Hydrogen Fuel Cells Are Becoming Too Big to Ignore

Discussion in 'Fuel Cell Vehicles' started by usbseawolf2000, Oct 27, 2015.

  1. john1701a

    john1701a Prius Guru

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    Yes and the improvements that have resulted in response to those initial misleading sources.

    Intentional or not, it did happen and we've had a struggle to get everyone on the same page since then.
     
  2. Zythryn

    Zythryn Senior Member

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    You are so adept at changing the meaning of words people use.
    My comment was, "For some of them...".

    For some Prius drivers the only thing that matters is the gallons saved. Would it be correct to imply GHG emissions don't matter to any of them because it doesn't matter to some?
     
  3. john1701a

    john1701a Prius Guru

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    So was mine. Nothing was changed. When would "all" ever apply?
     
    #123 john1701a, Nov 10, 2015
    Last edited: Nov 10, 2015
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  4. hill

    hill High Fiber Member

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    well when all ya got is smoke in stead of truth - you gotta light one up. I tend to feel a bit sad when he's forced to present this chart as proof - again & again. The motley fool article could have just as easily been titled "too ridiculous to ignore "
    .
     
    #124 hill, Nov 10, 2015
    Last edited: Nov 10, 2015
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  5. austingreen

    austingreen Senior Member

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    trying to google, all the links seem to talk about saving gas by using electric miles. Still Ok, I believe you there could have been older stories that I missed or didn't pay attention to when I read. If they did, bad gm like bad nissan for doing that.

    Still you have to agree that using that old slide from 2009, with the bad numbers does and misleading idea everything is natural gas, should be retired. I mean you have to at least use current numbers, which toyota says are about a wash.

    BEVs and FCVs when using ccgt and smr use similar methane per mile when hydrogen is made on site of the fcv and ccgt uses grid average efficiency, and epa numbers. YMMV.

    BEVs are at least twice as efficient as FCVs when using electricity, renewable or otherwise. YMMV

    It was on toyota's 2009 slides, but often forgotten that they also talk about nuclear or coal to make the hydrogen. Toyota is planning on using Kawasaki Heavy Industry (KHI) to produced hydrogen from brown coal in australia, sequester the carbon dioxide and hopefully the sulfur and mercury, then ship the hydrogen to Japan. This is a lot less efficient than SMR locally or ccgt, but it may be less expensive for hydrogen in Japan.

    Brown coal for a cleaner future in hybrid cars | Mining Australia


    Australian coal to power FCV boom - motoring.com.au


    Note the DOE was going to build a pilot plant IGCC that produced hydrogen, but this was cancelled when low natural gas prices made using coal instead of natural gas a bad decision in the US.
     
  6. usbseawolf2000

    usbseawolf2000 HSD PhD

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    Which slide are you talking about?
    You are quoting me out of context.

    The first one quoted was for cabin heat recycling waste heat through cogeneration at the vehicle level. Upstream fuel production was irrelevant.

    Second one quoted was talking about cogeneration ability (the lack of), specifically for BEVs. You pointed out I did not mention upstream loss for gas and H2 upstream so I posted a chart that included all.
    Oh yes, they were. The compared their bloated MPG (consumption) with the regular Prius MPG (fuel efficiency).

    First few year Volts do not even display how many kWh it used but instead it displayed a bloated MPG. After John and I criticized, GM included kWh in 2013 model.
    +1
    Beautiful. That was what we were asking for. EV miles driven by electricity with kWh consumed and gas miles by gallons.

    The combined MPGe saves the extra calculation work. That sure may disappoint/confuse the Gen1 Volt drivers.
     
    #126 usbseawolf2000, Nov 10, 2015
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  7. austingreen

    austingreen Senior Member

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    The one you keep posting with natural gas. The way to get toyota's number is to use california electricity with nukes and hydro not counted to power the compressors, while for the plug-in they assume national grid natural gas, I'm guessing circa 2004.

    Then there are the other ones the CFCP puts out that Toyota also promotes, figuring 0 ghg for grid tied wind or solar produced hydrogen, but no credit for solar or wind tied plug-ins, those fall to the national grid.

    Majority of plug-in drivers are concerned about gas usage. That bloated MPG, which is really the actual mpg of gasoline since it is running on electricity most of the miles. That is certainly a key figure as are gallons per year for plug-in buyers. There is nothing wrong with that number, other than volt drivers wanted fewer gas miles and more electric ones, and the gen II increased electric range.

    Now the second point, sounds like a more real point that they should have also included kwh, or m/kwh on the display. It sounds like Jeff N could get an estimate of this from volts stat, but moving it to the display is definitely better. Bad GM for not including this easy driver information aid from the begining.
    [/quote]
    +1
    Beautiful. That was what we were asking for. EV miles driven by electricity with kWh consumed and gas miles by gallons.

    The combined MPGe saves the extra calculation work. That sure may disappoint/confuse the Gen1 Volt drivers.[/QUOTE]
    It would be even a better guestimate if they used kwh from the plug, I believe gm has good estimates of this.
     
  8. usbseawolf2000

    usbseawolf2000 HSD PhD

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    This is pure conjecture from you.
    Total BS. That point may hold ground if a similar number was also provided for electricity.

    Don't Volt driver want to know their kWh usage?
     
  9. austingreen

    austingreen Senior Member

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    No the efficiency on the slide for well to pump number for hydrogen came from the cfcp, which used the california grid to come up with the number. The number for BEVs uses a completely different number. Really source the number? Why would toyota now be saying about the same if they really believed that fuel cell vehicles are still so much more efficient? Today's grid is more efficient though -) and BEVs are much more efficient that toyota assumed in that slide. Please stop pretending it is accurate. Soon we should have an actual number for hydrogen ghg in california. Then it will be much easier to compare, as long as they use the same rules and don't assume all the plug-ins are charged out of state.

    I'm not sure where you saw bs in my response. MPG is a key metric.
    I do agree that they should have included kwh or m/kwh originally as they do now. Yes volt owners want this data also, and gm changed fixed it. As I said, bad gm for not including it the first time.
     
  10. Trollbait

    Trollbait It's a D&D thing

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    We all know the California grid can divert electrons made by wind and solar to hydrogen production. It even swaps the electrons from a home PV system with fossil fuel made ones for that purpose.

    Your main issue is carbon emissions. That is not true of all those getting plug ins.If its energy independence and national security, they may not care what their domestic energy consumption is.

    That said, GM should have included it in the beginning. With customer feed back, they have fixed the oversight.
     
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  11. Jeff N

    Jeff N The answer is 0042

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    This issue is only present in the 2011 Volt. It was an issue of limited screen real estate. In the 2012 model year the "total miles driven" display area was changed to display the kWh used from the battery as documented in this article:

    Subtle Changes for the 2012 VOLT - GM-VOLT : Chevy Volt Electric Car Site GM-VOLT : Chevy Volt Electric Car Site

    So, this issue is present in less than 5% of the Volts on the road since 4,488 model year 2011 Volts were made out of the just over 100,000 Volts produced so far.

    Give it a rest already.... :)
     
    #131 Jeff N, Nov 11, 2015
    Last edited: Nov 11, 2015
  12. usbseawolf2000

    usbseawolf2000 HSD PhD

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    Complete BS. See PiP screen with limited screen real estate.

    SAE recommended not to mix the miles of EV and Gas when computing MPG.

    GM did it anyway. It was their strategy to sell Volt with "the bigger the number, the better" approach.

    Volt owners to this day, on the forums and facebook, continue to compare the bloated MPG with fuel economy MPG of hybrids. Either they have no shame or are ignorants.
     
  13. john1701a

    john1701a Prius Guru

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    Those particular owners have no shame. Even after terse exchanges many times pointing out the blatant misleading by omission, they keep doing it anyway.

    But what really soils the reputation of owners are the enablers who watch it happen time and time again, never bothering to speak out about the poor behavior.

    It's quite telling when you see that. A strong candidate for mainstream acceptance wouldn't rely upon such actions. The data should speak for itself.

    Using MPG alone doesn't tell the whole story.
     
    #133 john1701a, Nov 11, 2015
    Last edited: Nov 11, 2015
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  14. Jeff N

    Jeff N The answer is 0042

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    The fact is that the EPA was indeed evaluating a proposal to add a "bogus mpg" estimate to the window sticker but ultimately decided not to.

    The European equivalent to the EPA window sticker did actually adopt a similar proposal and the 2011 Volt got 196 mpg (US) or just over 230 mpg (UK). If a 2016 Volt were estimated this way for NEDC it would get a much higher estimate due to the increased battery range. The BMW i3 REx gets an estimate of 470.8 mpg (UK).

    This is just one of several different ways of measuring fuel or electricity consumption and it is completely valid although incomplete. I agree that it can sometimes be misleading but it is a useful metric for driver's whose primary interest is to reduce gasoline consumption for national security or other reasons.

    Another way is to exclude the electric miles and only measure gasoline used during the miles traveled after battery depletion and this is also completely valid although incomplete by itself since it does not tell you the gasoline avoided due to the car's electric battery range.

    The only way to get a complete picture is to use multiple different measurements.
     
    #134 Jeff N, Nov 11, 2015
    Last edited: Nov 11, 2015
  15. San_Carlos_Jeff

    San_Carlos_Jeff Active Member

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    Since you seem to feel this is so egregious and rampant among Volt owners I suggest you start monitoring the PiP forum so you can set them straight too. I just did a search and the first thread I found (999 MPG Club | PriusChat) has owners discussing mpg with no mention about electricity used. Those poor shameless ignorant people ;-)
     
  16. john1701a

    john1701a Prius Guru

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    They stopped 2 years ago, perhaps the result of that nagging.
     
  17. usbseawolf2000

    usbseawolf2000 HSD PhD

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  18. Zythryn

    Zythryn Senior Member

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    Good, I hope you set this guy straight...
    Seriously, this all about context. In some conversations not mentioning the electricity used is appropriate.
    To grow the alternative fuel market, you have to have something that appeals to people other than efficiency.

    If I can get 100 people to save 20% of their GHG emissions it is far better than getting 2 people to save 80%.
     
  19. Jeff N

    Jeff N The answer is 0042

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    Neither would a screenshot of a Prius Plug-in driven 79.8 miles by an auto journalist during a media "first drive" event, of course.

    If my "Volt top 10 MPGe" were merged into the PiP top 20 MPGe list I would be #7 in my 2011 Volt with 35 miles of official EV range at 95 MPGe and 37 mpg EPA hybrid estimates.

    6. vvillovv - 119.5 MPGe (3280 miles, 89% EV, 140EV MPGe)
    Jeff N - 115.7 MPGe (1,012 miles, 91% EV, 133.5 EV MPGe)
    7. giora - 114.3 MPGe (1377 miles, 75% EV, 166 EV MPGe)

    Volt - Top 10 MPGe | PriusChat

    If I instead had a 2016 Volt I would easily be in the top 5 and that's with my commute on the highway rather than on country roads at 20 mph like the very top MPGe entries on your PiP list.

    And, with the new Volt's display screen, I wouldn't have to hand calculate the MPGe result each day.
     
    #139 Jeff N, Nov 11, 2015
    Last edited: Nov 11, 2015
  20. usbseawolf2000

    usbseawolf2000 HSD PhD

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    I set everyone straight, regardless of which plugin owner. I continue to educate the difference between consumption MPG and fuel economy MPG.
    Again, come up with a new acronym for that and everything would be fine. Do not confuse the traditional use of MPG as a fuel economy figure rather than how much gas is consumed in bi-fuel vehicle.