like that article talks about.

Think about an inter city bus doing Cork-Dublin several times a day.... BEV wont cut it. A hydrogen pump at both ends will.

ELM327 wrote: »

The only way hydrgoen works is for large vehicles that only refuel at depots.

Thats basically what I'm agreeing with in the article and thats what they are targeting. I dont think its unreasonable at all if they can generate the hydrogen with renewables.... which very much remains to be seen.

ELM327 wrote: »

However hydrogen is more expensive than fossil fuel to produce, it is still a fossil fuel, and the vehicles are more expensive.

How is Hydrogen a fossil fuel?

It is a byproduct of oil refining but that's not the only way to generate it. It's not in itself a fossil fuel.

KCross wrote: »

How is Hydrogen a fossil fuel?

It is a byproduct of oil refining but that's not the only way to generate it. It's not in itself a fossil fuel.

Hydrogen is a fossil fuel currently because that is how it generated for any commercial applications.
It uses gas (fossil fuel) to electrolize water.
From memory you need around 2.5-3kWh of energy to produce 1kWh of hydrogen.
The mirai struggles to get 40mpge

unkel

KCross wrote: »

If China decides something, that means its going to happen!

You can say that alright!

Not sure I've seen any recent info on China backing buses to go hydrogen (instead of BEV) on a large scale for buses though. But you have a point in long range buses used in poor countries like China and Ireland where there isn't any better public transport infrastructure :pac:

ELM327 wrote: »

Hydrogen is a fossil fuel currently because that is how it generated for any commercial applications.
It uses gas (fossil fuel) to electrolize water.
From memory you need around 2.5-3kWh of energy to produce 1kWh of hydrogen.

This is it, hydrogen is currently only really produced in pilot schemes. The future is that it will be generated for free with excess renewable electricity production that would otherwise have gone to waste (zero value electricity)

kanuseeme

95% of hydrogen is produced from fossil fuel (methane) using steam and a catalyst, as you said producing it from water is not efficient

There is a lot of problems with Hydrogen, energy density and trying to stop the stuff escaping and blowing up airships/cars etc.

kanuseeme wrote: »

There is a lot of problems with Hydrogen, energy density and trying to stop the stuff escaping and blowing up airships/cars etc.

Minor detail!

unkel wrote: »

Not sure I've seen any recent info on China backing buses to go hydrogen (instead of BEV) on a large scale for buses though. But you have a point in long range buses used in poor countries like China and Ireland where there isn't any better public transport infrastructure :pac:

The China references are in this post...
https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=110731376&postcount=43

We have to think as well that Hydrogen is at least a decade away so looking at current products and processes is somewhat irrelevant. It hasnt matured yet.

If you looked back 10 years you wouldnt be betting on BEV either! We have no Hydrogen vehicles in the country today, we didnt have any BEV's 10 years ago, so who knows what 2030 will look like!

I think BEV and Hydrogen will both have a future. Its not a one or the other thing.

Old diesel

What's the range of an electric coach?????.

On a Dublin to Cork route you can have different buses coming and going.

So a coach pulls into Cork to charge after working it's route and one already charged lines up to take the passengers on next leg back to Dublin.

[Deleted User]

Old diesel wrote: »

What's the range of an electric coach?????.

On a Dublin to Cork route you can have different buses coming and going.

So a coach pulls into Cork to charge after working it's route and one already charged lines up to take the passengers on next leg back to Dublin.

The coaches normally stop for a break at Urlingford etc for maybe 20 minutes on longer routes. Plenty of time to 1MW charge extra range during a break like that. Another 300 kWh charged in 20 minutes for that extra 300 kilometers.

samih wrote: »

The coaches normally stop for a break at Urlingford etc for maybe 20 minutes on longer routes. Plenty of time to 1MW charge extra range during a break like that. Another 300 kWh charged in 20 minutes for that extra 300 kilometers.

This is a great use case for why Hydrogen is better for buses.
Centrally fuelled and must be cheaper than setting up a couple of 1MW chargers

Water John

TMK buses no longer stop in Urlingford, toilet on board basically, motorway all the way.
Charged Leaf 30 at fast charger in Fermoy today. Hooked on about 10 mins when BMW hybrid arrives, told her I'd be about 10 mins more. She went off to the shop.
Zoe arrives, a few mins later, she asks and I said I'd be disconnecting, (I was over 90% at that point). I hoped to be out and give the ZOE my place and as I did so the BMW owner arrived back. Felt sorry for the ZOE as the BMW was simply freeloading.
Maybe they both can charge?

Black_Knight

Water John wrote: »

TMK buses no longer stop in Urlingford, toilet on board basically, motorway all the way.
Charged Leaf 30 at fast charger in Fermoy today. Hooked on about 10 mins when BMW hybrid arrives, told her I'd be about 10 mins more. She went off to the shop.
Zoe arrives, a few mins later, she asks and I said I'd be disconnecting, (I was over 90% at that point). I hoped to be out and give the ZOE my place and as I did so the BMW owner arrived back. Felt sorry for the ZOE as the BMW was simply freeloading.
Maybe they both can charge?

BMW on CCS, Zoe on type 2

[Deleted User]

ELM327 wrote: »

This is a great use case for why Hydrogen is better for buses.
Centrally fuelled and must be cheaper than setting up a couple of 1MW chargers

I don't know about the pricing but 300 km of extra range in 20 minutes sounds great. That would be enough to do Dublin-Cork-Dublin with just 20 minutes of charging in Cork. And coaches do stop for 30+ minutes at the time at the bus terminals.

And the cost of 300 kWh is what 30 quid or less at wholesale prices. If a coach uses (I'm guessing) 25-30 lilters/100 km of diesel that's 150-200 quid for the fuel for a return trip vs. 60 on electricity. And who knows how much for H2.

samih wrote: »

I don't know about the pricing but 300 km of extra range in 20 minutes sounds great. That would be enough to do Dublin-Cork-Dublin with just 20 minutes of charging in Cork. And coaches do stop for 30+ minutes at the time at the bus terminals.

And the cost of 300 kWh is what 30 quid or less at wholesale prices. If a coach uses (I'm guessing) 25-30 lilters/100 km of diesel that's 150-200 quid for the fuel for a return trip vs. 60 on electricity. And who knows how much for H2.

It's more the cost of supply infrastructure for 1mw

ELM327 wrote: »

It's more the cost of supply infrastructure for 1mw

And you can imagine 10+ buses pulling into an MSA looking for a connection. It wouldnt work in reality.

[Deleted User]

KCross wrote: »

And you can imagine 10+ buses pulling into an MSA looking for a connection. It wouldnt work in reality.

It used to be just one at the time when they did stop at Urlingford on the Cork route. Would be simple enough stagger the coaches each to have their designated slots.

Water John

The Cork - Dublin travels on the half hour and the Dublin- Cork on the hour, AFAIK.

kanuseeme

Water John wrote: »

The Cork - Dublin travels on the half hour and the Dublin- Cork on the hour, AFAIK.

Two steps forward, one step back.:D

Is there any progress on wireless charging?

If a motorway had say a 20 km stretch with such a concept, that could charge or supply power to a EV bus or car.

Probably too expensive.

September1

Probably for scheduled services it would make sense to have replaceable batteries for buses, as usually cities have limited number of bus stations. It would also mean that batteries would not have requirement to charge quickly, so they could choose chemistry and design that maximizes capacity.

The Black Oil

Non-EV owner here. What's considered hogging? I was at an event in Merrion Square recently. Saw a Leaf and i3 (with company branding on its side) charging. I was out two hours later, Leaf was gone. There an auld fella was hooking up his Zoe where the Leaf had been. i3 was still there.

krissovo

The Black Oil wrote: »

Non-EV owner here. What's considered hogging? I was at an event in Merrion Square recently. Saw a Leaf and i3 (with company branding on its side) charging. I was out two hours later, Leaf was gone. There an auld fella was hooking up his Zoe where the Leaf had been. i3 was still there.

Marion Square is a 22kw AC charger, I would consider it as “fast” but not rapid (50kw+). The I3 can charge at 11kw I think so should charge fully from empty between 2 & 3 Hours to full.

Unofficial Etiquette for “rapid” chargers is you charge until your charge speed slow down to ~80% if people are waiting. Over that and you are hogging IMO, the 22kw fast chargers I would consider a grey area as they are more destination chargers so its more acceptable to stay longer. My guess is the I3 was fine until the Zoe turned up and then it would be “hogging” as it would be full or close to it.

In regard to a Nissan Leaf.

Plug it in at home on your home charger and leave it charge away. At 5am the battery is fully charged and charging stops. No timers on etc.

At 7am, you decide to pre heat the car remotely from the app on the mobile phone. When this happens, will the car start charging again? (As in the battery level will drop due to the heat being on.....( I think) and therefore charging will automatically restart again)

unkel

from_atozinc wrote: »

At 7am, you decide to pre heat the car remotely from the app on the mobile phone. When this happens, will the car start charging again? (As in the battery level will drop due to the heat being on.....( I think) and therefore charging will restart again)

No.

The pre-heating is done directly from the mains. The battery stays fully charged throughout.

unkel wrote: »

No.

The pre-heating is done directly from the mains. The battery stays fully charged throughout.

Ah nice one. So you can come out to car and have it nice and warm and battery will still be 100% full regardless.

unkel

Indeed!

JPA

Wrong unfortunately. If the car is 100% if will take from the battery. If it is still charging it will take from the mains.

JPA wrote: »

Wrong unfortunately. If the car is 100% if will take from the battery. If it is still charging it will take from the mains.

Is this the definite right answer so?

“If the car is 100% if will take from the battery“ in this case, will the charging re start once the battery goes below 100%?

NIMAN

I have actually done this, started the heating remotely whilst plugged in, maybe for 5 or 10mins.

The car was at 100% when I got in. It would have finished charging maybe a couple of hours before.