Is hydrogen the future of motoring?

Yes, and electric cars will be like mini discs, obsolete before they become popular! :pac:

Ask any of our experts, college professors, SEAI etc, they will all tell you hydrogen can only be regarded as an energy carrier and our hydrogen economy is possibly 50 years away. Check out the internet and you will see numerous people selling water for gas kits for engine conversions. I have been unable to find one manufacturer/supplier who will offer a money back guarantee or in fact tell you how to operate such a device, they are mostly referred to as hho kits,
not to be mistaken with an electric kettle but they can actually boil water too?
Do they work? none that I have bought but I have been foolish enough to part with my money for many such devices and some weeks later put in the skip.

I became interested in the subject some three years ago after becoming an unemployed professional, something to pass the time with. At first I contacted most of our third level Institutes to be told I was mad, Hydrogen is very difficult, expensive and very dangerous to produce, energy required is much greater than the energy output. I began to experiment.
The days become long when one is without a job and short of cash,
I had nothing to loose and if the professors were correct possibly my life but as always I am like a dog with a bone.

OK, here are some facts, Electrolysis of water is a lot easier than most believe, it just takes some low voltage electricity and some electrodes and of course an additive to make the water more electro conductive and I do not mean baking soda, it corrodes the electrodes.

Two years on my 08 Mercedes C220 is a hydrogen hybrid, mpg was at most 48 on a long journey but with a 50 euro conversion achieves 60mpg within ten miles and within twenty miles will achieve 65-70mpg with more power.
Experts will say the engine will blow but 60,000 miles later its running better than ever because its clean burning.
There is an optimum energy input, any excess will result in waste and heat up such a device. I have one on my oil fired boiler and efficiency has improved by 16%. I simply use less oil and one litre of water per month.
Let me put this in perspective, one litre of petrol currently will cost you one euro and fifty cent, this will also buy you 8kwh electricity and you can easily convert this into 2200 litres of a hydrogen/oxygen gas ( two thousand two hundred litres) is it any wonder the powers that be do not want this technology known. Testing on a Scania 420 has shown in excess of 20% improved fuel economy and I am now working on a highly efficient CHP which will provide heating and electricity for my home. Smart metering feed in tarrif is just ten cent a kw which will result in my fuel cost less than zero.Take the Prius Hybrid which has 27kw battery storage, the batteries are well capable of making hydrogen as the sole fuel for the engine and require recharge just once a week depending on mileage, The solutions are already known but the powers that be will tell you it simply cannot be done. Its about carbon tax and Revenue collection.
A prominent TV personality once told me, if you were from silicone valley everyone would say you are a genius but because you are Irish you are talking rubbish. I can imagine some of the comments I will get here but I will provide evidence when the time is right. Hydrogen injection despite all claims does actually increase emissions because more fuel is being burned that would otherwise go out through the exhaust, emissions are reduced by better mpg. Hybrid conversions are a possible retro-fit solution for all existing petrol and diesel engines and home heating and with rising fuel cost, Will our Government eventually tax rainwater ?

hydrogenengine wrote: »

Ask any of our experts, college professors, SEAI etc, they will all tell you hydrogen can only be regarded as an energy carrier

That's the beauty of it! Storage is expensive and inefficient, but possible all the same. Solution for Ireland:

1. Create massive reservoir a few hundred meters above sea level somewhere on the west coast. This reservoir is an energy buffer

2. Wind energy will fill the reservoir with sea water when it is windy

3. Hydro (water flowing back into the Ocean through hydro electric plant) creates electricity and feeds it into the grid. When there is oversupply, the electricity will be used to create hydrogen

4. Hydrogen supply is used for transport energy requirements

Zero emissions after the infastructure has been built. Actually never bloody mind zero emissions, less dependency on Russia (gas) and the Arabic world (oil) and a massive and permanent cash inflow for the state

hydrogenengine wrote: »

Two years on my 08 Mercedes C220 is a hydrogen hybrid, mpg was at most 48 on a long journey but with a 50 euro conversion achieves 60mpg within ten miles and within twenty miles will achieve 65-70mpg with more power.

I'd certainly be interested in how you've set this up i.e. how do you store the gas in the car, where do you introduce it to the fuel/air, how do you meter it, etc...

hydrogenengine wrote: »

Hydrogen injection despite all claims does actually increase emissions because more fuel is being burned that would otherwise go out through the exhaust, emissions are reduced by better mpg.

This doesn't really make any sense, co2 emissions are just another way of stating fuel consumption, carbon that goes in from the fuel comes out as co2. No engine is 100% efficient but in any modern car with electronic fuel injection, there is negligible HC and CO getting past the catalytic converter once that has warmed up.

Adding a hydrogen / oxygen mix may see more efficient combustion in the cylinder and less work for the cat and even lower HC and CO emissions, but there simply isn't enough available carbon to increase CO2 emissions.

Perhaps you were referring to NOx emissions which could increase in a leaner burning engine?

Its all about Energy,

Our Energy providers are pricing themselves out of the market, the consumer has little choice but to pay up. The price of crude is falling due to reduced demand and yet the price at the pumps is rising, The Irish Government are taking advantage without having the courtesy of telling us, ask any oil distributer. Hydrogen is the cheapest abundant fuel available,
The short term future I believe will be micro chp wherby we can provide our own energy needs and at low cost compared to any other fossil fuel.

Hydrogen when burned reverts to water, it is non toxic and harmless to humans
and is zero emissions. It is actually less dangerous than petrol as it dissipates into the atmosphere extremely fast and once diluted cannot ignite, Would you light a match at your petrol tank, unlikely as the fumes alone would ignite, with hydrogen it will not ignite unless the flame is applied at source. High pressure storage of hydrogen can be dangerous therefore produce on demand and it is within reach for us all to make our own fuel.
Why do you think the experts will say it cannot be done?? Figure it out for yourself.

very very interesting stuff hydrogenengine.

unkel wrote: »

LOL, what is it with Japanese companies claiming to have come up with an invention / innovation and people believe them too?

BMW had hydrogen cars driving around about 5 years ago

Spot the BMW fanboi! That BMW yoke didn't have a fuel cell, it burned hydrogen, which is the pig ignorant way of making a "hydrogen powered" car. IIRC it did something like 5 mpg on hydrogen and BMW would have been better sticking with petrol.

Hydrogen could be the future, but it's still out of reach of the normal motorist while EV makes inroads into affordability and delivery mechanisms.

In terms of delivery, it's primary problem is that it has much greater supply costs than plain old EV. Even if refuelling stations just bring in seawater and create the hydrogen onsite, that still costs money to ship and store. EVs cut out the middle man so there's no transitory fuel type.

However for the moment it does refuel a whole lot faster, it has twice the range of an EV, and it's a familiar delivery mechanism that people will be comfortable with. Also since a pure H2 vehicle is effectively an EV with a fuel cell bolted on, these vehicles will be able to take advantage of any jumps in the EV technology apart from the battery.

It could also just be another transitory vehicle type. Since they're effectively just EVs with a different power source, then there's no reason why you couldn't run a battery and H2 system in tandem. Battery goes till it runs out, then it switches to the more expensive hydrogen to run the car and recharge while you drive. The cost of such a dual setup would be a minimal increase (on H2-only cars), but it could give EVs a range that petrol or diesel vehicles could only dream of.

As battery technologies improve, it will make more sense to only use battery tech and not H2, and it would even be relatively cheap and simple to convert a H2 car to a pure EV.

In reality it's effectively a format war. H2 and EV each have their own strengths. The consumer will decide who lives and who dies.

My suspicion is that unless someone manages to bring a €30,000 H2 car to market within five years, and they manage to not have any "exploding car" incidents, then they stand a chance. Safety will be the number one hot topic. Any serious incidents involving leaked hydrogen and people just won't go for it.

hydrogenengine wrote: »

There is no gas storage required, the gas is produced on demand with low voltage from the battery/charging voltage, and is then injected via the air intake just before the turbo. One litre of water decomposed will produce 1860 litres of gas so top up with a quarter litre of water every week, depending on mileage.
The particulate filter was due to burn off at 56,400km but when tested at 50,000 had just 1% carbon, possibly there since before installation at 20,000 miles. The setup/emissions are checked using Snap On exhaust gas analyzer
which is a must have to regulate the amount of gas input, too much gas is worse than less. When the gas burns o2 reduces but co2 will increase at optimum combustion, too much gas will increase Nox emissions.
The setup is a fairly exact science gained simply from experience and proper test equipment.

So how does this setup take account of varying engine speeds. A 12v electrolysis cell will be producing gas at a pretty constant rate. Volumetric air intake will vary almost proportionally with engine speed. You state yourself that too much gas increases the NOx, so how do you account for engine speed?
I don't doubt that you can get a cleaner burn by adding the gasses, I just dont see how that can be done in a balanced manner over the rev range with the setup you describe.

It's a great idea and I'm all for it but there's just too much money in oil for them to offer any alternative fuels at the moment. Sure the oil compaines most likely have all the exclusive rights and patents in place to make sure alternative fuels don't make it to the consumer. Until such a time they see fit. So unless you make biodiesel your suckered into paying the cartel price for fuel.

YouTookMyName wrote: »

Whoever figures a way to transport it safely becomes a millionaire no?

You wouldn't transport hydrogen. Not in big tankers anyway, too great a risk. As I mention, you would transport water to refueling stations. Probably not water from the mains, that could be quite expensive.
The station itself would then have the necessary equipment for generating the hydrogen on demand and could also store and sell on the oxygen. Producing hydrogen isn't like refining crude oil, the equipment wouldn't be very expensive or complicated.

But you might be right - whoever figures out the most economical delivery system could be a millionaire.

n97 mini wrote: »

Spot the BMW fanboi! That BMW yoke didn't have a fuel cell, it burned hydrogen, which is the pig ignorant way of making a "hydrogen powered" car. IIRC it did something like 5 mpg on hydrogen and BMW would have been better sticking with petrol.

I still suspect the fuel cell/EV approach will basically suck to drive though but yes, having read the Hydrogen7 Wiki page, the BMW car of 2007 is bizarrely limited.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BMW_Hydrogen_7