GM and Honda are working together to develop FCV

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The two automakers are said to be working together on new technology.

GM has expertise in some technologies that are especially applicable to mass-market fuel cells, like the ability to apply very thin but uniform coatings to parts. Meanwhile, Honda has been able to reduce the size of its fuel-cell apparatus, called a "stack," to about the same size as its 3.5-liter V6 engine.

If Honda is contributing advances in size, and GM is contributing advances that help lower costs, it's easy to see how the two might have decided to team up.


http://www.fool.com/investing/general/20...er.aspx?ref=yfp


If I bet my money on either Honda/Toyota FCV(Fuel Cell Vehicle) or Tesla EV(Eletric Vehicle), I would bet on Tesla.
 
Remove all political bias, agendas and taxpayers money and it's really anyone's guess which technology would stand on its own feet. My guess is that neither would in the next 30 years or so.

Fuel cells have a big problem to overcome, bigger than EVs, because as of right now, we use electricity to produce hydrogen. Since our current infrastructure cannot support charging of widespread EVs, it will certainly not support the production of hydrogen needed for fuel cells.
 
This worries me, since GM has sold EV patents to oil companies in the past, and I'm not sure they have learned from their mistakes.
 
Currently, the majority of hydrogen (95%) is produced from fossil fuels by steam reforming or partial oxidation of methane and coal gasification with only a small quantity by other routes such as biomass gasification or electrolysis of water.

That's according to Wikipedia reference from 1999, so it can't be wrong. But, energy.gov uses the same 95% figure.
 
Originally Posted By: Nate1979
Fuel cells are the technology of the future. Always has been and always will be.


I agree, I think you pretty much nailed it!
crackmeup2.gif
 
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Originally Posted By: slacktide_bitog
This worries me, since GM has sold EV patents to oil companies in the past, and I'm not sure they have learned from their mistakes.


Patents eventually expire.
 
Originally Posted By: KrisZ
Remove all political bias, agendas and taxpayers money and it's really anyone's guess which technology would stand on its own feet. My guess is that neither would in the next 30 years or so.

Fuel cells have a big problem to overcome, bigger than EVs, because as of right now, we use electricity to produce hydrogen. Since our current infrastructure cannot support charging of widespread EVs, it will certainly not support the production of hydrogen needed for fuel cells.

Currently, the dated electrical infrastructure doesn't support charging millions or tens of millions EV, but it will change in 5, 10 and 20 years.

So far there are two competing alternate zero emission vehicles. Tesla and European companies concentrate on battery EV, Japanese (Honda and Toyota and may be others) are working/promoting fuel cell(currently hydrogen only) EV.

More alternate energies(wind, solar or others that we don't know yet) are developed and built, we need to phase out fossil fuel. Not in 5-10 years but in 20-30 or 50 years.

Currently battery EV is winning because owners can charge at home using existing outlet or slight upgrade to higher wattage.

Hydrogen filling stations are scared, only few are currently available and mostly in Southern California. The cost of building a hydrogen filling station with several pumps is estimated at a million dollar, therefore not many investors want to invest that large sump of money for few Toyota FCV.
 
Originally Posted By: HTSS_TR


More alternate energies(wind, solar or others that we don't know yet) are developed and built, we need to phase out fossil fuel. Not in 5-10 years but in 20-30 or 50 years.


Unless there are some SERIOUS advances in solar cell and wind turbine technology, they are NOT going to meet the increasing demands on the grid from electric vehicles. A $3.5 million dollar wind turbine is ~2MW, a 200 acre solar field is around 10MW. A single hydro electric dam can be thousands of MW (the Robert-Bourassa dam in Quebec is 5,616MW with 16 turbines) and an ECR-1000 CANDU reactor is 1,200MW.

I am truly amazed at the lack of the pursuit of hydro electric, the "original green" energy source. It is proven and reliable and existing dams can always be upgraded with more modern higher output turbines.
 
I truly don't know much about alternate energies.

The Federal government and some states are promoting zero emission vehicles in the form of rebate(s). Currently there are only 2 ZEV's, battery and fuel cell.

If they are promoting BEV then they should know it needs electric, they should know the state of current power grid and the need of upgrading it, for future usage with many more BEV coming online.

Solar efficiency are improving(slowly), more rooftop solar are installed every year, home batteries are under development and should be able to store some power during the day to use at night and to charge battery in the BEV.

Yes, hydro electric is the best green energy in term of cost, land use, minimum damage to environment ... Many states for some reasons don't like it, even some states demolished some dames that used to generate electric the last 15-20 years. May be because it interferes with some fish migration.

The bottom line is, zero emission vehicles are coming, the infrastructures are need to change/upgrade to cope with it, how it is done is another question.
 
The current state of electrical production is borrowing from Peter to pay Paul. The same people who push for electric vehicles, are the same ones who ensure that no new nuclear or coal powerplants get built.

To replace even a fraction of the fossil fueled vehicles with electric cars would require an epic increase in the production of energy. There is simply no way to do this, regardless of how efficient the tech becomes. Even at 100% efficiency, charging a battery in less than 10 minutes requires the same energy that will currently power hundreds of homes.

With an unlimited budget, unlimited manpower, and tech that doesn't even exist, this is literally impossible.

There's only so much energy sent down by the sun for a given area, only so much energy in a given flow of water, and only so much energy in a given force and area of wind. There is a limit to this whole affair.

Either our current usage of coal fossil fuel will be multiplied by a staggering amount, or this whole thing just isn't going to happen.

People like to forget where these batteries come from too. Here is the "green" future of your planet with electric vehicles:





But hey, as long as this goes down outside of US borders, then we're totally saving the environment.
 
Originally Posted By: DoubleWasp
The current state of electrical production is borrowing from Peter to pay Paul. The same people who push for electric vehicles, are the same ones who ensure that no new nuclear or coal powerplants get built.


That's just it. The amount of money the Ontario government has pi$$ed into the wind on solar and wind turbines they could have EASILY added the four ACR-1000's to Darlington that they were planning (with money to spare), which would have upped its capacity by 4,800MW, eclipsing Bruce and making it the most powerful nuke plant in the world (a title Bruce currently holds). But the argument AGAINST allowing that construction was that we had too much power capacity already (despite the project initially and the environmental assessment both being approved) and so it was put on hold. People charging up their EV's would quickly turn that surplus into a deficit I'd wager, as you've noted.

But nooooo, they want to mine precious metals and pollute the air in China to build their turbines and solar panels so they can drive around in their electric vehicles here pretending that this stuff is happening on another planet
smirk.gif


I was just down east visiting my parents as my wife was aiding her grandmother whose husband just passed. Amherst, NS has no bloody money. The roads are a disaster, their healthcare system is SCARY, but they've built five brand new wind turbines on the marsh between Aulac and Amherst, so they've roughly spent 15 million dollars. Since Amherst is in a decline, I'm doubting there was an energy deficit there. Now, this is possibly one of the BEST spots for wind turbines location-wise, since it is right on the bottom of the bay of Fundy and windy basically 24/7/365, HOWEVER, when the local infrastructure is in such a horrific state of disrepair, it would seem that again the priorities of "appearing green" trounced the financial obligations of proper upkeep and maintenance of the county.

Had this been Sackville, which is on the NB side and has much deeper pockets due to being a University town there wouldn't be much room to say anything. Sackville is currently putting in all new sidewalks downtown and are replacing all the downtown streets, they are in good shape.
 
There are many conflicting interests in improving power grid, how it will play out I have no idea, but one thing I know for sure is ZEV(BEV/FCV) are coming. Most European countries and North America and China/Japan are promoting it.

There is no way to kill ZEV now. Technologies are changing every few decades, the world needs to adapt to new tech sooner or later.
 
Originally Posted By: HTSS_TR
If I bet my money on either Honda/Toyota FCV(Fuel Cell Vehicle) or Tesla EV(Eletric Vehicle), I would bet on Tesla.

What is the criteria of the bet - who releases a viable product first? The auto manufacturers have a significant advantage in bringing new technology to the market. How Toyota brought the hybrid gas / electric is one example.

I understand auto MFG's are interested in fuel cells over electric vehicles because of the limited range of the latter. But as others have pointed out, the elephant in the room is the H2 supply. Where does it come from and does it make sense (from an energy perspective) to reform or electrolyze H2, liquify, compress, transport and turn back in to electricity? I've seen the scientific papers ~10yrs ago suggesting it isn't, and I agree.

And government wants to invest in green technologies, and there's an endless line of companies waiting and wanting the tax dollars.

And along with the Americans and Japanese developing FC's, we also have the German's involved too.
 
Originally Posted By: NJC
HTSS_TR said:
Quote:

If I bet my money on either Honda/Toyota FCV(Fuel Cell Vehicle) or Tesla EV(Eletric Vehicle), I would bet on Tesla.

What is the criteria of the bet - who releases a viable product first? The auto manufacturers have a significant advantage in bringing new technology to the market. How Toyota brought the hybrid gas / electric is one example.

I understand auto MFG's are interested in fuel cells over electric vehicles because of the limited range of the latter. But as others have pointed out, the elephant in the room is the H2 supply. Where does it come from and does it make sense (from an energy perspective) to reform or electrolyze H2, liquify, compress, transport and turn back in to electricity? I've seen the scientific papers ~10yrs ago suggesting it isn't, and I agree.

And government wants to invest in green technologies, and there's an endless line of companies waiting and wanting the tax dollars.

And along with the Americans and Japanese developing FC's, we also have the German's involved too.

My bet is that 10-20 years from now EV will have larger market share than FCV.

The H2 infrastructure is way under developed, the cost to build a H2 station is too high for investors to invest. Cost of producing H2 is very high also, so the money saving is not there compares with ICE. Currently, only Californian can buy and drive FCV because most of the very few H2 stations are in California.

For EV, owners only need an electrical outlet to charge their battery overnight, or charge it at work or other locations.

As with any bet, I may win and I may loose.
 
Originally Posted By: OVERKILL
Originally Posted By: DoubleWasp
The current state of electrical production is borrowing from Peter to pay Paul. The same people who push for electric vehicles, are the same ones who ensure that no new nuclear or coal powerplants get built.


That's just it. The amount of money the Ontario government has pi$$ed into the wind on solar and wind turbines they could have EASILY added the four ACR-1000's to Darlington that they were planning (with money to spare), which would have upped its capacity by 4,800MW, eclipsing Bruce and making it the most powerful nuke plant in the world (a title Bruce currently holds). But the argument AGAINST allowing that construction was that we had too much power capacity already (despite the project initially and the environmental assessment both being approved) and so it was put on hold. People charging up their EV's would quickly turn that surplus into a deficit I'd wager, as you've noted.

But nooooo, they want to mine precious metals and pollute the air in China to build their turbines and solar panels so they can drive around in their electric vehicles here pretending that this stuff is happening on another planet
smirk.gif


I was just down east visiting my parents as my wife was aiding her grandmother whose husband just passed. Amherst, NS has no bloody money. The roads are a disaster, their healthcare system is SCARY, but they've built five brand new wind turbines on the marsh between Aulac and Amherst, so they've roughly spent 15 million dollars. Since Amherst is in a decline, I'm doubting there was an energy deficit there. Now, this is possibly one of the BEST spots for wind turbines location-wise, since it is right on the bottom of the bay of Fundy and windy basically 24/7/365, HOWEVER, when the local infrastructure is in such a horrific state of disrepair, it would seem that again the priorities of "appearing green" trounced the financial obligations of proper upkeep and maintenance of the county.

Had this been Sackville, which is on the NB side and has much deeper pockets due to being a University town there wouldn't be much room to say anything. Sackville is currently putting in all new sidewalks downtown and are replacing all the downtown streets, they are in good shape.

Has Ontario really spent nuke plant money on renewables yet? $6-8-10 billion, then legacy costs for 100's of years?
I don't think we are short on base load power anyways? Solar is good for summer peak loads atleast, when electricity prices get way up there.
We aren't quite there yet with small and midscale renewables, but eventually it makes sense to get rid of the efficiency loses in long distance transmission, and reduce the grid infrastructure costs.
 
Originally Posted By: IndyIan

Has Ontario really spent nuke plant money on renewables yet? $6-8-10 billion, then legacy costs for 100's of years?


If by legacy costs do you mean the operating costs and 30 year refreshes? We've refreshed most of Bruce and Darlington is currently on its refresh. Pickering has been deemed non-viable for a refresh and so it will slowly be decommissioned, the process of which will also carry with it costs.

According to this site (which I don't know is suspect or not): http://www.windontario.ca/

Quote:
over the next 20 years, your household will pay an additional $40,000 for electricity.

The cost of wind power will add $110,000,000,000.00 to our electrical bills.
($100 billion can buy 5,000,000 Honda Civics.)


100 billion is about 10 quad-ACR-1000 plants, which would make 4,800MW each, so 48,000MW of nuclear power. Instead, that money is being spent on 7,700 wind turbines @ 2MW, or 15,400MW of installed wind capacity, which translates to less than half of that in actual capacity (since they are basically never all spinning). Sounds like a real bargain, LOL!
wink.gif


That site also covers in DETAIL the costs of Nuclear power (6.8c/KW) vs wind, which is around 13c. Which explains why our hydro rates have continued to rise under the absolute dolts that are running this province.

Originally Posted By: IndyIan
I don't think we are short on base load power anyways?


No, we weren't, that was just it. That's how we were able to retire that last coal plant. This made spending the money on the turbines and solar fields even more stupid. If anything we could have just upgraded a few of the hydro-electric dams.

Quote:
Solar is good for summer peak loads atleast, when electricity prices get way up there.


Maybe personal solar? You and I footed the $40 million for that 10MW solar field out on Lilly Lake road that they've had to replace half of already with our hydro bills. How many of the dams along the river could have been upgraded with that money instead?

Originally Posted By: IndyIan
We aren't quite there yet with small and midscale renewables, but eventually it makes sense to get rid of the efficiency loses in long distance transmission, and reduce the grid infrastructure costs.


I'd argue we've been there for a long time. The GPA has had the ability to be self-sufficient for over 100 years with hydro, even Lakefield has its own dam. These are reliable mid-scale renewables that make power 24/7/365 unlike wind and solar. I firmly believe the entire reason we have that solar farm is the green image it projects, nothing more.
 
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