The unnamed vehicle will have a plug for charging so you don't have to rely on hydrogen so much:
Hydrogen fuel cells still represent a small slice of the electric-vehicle market share, since they rely on unique infrastructure, but Honda is not letting that slow down its aspirations. In 2024, the automaker intends to shake up the market a bit with a new fuel-cell vehicle based on an immensely popular car, with some unique features that could help it gain traction with buyers.
Honda this week announced that it will build a hydrogen fuel-cell electric vehicle at its Performance Manufacturing Center in Marysville, Ohio, in 2024. While the vehicle does not yet have a public name, Honda did say that this new FCEV will be based on the CR-V SUV, one of the automaker's most popular offerings.
There's an interesting twist in here, too. While every other fuel-cell vehicle turns compressed hydrogen gas into electricity, which is used to propel the electric motors powering the vehicle, Honda's FCEV will ease the transition to hydrogen by offering a charging plug. This will, in Honda's words, "[enable] the driver to charge the onboard battery to deliver EV driving around town with the flexibility of fast hydrogen refueling for longer trips." So, in a sense, it's like a plug-in hybrid, but instead of gasoline, it uses compressed hydrogen.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 09, @09:43AM (8 children)
I have never seen a hydrogen filling station. When they are as ubiquitous as gas stations maybe I’ll consider one.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 09, @09:45AM (4 children)
Also, how energy dense is gaseous hydrogen? How many miles per tankful?
(Score: 2) by turgid on Friday December 09, @10:49AM (3 children)
It's not very dense. As to your other question, propane cylinders are relatively common and easily available for camping stoves and portable heaters, so it shouldn't be too difficult to do the same for hydrogen.
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 09, @02:49PM (2 children)
But LP tanks store propane in liquid state (much more dense). AFAIK, you can't store liquid Hydrogen in a simple tank (without elaborate refrigeration). And, storing it in as a pressurized gas won't provide enough energy to make it worthwhile.
(Score: 5, Informative) by RS3 on Friday December 09, @07:41PM (1 child)
In one of the now-gone SN discussions I had posted a link to a really good list of various fuels and the energy content per weight, and per volume. If I find it again I'll post it.
Gasses, in gas state, are far far less energy-dense, but when held in liquid state, are in the range of typical petro and alcohol fuels.
Propane is very reasonable to store. It phase-changes from gas to liquid, at typical human environmental temperatures, in the 100 - 200 PSI (690 - 1380 kPa) (6.9 - 13.8 Bar) range, so easily stored in steel bottles that most of us see here and there. It's (obviously) used in outdoor cooking grills, small electric generators, some forklift trucks, some road vehicles.
Hydrogen, however, liquefies (well, condenses but isn't actually liquid as we think of a liquid) at much higher pressures, in the 5,000 - 10,000 PSI (34,500 - 69,000 kPa) (345 - 690 Bar) range.
Here's a fairly good discussion of hydrogen pressure and states:
https://chemistry.stackexchange.com/questions/140496/at-what-pressure-will-hydrogen-start-to-liquefy-at-room-temperature [stackexchange.com]
So storage is much more complicated than with propane. Steel bottles that can withstand that pressure are quite heavy and somewhat impractical. Woven carbon fiber wrapped tanks have been used, as well as many other storage methods and systems:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_storage [wikipedia.org]
Here's a morre succinct article on some actual / practical methods / systems:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/engineering/compressed-hydrogen-storage [sciencedirect.com]
Yes, the colder you store it, the less pressure required to "liquefy" hydrogen. However, there's huge risk if the refrigeration system fails. OF COURSE, such tanks always have at least 2 "blow-off" valves (aka pressure relief valve). But, massive hydrogen release is a big fire and explosion risk. My overall gut feel is that a refrigeration system probably isn't practical, but someone could do a cost - benefit - risk study.
IIRC Iceland has experimented with hydrogen-powered busses, and they had 3 or so filling stations. They had (have?) carbon-fiber wrapped storage bottles on the roofs. Lots of small ones, which makes sense if one leaks, the loss is much less.
Also, a couple of years ago someone on greensite pointed out that hydrogen "leaches" through almost everything, so long-term storage, as well as long-range piping, isn't super practical. I don't have numbers for that. At least it's cheap, abundant, and harmless, unless it's confined, and then boom goes the zeppelin.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday December 11, @01:14AM
Hydrogen also makes most of the metals it's diffusing through brittle. If that steel tank gets banged you don't just get a dent in it, you might shatter a chunk of it.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by TheGratefulNet on Friday December 09, @01:48PM (1 child)
this fuel is for fleets. never ever for regular working people.
stupid idea for consumers. great for fleets if they want it, but with electric also as a choice, I see little value in fuel cell.
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 09, @06:41PM
Better alcohol fuel cells and catalysts might change things.
Can produce alcohol from fermentation and also from CO2 + H2.
https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.iecr.2c00720 [acs.org]
Then liquid alcohol can be transported and stored similar to liquid hydrocarbons.
Then you need to convert that fuel to electricity:
https://phys.org/news/2020-05-materials-efficiency-ethanol-fuel-cells.html [phys.org]
https://www.ucf.edu/news/ucf-researchers-ethanol-fuel-cells-offer-new-alternative-to-power-cars-technology/ [ucf.edu]
(Score: 2) by richtopia on Sunday December 11, @01:18AM
Currently in the USA California is the only option: https://afdc.energy.gov/fuels/hydrogen_locations.html#/find/nearest?fuel=HY [energy.gov]
There used to be a hydrogen station in the Metro Detroit area when GM was still promoting hydrogen as a viable future fuel. Also, Japan has a significant hydrogen network. Both Honda and Toyota have production vehicles being sold in Japan, so I predict this vehicle will arrive as a knock-down kit and get assembled on-site (the article reminds us this facility builds low-volume vehicles for Honda's NA market).
While hydrogen's lack of refueling infrastructure prohibits it from solving transportation issues today, you can still be an early adopter and experience the technology if you live in California's urban areas. I guess the fueling centers are currently meetup locations for the area's Toyota Mirai owners, since that is pretty much the only viable NA option today. Only time will show if hydrogen becomes a player in transportation fuels, but it stands a real chance to fill a long-range niche while maintaining an electric drive train. There is also a lot of support from the fossil fuel industry - the oil companies see divestments from traditional fuels, but if hydrogen is a viable energy store natural gas can play a role in the transition.