There
is an awful lot of talk today about hydrogen fuel cells as the savior for
today's ecology unfriendly cars. I still don't fully understand why
liberals and so called "environmentalists" will get behind a
losing proposition with such enthusiasm. Losing proposition?
Yes.
Even if the fuel cell cars are perfected it would take years or decades to get to a point where 70 or 80% of the national fleet of cars was a fuel cell car. There is very little push for a hydrogen system that uses existing internal combustion technology. If such a move were made the conversion of the entire national fleet of cars could take place in a few short years.
The process to convert a gasoline engine to hydrogen is complicated but not unfeasible and really not that difficult. The fuel injection system would have to be converted to deliver a gas instead of a liquid. The computer would have to be replaced or reprogrammed. The gas tank replaced with hydrogen tanks. The exhaust system should be converted to stainless steel.
Here is the problem with fuel cell cars. Weight, weight and more weight. Recently a fuel cell car was announced that was 20-30% smaller than a Honda Civic but weighs 60% more! The car made an impressive 107hp and even more impressive 200 lb/ft of torque. But to have a car that weighs 3700 pounds that would only weigh half that if it were a conventional car does not make sense.
A fuel cell car is fairly simple. It is an electric car with an electric motor. Instead of batteries that need recharging, the electric motor is powered by fuel cells. Fuel cells covert hydrogen into electricity through a chemical reaction. When the cells are depleted of hydrogen the user refills the hydrogen tank and drives on. The fuel cells are heavy and thus the amount of electricity required to move the car is increased due to the weight, the only way to increase power in the electric motor is to use more of it, thus either give up driving range or increase power cells. The latter requires guess what? yes, more heavy fuel cells.
Engineers
may argue that the internal combustion (IC) engine is just about as
refined as it can get at this point. It is not an efficient engine
either. IC engines are at best 35% efficient. (efficiency
is the amo-
unt
of power that actually is usable for the task of the engine or
motor. the rest is wasted or recovered for secondary uses such as a
car heater) This is due to a loss of heat through friction of parts
and dissipation of heat. Electric motors are far more efficient
often above 85% Electric motors are also easier to maintain and
repair. The IC engine of course already has an enormous maintenance
and repair industry in place. IC engines can be made to produce
insane amounts of power so easily that the 65% loss or waste is almost
moot.
Wouldn't it be nice to be able to drive a Corvette and produce less pollution than a Toyota Prius Hybrid? If we stop listening to the oil companies and the environmentalists, we can. Hydrogen is the answer and so is the internal combustion engine.