Fueling Cars with Water: Korean Research Team Develops Tech to Mass Produce Hydrogen

[nationalize the fed]

Business Korea.co 16 September 2014


Quentin Willson refuels the Hyundai ix35 fuel cell car with hydrogen fuel at Nottingham University on Sept. 14, 2012. (Photo by Bexi81 via Wikimedia Commons)

The technology to mass produce hydrogen out of water using sunlight has been developed, which means that a breakthrough to secure hydrogen, a next-gen source of energy, has been discovered. If this technology is commercialized, the era of fueling automobiles with water could begin.

According to the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning on Sept. 15, a research team consisting of Professor Lee Jong-hyup at Seoul National University succeeded in developing the technology to mass produce hydrogen, a next-gen source of energy, out of water using sunlight...

...This newly-developed nanostructure will also be highly practical in the solar energy conversion field, since electric energy can be produced by the structure as well in an environmentally-friendly way.

Professor Lee projected, “The results of this research will greatly contribute to the improvement of clean energy-based industries by changing the traditional energy production system. When this technology is commercialized and the energy storing technology is more advanced together afterwards, home appliances and even automobiles can be operated with only water, without any infusion of electricity or fuel from outside.”...MORE
http://www.businesskorea.co.kr/article/6362/fueling-cars-water-korean-research-team-develops-tech-mass-produce-hydrogen

Future Fuel Now

[NYC_SKP]

1. Wrong in so many ways. Water is NOT fucking fuel. Please.

the sun is the source of energy in this scheme, it's actually nuclear energy.

Hydrogen is the medium, the energy storage medium, if you will, you can even call it fuel if you like.

Water is simply the raw material from which the hydrogen is derived using whatever primary source one likes.

We can and do derive hydrogen using coal as the primary source.

Calling water "fuel" is, to be kind, bad science and poor used of terms.

[ret5hd]

4. I suppose you could make the exact same arguments about oil...

The sun is the ultimate source of that energy also.

But I believe that insistence on strict adherance to a precise literary exactness from a business article to be pedantic and boring.
But that's just me.

Also, I think you meant "use" instead of "used". Just sayin'.

[caraher]

14. Not really

This matters a lot because once you invest in making carbon-neutral electricity, you want to use the energy efficiently. If you want to power transportation, you can charge a battery that then runs an electric motor, or you can go through the electrolysis and a fuel cell to make the electricity. The latter process is going to be much less efficient in most instances, even taking the most optimistic industry figures for the efficiencies of those two steps.

This isn't an arid academic distinction, it really matters in terms of making good policy. My bullshit meter immediately pegs the instant I see "Fueling cars with water." It's pure propaganda, trying to hoodwink the credulous into belief in a technological silver bullet.

[CentralMass]

2. Very interesting. Thank you for posting it.

Cost effective production of hydrogen seems to be like the search for the Holy Grail. I hope it pans out.

The last time I looked into it, I read that using electricity to charge electro chemical batteries in electric vehicles utilizes the energy ~6X more efficiently than using it to convert water into hydrogen.

[nationalize the fed]

3. If the resources of the US were not being wasted

on surveillance, drones and regime changes much could be done to make hydrogen electrolysis cheaper.

But the US has places to bomb and regimes to change.

Here's an animation of a working Solar Hydrogen station in Emeryville Ca.

Look outside on a sunny day. That sunlight could be making hydrogen. But it's gone to waste. Because the US has better things to do- like rule the world, and spread Fracking to Ukraine, where Joe Biden's son has been given a seat on Ukraines largest gas company.

TIME.com July 7, 2014: An obscure private Ukrainian natural gas company has been hiring friends and family of Secretary of State John Kerry and Vice President Joe Biden, while seeking to influence Congress
http://time.com/2964493/ukraine-joe-biden-son-hunter-burisma/

[CentralMass]

5. I maybe wrong but I don't believe that the laws of physics

allow much wiggle room on making the electrolysis of water for the production of hydrogen much more efficient then it already is.

Having said that producing hydrogen with electricity for use as an energy carrier to power vehicles is not efficient or cost effective. Using electric vehicle at this point in time is much more efficient.

The energy required for electrolysis to convert water to hydrogen, then compress it , then convert it it into either mechanical energy through combustion or back to electrical via a fuel cell then to mechanical via electric motors has inefficiencies.

The most cost effective method of producing hydrogen in volume is by reforming natural gas by adding thermal energy (steam) to convert it to hydrogen and carbon byproducts and even that method makes it cost ineffective.

[dumbcat]

6. I find that video slightly misleading.

Near the end of the video it says the facility pictured can produce up to 360 kG of H2 per day, implying that the energy to do so comes from the solar panels. ("the facility can produce&quot

Those look like about the size of 250 watt STC panels. Nine of them would produce 2.25kW. Given the annual average 5 hours of equivalent sun per day in the LA area, they could produce at most 11.25kWHr of energy per day. Current electrolyzer technology takes approx. 46 kWHr of electricity to produce 1 kG of H2. Therefore those solar panels have the capability to produce, at most, 0.25 kG of H2 per day. That is the equivalent of about a half gallon of gasoline. That's not going to get the bus very far.

The energy to produce the other 359.75 kG of H2 comes from the grid, and from whatever assortment of energy sources serves the LA area. That would require another 16,548.5 kWHr from the grid per day. At the average LA electricity cost of $0.21/kWHr that's $3310 per day. That $3310 will produce the equivalent of 497 gal of gasoline (at 33.41 kWHr per gal equivalent with the current electrolyzers) for a cost of $6.66/gal equiv. of gasoline. (And that doesn't include the amortization of the capital cost of the facility.)

So, it's cool. I like it. I would like to have one if someone else paid for the electricity. Someday it will probably be cost effective. But for now, I would buy gasoline at $4.25/gal.

I like math.

Anyone see any holes in my math? I got most of the energy and conversion factors at the DOE hydrogen fuel cell website, which I don't have handy right now.

[CentralMass]

7. I trust that your math may be better than mine but it looks resonable

If I could purchase a hydrogen powered
vehicle at an affordable cost and be able to "fill it up" for the equivalent of ~$5/gallon, I'd be driving one.

Some quick data on the Electric Nissan Leaf
http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/news/2011/12/leaf-volt-tests-show-electric-cars-cost-less-per-mile-to-operate/index.htm
"
The pure electric Nissan Leaf costs just 3.5 cents a mile based on the national average of 11 cents/kWh of electricity. That’s less than half of what it costs to drive the most fuel-efficient four-door car we’ve tested, the Toyota Prius. (This calculation doesn’t include other costs such as maintenance or depreciation. But maintenance on an electric car is theoretically miniscule compared with gasoline cars. And depreciation is unknown for such a new technology.)"

[dumbcat]

8. May I ask where you got the figure for

national average electricity cost? I ask because I spent some time this morning while composing the above analysis looking for the current commercial electricity rates in the LA area. I found a BUNCH of pages, from all sorts of sources, showing national averages and specific cities, but they varied all over the charts. I don't remember which site it was, but I think it was a DOE site, that gave the current national average price at $0.14/kWHr, which sounds fairly reasonable to me. We have very low rates here in Texas and I am paying 10-11 cents per kWHr. I'm just wondering where you got your price of 11 cents for the national average from? Thanks.

[CentralMass]

9. That was Consumer Reports figure.

[dumbcat]

12. Thanks

I went and looked at the latest figures from DOE for July 2014 and they are also saying about 11 cents.

[CentralMass]

10. Also, did you include the amount of power required to compress the hydrogen ?

[dumbcat]

11. Yes, I think so

I think the 46 kWHr per kG of H2 figure I used includes the energy to compress it to some delivery pressure, but I can't remember what it was. I had that figure in my notes from a previous analysis of another production system a while back. I wish I had kept better notes as to my source. I think it may have been here:
http://www.hydrogen.energy.gov/annual_review14_proceedings.html

Also lots of good info here:
http://www.hydrogen.energy.gov/

[CentralMass]

13. Here is another interesting link.

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