$2.00/L by...

[Ozy_Flame]

Interesting on the water-powered car. Although if the thing tops out at 80-km/h, I would think these vehicles would be best served for inner city driving. No way they can hold up on the QE2, they're not strong enough.

I'd love to see an incentive for water-fueled cars to replace gas-powered automobiles in urban areas.

[CaramonLS]

Originally Posted by MelBridgeman

Ah the car the runs on water from one scarce resource to another.

Because it isn't as if water is used in the extraction/refining process for oil, now is it?

[metal_geek]

Originally Posted by worth

can the car run on salt/ocean water?

If not, it's pretty much a complete waste of time IMO.

I'm sure they could use salt water, they just need a way of generating electricity close by so they don't have to transfer along the grid. Basically they need a "private" source of electricity. Might work for wind power or thermal generation near the ocean but realistically, short of building a nuclear reactor near the ocean, hydroelectric is the best we've got. I guess it doesn't have to be that close, but the closer the more efficient the conversion.

Would be very simillar to driving around on propane.
________
LOVE HELP FORUMS

[Boblobla]

Originally Posted by CaramonLS

Because it isn't as if water is used in the extraction/refining process for oil, now is it?

It is not used on the scale that it would be if internal combustion engines were replaced. That water is actually reused over and over as well rather than being depleted like the water would be in this case.

[MelBridgeman]

Originally Posted by CaramonLS

Because it isn't as if water is used in the extraction/refining process for oil, now is it?

So as long as we stop using Oil, who cares? round and round we go...

Also what does this car emit? Water Vapour? Anyone know, i am not going to read the article.

[metal_geek]

Originally Posted by Boblobla

It is not used on the scale that it would be if internal combustion engines were replaced. That water is actually reused over and over as well rather than being depleted like the water would be in this case.

That's interesting, it's not that the water is being depleated as such...

The water is being split apart in one stage, and in another being reunited with the O2 that was split from it earlier. The result is Hydrogen is esentially "Burned" when it come in contact with Oxygen and instead of carbon and O2 (CO2), the result is plain old H20. The the water is not really depleated as much as moved from 1 place to another.

What's so interesting is as that water drips out onto the Highway, and runs back into the rivers, does the redistribution of it affect the local climate? So we split apart water in Northern Alberta, ship the hydrogen to California. Does 1 place "Import the water" and does places along the highway have a lower Oxygen to CO2 ratio from the O2 consumed, and Local Humidity? Does Northen alberta get "Dryer" and more O2 locally?...

Fuel cells are more complicated then plain old buring hydrogen, but are really interesting, in that you can esentially put a "Engine" producing electricity into anything. Cars, laptops, phones, whatever. Then as technology advances, you can just drop in a advanced fuel cell, as opposed to having to change your whole engine to be more "Effiecient"...
________
Glass Bongs

[arsenal]

I have my doubts about this.
It is essentially a perpetual motion machine.
Water goes in, split into H and O2, then recombined into Water?
Thus, getting more energy out of the process that you put in?
Sorry, fake.

[metal_geek]

Originally Posted by arsenal

I have my doubts about this.
It is essentially a perpetual motion machine.
Water goes in, split into H and O2, then recombined into Water?
Thus, getting more energy out of the process that you put in?
Sorry, fake.

They have to have something that splits the water apart and as far as I've heard anything about, it takes more energy to do that then energy is able to be generated from the Hydrogen. Benifit to hydrogen is, you can use renewable sources like hydro to generate the electricity and store it in a portable medium like Hydrogen, with no recharge time like a battery.

Same as this video about burning saltwater.....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGg0ATfoBgo

The guy uses radio waves to make the saltwater burn... All fine and dandy cept listen at the very end to all the noise in the background when he's demonstrating it... Whatever that is, be it generator, cooling fans, or giant microwave ovens, I can gurantee it's pulling multiple times the energy that flame can generate...
________
Rhode island dispensaries

[if.away]

Originally Posted by metal_geek

it takes more energy to do that then energy is able to be generated from the Hydrogen. Benifit to hydrogen is, you can use renewable sources like hydro to generate the electricity and store it in a portable medium like Hydrogen, with no recharge time like a battery.

True. Most people talk about hydrogen without even realizing that hydrogen itself will never return as much useful energy as was consumed to create it, and energy from hydrogen will always have a higher cost than the energy that was used in its manufacture. Hydrogen is and will never be an energy resource in the same sense as the fossil fuels are, instead it is a secondary fuel. Electrolysis yields around 7 cubic feet of pure hydrogen per kWh of electrical energy put into the electrolysis cell, which is around 67% efficiency assuming 325 Btu/cubic feet heat content for hydrogen gas. But fuel cells operating on pure hydrogen can achieve 40-70% efficiency for producing electrical energy relative to the fuel energy content of the input hydrogen. If we use 70% and assume a 90% efficiency for an electric motor you can get a combined efficiency above 60% for producing mechanical energy from hydrogen fuel, which is much higher and more attractive than the 30% achieved by the most efficient IC engine.

Assuming US figures, if hydrogen is to displace as much as 10% of the national transportation fuel budget you basically need to overcome the exact same problem related to electric cars in terms of the source of electricity, so you go back to square one but with a nastier alternative.
On top of it, in the case of hydrogen it is much more difficult to achieve a hydrogen based economy because of the low thermodynamic efficiency of the automobile engine, plus the whole safety issue regarding hydrogen as a fuel, plus the fact that hydrogen cannot *yet* be stored as a metallic hydride at an energy density comparable to that of liquid hydrogen, but at room temperature. And on top of all these issues, billions of dollars must be invested in the infrastructure to deal with the magnitude and complexity of distribution + transport.

Basically, hydrogen is orders of magnitude more difficult and technically challenging than pure electric cars while having similar electricity requirements as electric cars. So why not focus on improving electric batteries(hello Tesla) and working our way up to pluggable hybrids and then to electric cars while at the same time building a stable and clean electricity generating network to deal with the increased demand?

[Dan02]

Originally Posted by if.away

Basically, hydrogen is orders of magnitude more difficult and technically challenging than pure electric cars while having similar electricity requirements as electric cars. So why not focus on improving electric batteries(hello Tesla) and working our way up to pluggable hybrids and then to electric cars while at the same time building a stable and clean electricity generating network to deal with the increased demand?

Well for one, because batterys take hours to recharge whereas a hydrogen vehicle wouldnt be much different in terms of time then a gasoline powered one. The biggest drawback of pure electric cars is they do have a finite range.

[metal_geek]

Originally Posted by Dan02

Well for one, because batterys take hours to recharge whereas a hydrogen vehicle wouldnt be much different in terms of time then a gasoline powered one. The biggest drawback of pure electric cars is they do have a finite range.

I don't see either approach as being mutually exclusive. There are Hybrid cars today, as well as there could be hybrid Hydrogen cars tomorrow.

A hybrid is definantly less efficient but alot more practical. We can make improvements in the generation side of the electricity and Hydrogen for the cars, while leaving the flexibility in the usage side. Then improvements in both batteries, and hydrogen generation will benefit everyone.

When you really boil it down, all we are doing is converting the energy of falling water, into either Hydrogen, or electricity so we can transport it and use it on our cars. As long as we use some form of naturally occurring motion to generate the electricity, and a non destructive medium to transport it, why not move with a hybrid approach and increase efficiency as we go.

Even if we start out with 1 or 2 hydrogen fuel stations locally, and use the existing infrastructure for the battery charging station. It would go a long way in reducing local demand for fossil fuels as adoption increases..
________
LATINJANNE