Fuel Cell Cars

[GT40FIED]

Ok...I just got to thinking about this today and it kinda pisses me off. After watching some crap on flexible fuel and fuel cell vehicles I got pissed listening to all of these people say that fuel cell (hydrogen) vehicles will reduce emissions greatly. True, when hydrogen itself burns it produces only water (H2O). BUT...they plan on getting this hydrogen by extracting it from gasoline. Gasoline's chemical compound is C8H16 (sorry...my computer won't do that small number thing). So....by that rationale once they extract the hydrogen there will be roughly 1/3 of the product left as carbon dioxide. What are they gonna do with this shit...toss it in the trash? It's great...another tree hugging hippy crap idea that causes just as much pollution as driving a car on good old unleaded but now we're supposed to think it's better. F@ck that shit...I'll keep my 12mpg V8 and screw anyone who tells me that I'm hurting the environment.

Sorry...just had to vent about this crap.

http://www.upei.ca/~physics/p261/pro.../hydrogen1.htm

this site say theyre gonna take hydrogen out of water.....


Now what you said is KIND of right. As of now...they are taking Hydrogen out of gasoline and yes...carbon is left behind. (I dont know what they do to it though. ) This process is called "reforming". They use heat to seperate the carbon and hydrogen molecules. But take notice...they are not going to use this process to get hydrogen if we use fuel cell instead of gasoline. They are gonna get Hydrogen from Water...(h2o)...they'll seperate it by using eletrical current. Why dont we use it now?? Its EXPANSIVE to do it this method. I THINK only nasa uses this liquid hydrogen to propel their rockets. they're probably the only one who can afford it.

they are researchin for a more feasible way to harness hydrogen. (of course....makin it affordable and environmental friendly).

Dont get me wrong but hydrogen is the most abundace element in the universe. im pretty sure we'll find hydrogen somewhere else rather then gasoline...?

"Hydrogen can be produced from a wide variety of domestic resources using a number of different technologies."

this quote came from this site:

http://www.eere.energy.gov/hydrogena...ells/hydrogen/

Dont you think this is a reliable source?


Maybe you knew all of this already then Kudos to you.....maybe someone else learned something when reading this.

[thermal]

They used the remaining Carbon Dioxide and reformulate it as a fire extinguisher.

[ebpda9]

i have a friend who is a chemicla engineer and i asked him about separating the hydrogen from the oxigen in water and he said that it will take as much energy as it would make the hydrogen by burning it

[AzCivic]

Originally posted by GT40FIED
Ok... Gasoline's chemical compound is C8H16 (sorry...my computer won't do that small number thing). So....by that rationale once they extract the hydrogen there will be roughly 1/3 of the product left as carbon dioxide.

you can't get CO2 from C8H16.

[nonovurbizniz]

Originally posted by AzCivic
you can't get CO2 from C8H16.

If there's any oxygen present you can.

[ebpda9]

Originally posted by nonovurbizniz
If there's any oxygen present you can.

[AzCivic]

if you take the carbon off c8h16 its not going to automatically bond to oxygen for no reason.

[ChrisCantSkate]

Originally posted by AzCivic
if you take the carbon off c8h16 its not going to automatically bond to oxygen for no reason.

yes it will. theres o2 in the atmosphere and if you have an unbalanced amount of carbon then it will bond with o2. kind of like how you never see o1, it automatically bonds with another oxygen molocule to be balanced

[AzCivic]

so you're saying there's no free carbon on the planet?

BMW has already built hyrdogen-powered cars, they built a fleet of 12 (or somewhere around that many) V12 7-series cars....of course those aren't fuel cells.

There are many ways to get hydrogen. The most common method currently in use is, as you said, to extract it from natural oil.

The second most common method is, as mentioned, electrolysis. Electrolysis will take more energy to separate them than you will get back from recombining them. Electrolysis is the exact opposite of what a fuel cell does, since NO process is 100% efficient, you always lose something in the conversion. If it were 100% efficient, you could use the electricity from the fuel cell to power electrolysis and keep combining/splitting water forever....but it's not 100% efficient, so you waste energy in there. Of course using electricity is the "cleaner" approach....yeah right, most of the electricity comes from natural gas or coal burning power plants....or maybe even nuclear....or hydro.....tell me all those are environmentally friendly! They all suck.

But there is lots of research going on in this field. One promising "technology" is to use an algae. There is an algae (maybe more than one, I'm not sure) that processes water and naturally releases hydrogen as a byproduct. Harnessing their power would be an environmentally friendly method assuming they don't have any bad byproducts. The problem with this is that they haven't managed to get a system stable or large enough for any industrial production yet, but it's research in the works.

Another "clean" way of doing it is to use solar power to provide energy for electrolysis. There are cleaner and less clean ways of doing this, but a lot of it comes down to whether you can produce it on a large enough scale and do it cheaply enough to make it practical.....time will tell.

b

[GT40FIED]

I've got another option...how about we as a country all stop clamoring over this new "emissions free" technology, bite the f@cking bullet, and realize we can't do everything perfect and go back to flexible fuel vehicles. I remember back in the late '90s Ford campaigned a number of cars and trucks (begining with the show-only Super Stallion Mustang) that could run either on gasoline, E-85 alcohol, or any combo of the two. Sure, it's kinda hard to get your hands on automotive grade ethanol compared to gasoline, but it's a helluva lot easier to make and produces less emissions that gasoline while theoretically giving you a boost in power. That Super Stallion made around 50hp more on the ethanol if I remember right...maybe more. Oh yeah...and natural gas was cool too if it didn't create the possibility of you blowing up half a city block if you got hit hard enough.

True, true. If you're worried about running around with natural gas, you're gonna love hydrogen!!!

In Wales the police set up a special task force specifically to catch drivers who were taking oils from restaurants that do a lot of deep frying and running them in their diesels.....bypassing the tax system.

Many diesels will run on corn oil. I'm not sure if it burns cleaner or not (environmentally speaking), but it's pretty easy to produce and at least smells better.

There are so many problems that contribute to what's going on. * Americans love their gigantic gas guzzling SUV's.
* The government loves gasoline taxes.
* Some people in the government get huge contributions from.....you guessed it, gas/oil companies.
* If we reduce our dependency on oil, what excuse will we have to bomb other countries?
* Contrary to what the government may say, they actually don't care about the environment right now.
* Contrary to what most people who "support the environment" may say, they actually don't support the environment. Hard to break bad habits sometimes.....

b

[GT40FIED]

Ahhh....I believe in typical Spoogenet fashion, he's hit the nail on the head. First of all, our our economy is largely driven by oil. Without it as a trade product we'd see some MAJOR financial downturns. Around the turn of the century gasoline powered vehicles came in a distant third in consumer polls to electric and steam vehicles and now look at us...it's come full circle with the same limitations. Electric vehicles still have very limited distances of travel and long recharge times. Forget steam engines...boilers exploding everywhere and scalding the shit out of you. Diesels get good mileage and make huge torque but we just can't get over that diesel clatter. I still don't get why ethanol never caught on. Its made of...what...wood, I believe, that's been distilled into alcohol. It burns cleaner and creates more power. Plus if your tank ruptured you're not looking at Hiroshima if there's a spark around. People like to think they're enviromentally concious, but if that were true would our beloved president even CONSIDER opening up protected Alaskan area to drilling? How's this...why not open Jenna Bush's wetlands for public drilling? F@ck all these buerocrats (sp?) who take huge kickbacks from oil and energy companies *cough*Dick Cheney*cough* and then stand next to a fuel cell prototype with a big thumbs up. And screw all these wannabe hippy dicks who protest global warming and "no blood for oil" crap then drive home in their Explorers and Yukons. So perhaps everyone should just do what I do...I don't like the idea of what we're doing to our planet but I'm a creature of habit and will freely admit that I think Honda Insights look gay as f@ck and any car I drive had better make at least 250hp. It might not be pretty, but at least it's honest.