Toyota to announce hydrogen fuel cell breakthrough

Honda's next gen solar-powered hydrogen fuel cell station for home use

 

.5kg per 8 hour overnight 'charge'?
So that is, according to Honda, about 30 miles.
I can get that in an electric car plugging into a standard 110 outlet.

Combined with hydrogen fueling stations this isn't too bad, depending upon the costs. But for convenience, I'll stick with my 200 mile overnight charge with a standard NEMA 14-50 outlet.

 

But if I fill the car at night, and it's solar powered...

Great that Honda engineers reduced to size and improved the efficiency. It's neat that they got rid of the compressor. The Clarity uses the lower pressure tanks though. So this system might not be able to fill a 10k psi tank unless it is partially empty.

Yes, simply charging a BEV gives you more miles per watt used than making hydrogen at home. This is likely only intended as a stop gap until the infrastructure expands though. At least Honda is attempting to answer that in some manner.

 

you can make the hydrogen during the day, and put it in the car at night, but that likely requires a compressor Really the grid is more efficient if you grid tie the solar, and use non peak power at night.

No its not a stop gap, its likely a mistake. Charging at home is an advantage of plug-ins, that honda has been trying to apply to cng and hydrogen. The problem is it does not work well.

Ford and GM have talked about adding a bigger battery and a plug. Say it was a 20 mile range, instead of 0.5kg (30 mile range), it still would be much more efficient and keep you from needing to refuel as offten, or.... you could give it a 50 mile electrical range and only use hydrogen on long trips. These bigger batteries allow smaller less expensive fuel cells, but you still need the same big hydrogen tanks.

 

Yep, Honda should just focus on the hydrogen generator with this. Drop the solar part, but always stress the home solar or wind opportunity. Perhaps even tie in their home NG electric and heating cogen units.

I agree. The properties of hydrogen, either compressed or liquidified, make it a poor choice to power small vehicles. Fuel cells might work out as a range extender for plug ins in the future though.

My golf clap for Honda is that they acknowledge the infrastructure issue of hydrogen, and are looking at solutions beyond getting the government to build it.

CNG home filling may have been before its time. Honda started pursuing it before the heavy fracking increased supply, and looking for options to replace oil were serious. Now trucking is starting to switch to CNG, and there are GM bi-fuel pick ups available. So the station network could start to expand. So home filling could work for commuting and local stuff, while there are stations for trips.

It will still be a small market compared to BEVs and PHVs, but probably would have done better started now.

 

The Honda's home fuelling for cng cost $5000. Unless they have had some serious cost cutting I can't see this as viable. I am sure this home hydrogen thing has been in the works for years, but its not going anywhere.

Honda has entered a fuel cell partnership with GM, and since gm is looking at fuel cells as more of a range extender then perhaps honda will go this way also.

bifuel cng/gasoline makes some sense with home refueling if stations can come down in cost. $5000 seems crazy expensive for a filling station.

 

Yes, the CNG home filling station costs were high. If introduced with the lower NG prices of today, along with the greater push to move from foreign oil, there may have been more interest in it. Which could have spurned on development and pressure to lower the price.

As it is, the Phil company eventually went under, and I don't know if a home station is even available.

Back to the OP, did Toyota ever say anything new about their FCEV at the show?

 

No. The stars of the show were all plug-ins. I didn't see one article written during the show, where the fcv-r was even mentioned. Perhaps Toyota changed their mind. It was the wrong place to issue another press release saying no one wants plug-ins. Perhaps Toyota will change the marketing message when they announce any new technical details.

 

Toyota to Debut Fuel Cell Vehicle at Tokyo Motor Show, Will Not be a Lexus

Daily Kanban drives Toyota’s 2015 fuel cell car, talks to its father | Daily Kanban

 

Nice we have some details.

Modified lexus hs (toyota sai) chassis, which puts it at about the same size as the clarity or prius. 5 kg fuel capacity in 2 tanks. 300 mile range (probably closer to epa than what toyota claims were in the past), which if it leaves 10% as reserve hydrogen would give it a 67 mpge efficiency. No tests but that fits in the ballpark of improvements compared to a clarity (10% more efficient after some more work). Who knows toyota could squeeze a little more efficiency out of it by the time of very limited production in 2015.

I did like this more honest description of the production plans

Bloomberg's take
Toyota Shows Hydrogen Prototype in Race Toward Fuel Cells - Bloomberg

 

With the recent cold snap we are having lots of accidents due to 'black ice'.
Very dry, no snow for days. Many are attributing the extreme black ice to condensing and freezing exhaust.
At temperatures like this, -10 to -20f, exhaust actually does sink to the road surface undisturbed.

My question is this, just how much water is emitted by hydrogen vehicles?
It takes very cold weather to turn car exhaust to ice. If that exhaust is simply water vapor it would freeze to road surfaces much more easily, would it not?

 

From a gasoline ICE exhaust, 20% is already water vapour. In a hydrogen FC, it is 100%.

 

True, but I am wondering the quantity, not percentage.
Basically wondering how much more, or less, exhaust a hydrogen car will put on the road.
If it is the same amount, does that mean we will be getting 5 times the black ice?
And at warmer temps as well?

I suppose that in the initial roll out area in California, it won't be an issue. But if they plan to roll this out in northern climates it may be an issue worth investigating.

 

I certainly do not agree on blaming exhaust gases alone on black ice formation...they can contribute, according to

The Straight Dope: Is there really such a thing as "black ice"?

In places where cars idle (such as driveways, toll plazas, and intersections), automobile exhaust can be an important contributor.

 

when is the 'breakthrough' coming?

 

Oh, I completely agree with you. It is just one of a number of factors.
However, if you raise one contributing factor, you still get a rise in the occurances.

This may be a complete non issue as their very well may be much less exhaust from a hydrogen car, so even if it is 100% water vapor! overall it will not have a greater effect. I was just wondering if anyone has come across any info on this.

 

CES 2014: Toyota says fuel-cell car has 310-mile range

There doesn't appear to be any new information @CES, just a rehype of the previous information, but please if there is some and I missed it, inform us.

Since the car has been planned for 2015 since 2009, I guess its every time they put out a press release
Green Car Congress: Toyota Plans Limited Consumer Sales of Hydrogen Fuel-Cell Vehicles by 2015

In the next decade less than 0.1% black ice forming exhaust from fcv. I really think this is a black swan question. How many fuel cell vehicles do you think will be driven in places that they can produce black ice when there are few hydrogen refuelling stations, and are not going to be many cars on the road. By the time fuel cells are in cold climates, if they ever get there, I expect they will have big batteries and can shut down the fuel cells during long idles.

I think they have enough problems making them worthwile in california. I really doubt anyone but CARB and the fuel cell lobby thinks these things will be popular in indiana.

 

In about ten years, given enough money for research......

 

From the trail of press releases 2009-2015, toyota belives the breakthroughs have already happened. All they need now is for governments to pay to get the cars on the road.

From the pretty graphs the DOE puts out, prices will drop for fuel cells at about quantities of 50,000. Perhaps all the car companies could share them and make one large batch with the best tech. I still don't know if a fuel cell volt cost the same as a chevy volt, 50,000 people would raise their hands to get one. I mean a phev can drive the whole country, while a fuel cell would be restricted to california.

 

By mass, or by volume?

My impression was that the basic energy in gasoline is roughly evenly split between carbon and hydrogen. If the carbon is abolished, without any change in energy efficiency, then we need twice as much hydrogen, so the amount of water vapor from a hydrogen vehicle should be just 2X that of a gasoline vehicle. At worst.

But hydrogen vehicles should be essentially EVs with hydrogen tanks. Today's EVs are considerably more efficient than traditional ICE vehicles, so the multiplier should be much less than 2X, possibly even less than 1X. And they won't need to emit anything while stopped at intersections and in traffic jams, so that icing mechanism should be reduced.

Plus they needn't emit that constant heat that melts nature's snow on the road underneath the engine compartment, so I'm not expecting anything worse than we have right now.