Posted on 07/15/2008 5:26:14 PM PDT by K-oneTexas
Can Hydrogen Cars Reduce America’s Oil Dependence?
NO, NO and NO.
Natural Gas can.
No, they can but only with the burning of coal.
I’m all in favor of continuing research and development of alternative energy and updated technology in cars. But the enviros take it to the extreme to get us off of fossil fuels no matter what. I would bet anyone that the vast majority of cars in America will still be using gasoline and diesel 20 or 30 years from now. Whatever shifts in energy and techonology will be very slow in coming.
And that shows how short sighted the Democrats / liberal / enviro radicals are. Even if it takes years to fully develop oil fields, we still need to develop those resources, becaue their pie in the sky alternative forms of energy are not going to totally replace the internal combustion engine any time soon.
IF,IF, we ALL drove some kind of hydrogen, nat gas car, how long would it take for the FEDS to add a TAX on it to compensate for lost GASOLINE revenues ????
Boondoggle at its best.
Biodiesel from Algae growing on sewage.
Biodiesel from Algae growing on sewage.
Biodiesel from Algae growing on sewage.
I’m kind of wondering what the water vapor coming out of the tailpipe would look like in January in Northern Wisconsin. Would it be a large ice plug in the tailpipe or a nice ice stripe on the road?
Note that Honda introduced this car and its technology under the most limited possible circumstances, with a few leased vehicles in a small geographic area.
Envirotech is big time valuable in branding these days. Honda doesn’t care if the tech works; they just want the PR
and branding association with Honda Motor. Shockingly, the MSM and enviros eat up the feel good propaganda, with nary a hint at whether the tech will ever be introduced in a serious way.
The conclusion forgot to mention the cost in fuel/mile traveled and H2 exceeds them all in costs. I have heard numerous critics of viable, renewable, ETOH tout H2 as a great alternative. Right!
Thanks for the article.
“running a car on hydrogen doesn’t reduce net carbon dioxide emissions compared with a hybrid like the Prius running on gasoline”
Hogwash. If we used nuculer* energy to strip the O from H20 we would have and excellent internal combustion and fuel cell fuel for our future cars and the entire process would emit NO carbon dioxide nor any other pollutant.
* If nuculer is good enough for President Bush, it’s good enough for me.
Where is the infrastructure for such a process and who wants a car running on crap? Very small joke. But still, the infrastructure and the fact that algae doesn’t grow on sewage in the winter of many northern states.
You make a very good point. Or would it end up iceing the road.
It takes electricity to generate hydrogen through electrolosis of water. You can generate electricity using oil, coal, natural gas or nuclear. In lesser amounts electricity can be generated by hydro-electric, wind and solar. Every energy conversion will likely have less than 50% efficiency, likely more like 25%. The conversions are:
1. Fuel to Electricity
2. Electricity to Hydrogen
3. Hydrogen to Motive force in a car
The very best you can hope for is about 12.5% of the fuel or source of energy as an efficiency if every conversion were the impossible 50
5 efficiency, but more likely the 25% per conversion high end efficiency today would be around (get this) 1.6%. It seems it would be better using fuel directly in our engines for a possible 25% efficiency
Yes. But only if combined with nuclear power. Otherwise, you are just wasting power.
I second natural gas. Conversions are done in England all the time on Land Rovers & Range Rovers.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.