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Toyota aims to have the first all-solar commercial car

Toyota, maker of the Prius, is the indisputable king of the hybrid market, for better or worse.    Despite a downturn in hybrid sales, the company continues to push ahead, looking forward to the release of its upcoming third generation Prius.

However, more iterative improvements may not be enough to turn around sales; Toyota may have to look to something akin to what GM did when it threw its weight behind the all-electric Volt.  In response, Toyota is considering radical new designs which could turn the car industry on its head if successful.

A top business daily, The Nikkei, is reporting that Toyota is developing a new vehicle which will be powered solely by solar energy.  The report was released on Thursday, and Toyota was unavailable for comment.

Toyota has already planning to equip some of its upcoming Prius cars with smaller solar panels to provide power to the onboard electronics, but an all-solar car would require drastically more power.  If Toyota is indeed cooking up a solar vehicle, it would have the first commercial solar concept car.

According to the report, the new solar car will be covered in solar cells and will also be an electric plug-in, similar to the Chevy Volt.  It can plug into household sockets to harvest energy from solar panels on the home.  However, according to the report, the automaker eventually wants to ditch the plug and make the vehicle entirely independently solar-powered.

The report cites Toyota's economic struggles as a key reason for pushing the solar project.  December marked the announcement of Toyota's first operating loss in 70 years, a sobering turn of events.  In the U.S. and abroad Toyota is halting work at several plants. 

Toyota continues to push ahead on other solar plans, though.  It is outfitting its Tsutsumi plant in central Japan, which produces Lexus luxury cars and Camry sedans, with solar panels to provide part of its operating power.  The panels, amounting to 60 tennis courts in surface space, can produce enough electricity to power 500 homes.  This amounts to big savings in power costs and emissions, says Toyota.

The company is well situated to take on the solar market, too due to an important partnership with Panasonic Corp., whom it has battery deals with.  Panasonic previously did not have significant solar expertise, but with the acquisition of Sanyo Electric Co., a leader in solar energy, to be finalized next year, it will have new assets to bring to the table.

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Not likely
By thepalinator on 1/2/2009 10:54:24 AM , Rating: 3
Even if solar cells were 100% efficient, making an all-solar powered car that gave decent performance is pretty much impossible. There just isn't a lot of energy in sunlight.

If you don't mind driving around an eggshell with a top speed of 30 mph, then Toyota might be able to make you happy in 15 years or so.




RE: Not likely
By Bateluer on 1/2/09, Rating: 0
RE: Not likely
By bildan on 1/2/09, Rating: 0
RE: Not likely
By masher2 (blog) on 1/2/2009 11:46:56 AM , Rating: 5
> "Uh, there is a LOT of energy in sunlight. We just cannot 'harvest' it efficiently enough"

Not really. Above the atmosphere, the earth receives over 1KW/sq meter. Down here on the ground, however, that's reduced by air, clouds, the day/night cycle, and (most important in an urban setting) shading from tall buildings, trees, and other obstructions.

At noon at a clear, low, latitude you might receive 500 m/sq. meter. In a high-latitude, cloudy location like Seattle, you might average only 150 watts/sq. meter over an entire day -- in a clear area. Driving on a downtown city street, probably about half that due to shading effects.

Even a small car engine today generates 100kW or more (100,000 watts). Powering that through sunlight would, in most urban settings, require an absolutely astronomical surface area.


RE: Not likely
By xsilver on 1/2/2009 7:38:47 PM , Rating: 2
I think the pipe dream isnt to have a corolla with a solar powered drivetrain but rather have single/dual person pod type vehicles that resemble go karts more than anything. How that will integrate with regular vehicles I have no idea.

Where I am (and in europe apparently) there are a lot of bike lanes popping up, maybe a vehicle will be developed to take advantage of this? eg. narrow enough


RE: Not likely
By carl0ski on 1/3/2009 10:14:57 PM , Rating: 2
Motorcycles are not permitted in Bicycles lanes nor scooters. They are extremely hazardous to real bicycle users.

However if slender vehicles do become common place a single lane on a highway dedicated to Motorcycles , scooters and your single man car.


RE: Not likely
By DeepBlue1975 on 1/5/2009 6:55:10 AM , Rating: 2
I don't know too much about this, but...

Would it be feasible for sunlight to be harvested after using some optical tricks like using converging lenses to concentrate more sunlight per unit of surface?

The problem I see with this is that the surface of the magnifying glass should be as big as the solar panel getting the same amount of power without the magnifier, and you need to create some depth between the two elements for the effect to have any sense, but if the cost of the glass + the panels needed after magnifying is less than the original cost of the big solar panel alone, maybe that could be useful to, at least, make the technology cheaper for small applications.

Maybe even with nanomaterials some similar effect could be achieved without needing the actual use of a giant magnifying lens and requiring less depth to get a benefit...

Hmmm... Never mind, I'm just dreaming awake a bit. I like this kind of mental exercises even when I don't get anything productive out of them :D


RE: Not likely
By Kary on 1/5/2009 4:24:38 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
In a high-latitude, cloudy location like Seattle, you might average only 150 watts/sq. meter over an entire day -- in a clear area.


...a car is what...2 meters wide....3 meters long... 6 sq meter across the top... 150watts/meter^2 x 6 meter^2 = 900watts= 0.9KW .... is my math wrong?

Still, I get what you are saying...inconvenient HAVING to make sure you park in the sun...making sure where you park STAYS in the sun....if you don't have batteries, making sure you drive in the sun :)

A commuter vehicle could probably get away with this if special parking was laid out by cities (yes California, you were planning this anyway, right :). If plug in vehicles got popular enough it might actually pay for cities/businesses with lots of employees/customers to even foot the bill to use solar to power free recharging (which makes more sense than putting it on the car in my opinion)...or just pull the power from the grid.


RE: Not likely
By Doormat on 1/3/2009 5:05:19 PM , Rating: 3
Absolutely incorrect.

Even in the southwest US, peak insolation on the summer months is 1200W/sq meter. Average daily insolation is roughly 700W/sq meter.

So if you had a 2 sq meter area on top of a car, and you left it out on a 100% sunny day (not a cloud in the sky) you'd collect roughly 750Wh. Or enough to drive 2.5 miles.


RE: Not likely
By DemolitionInc on 1/5/2009 9:57:46 AM , Rating: 3
you forgot the 40% efficiency only on solar panels which brings your 750Wh down to 300Wh. Also 40% only on the newest available technology, which is expensive.


RE: Not likely
By Kary on 1/5/2009 4:30:07 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
Absolutely incorrect. Even in the southwest US, peak insolation on the summer months is 1200W/sq meter. Average daily insolation is roughly 700W/sq meter. So if you had a 2 sq meter area on top of a car, and you left it out on a 100% sunny day (not a cloud in the sky) you'd collect roughly 750Wh. Or enough to drive 2.5 miles.


Ummmm, you forgot to multiply by the number of hours the car sat in the sun.

700W/Meter^2x0.3 (darn inefficient solar cells)x 8 hrs. = 1,680 Watt Hours
If it takes 1Kw/hr to run the car you can drive for 1.68 hrs a day....again, not useful for driving cross country, but not bad for commuting to work.


RE: Not likely
By devonz on 1/6/2009 2:03:19 AM , Rating: 3
I don't actually KNOW how much energy it takes to drive a car at a reasonable speed (say even 45 MPH), BUT I'm pretty sure its WELL over 1KW. Hell, my hair dryer uses 1.5KW, he he he :) Lets not forget its not just about moving the car, but also about cooling/heating the interior, running all the lights, gadgets, computerized components etc. Considering that PCs are reaching 300 watts at IDLE now sometimes, these "accessories" will probably exceed your 1KW without even actually MOVING THE CAR :)


RE: Not likely
By jimbojimbo on 1/7/2009 11:43:24 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
my hair dryer uses 1.5KW
That's 1.5KW/hr. You don't use 1.5KW just by flicking it on.

Me, I only drive once or twice a month so if it sits in the sun to charge for two weeks before I have to drive it, that's fine by me.


RE: Not likely
By Radnor on 1/2/2009 11:22:50 AM , Rating: 2
Although this car suffers even more than the normal electric from the long distance journeys, i can see this project as a great commuter.

I'm working, and my car gets parked outside about 10 hours per day, while i'm working. Depending on the specs this is not a bad idea.

Lets see how they pass from the idea to the project car.


RE: Not likely
By Mitch101 on 1/2/2009 11:36:07 AM , Rating: 3
While personally I am waiting for a car that runs on dark matter this will do in the mean time.

Awww did Nibbler make a boom boom.

I am interesting in seeing what they are able to produce before passing any judgment on performance. Even then it may not be the car for me but surely they wouldn't be pursuing it if there wasn't a market for it.


RE: Not likely
By FITCamaro on 1/4/2009 2:08:48 AM , Rating: 2
My research into how to turn the souls of child chinese slave laborers into 93 octane is progressing well compared to that of a useful car being 100% solar powered.

Can you power a car with solar power? Yes. Can you do anything with said car? No. It will have room for you. That's it. A lot of the cars in those solar car competitions have the driver laying down.

http://www.dur.ac.uk/dusc/images/dusc_body2006_tri...

http://xnet.rrc.mb.ca/solarcar/photogallery/Gimily...

http://www.speedace.info/solar_cars/solar_car_imag...

Yeah I want to drive that to work.


RE: Not likely
By belowsealevel on 1/5/2009 4:15:46 PM , Rating: 2
Oh, sure, now you're going to bring reality into the discussion! Like ethanol, hydrogen is a net energy loser, kinda-like plug-in cars are not "emission free". They simply displace the exhaust, right out the smoke stack that I see down the block from my home. People just don't seem to understand that there is no free lunch, and these enviro-scammers keep playing on their dreams. We don't have an energy shortage, we have a government/environmental movement that is stifling our ability to tap and exploit energy that's all around us, particularly entrepreneurialism/capitalism.


RE: Not likely
By Kary on 1/5/2009 4:33:02 PM , Rating: 2
Well, solar is emission free as far as breathing in the fumes...unless you can't afford to move away from that coal power plant, of course


RE: Not likely
By belowsealevel on 1/5/2009 7:03:05 PM , Rating: 3
You know, I don't mind the power plant, anymore than I mind the oil rigs that are pumping away, a few miles from where I'm sitting now. I see both of them every day, and I'm glad they are there. To be honest, I have been contemplating building an algae farm downwind from the stacks, so I can use their CO2, and the water from the water treatment plant, as raw materials for a bio-diesel farm. Just recycle that carbon over and over, and maybe create some economic activity while I'm at it.


RE: Not likely
By Spectator on 1/2/2009 11:46:55 AM , Rating: 2
When they combine this tech with Hydrogen tech.

And we get a car that we just have to pump water into. The world energy providers will jump out of windows like its a stock market crash :P

Hmm. perhaps we should look into de-salinisation tech and invest thier now :)


RE: Not likely
By belowsealevel on 1/5/2009 4:08:50 PM , Rating: 2
The questions isn't the amount of energy in sunlight, and we shouldn't be looking at things that way. Instead of bankrupting the firm, trying to create "cars" that run on sunlight, why not simply have "CAR" makers offer "CAR" buyers, as an "accessory", a golf cart-sized spare vehicle - that could be solar powered - to use when they are just going to the market, or to dinner down the street, or anywhere withing a few miles of their homes? Instead of adding $20K to the price of a real car, that people need to use for certain things, provide a $2000 "extra" that they can use when it makes sense? And THAT could be done today, with existing technology. I own a car, but I ride a motorcycle most of the time, and a bicycle once in a while, and walk once in a while. Hell, if GM gave away a small motorcycle with every pick-up, suv and sedan, the "fleet" mileage they'd actually achieve would soar. Now, if they deal with the unions, they can immediately put millions of Americans to work, and the only people who will be unhappy are the environmentalists, who actually just want to take away everyone's private car.


Hydrogen can work
By MaestroCaldwell on 1/2/2009 3:15:18 PM , Rating: 2
I may not be an expert on it, but I am hopeful about the hydrogen fuel cell. Hydrogen can be made in your own home with solar panels, eliminating the need for refueling stations, although stations will be built for hydrogen cars traveling long distances. Los Angeles already has refueling stations, as well as the production and sale of the Honda FCX Hydrogen Fuel Cell car, which proves it is very possible for our country to do all of this. The only problem is cost, and nobody is willing to help get this technology off the ground. Yet I am still hopeful, and I will always support solar, wind, and hydrogen. I'm tired of dependence on oil




RE: Hydrogen can work
By William Gaatjes on 1/2/2009 4:35:03 PM , Rating: 3
You will always be dependent of oil. Petrochemicals are indispensable at the moment. Plastics and al kind of chemicals that are made from oil and who knows what more ...

Here are some according to this website.
But when i read it , it is just plastics mostly...

http://www.anwr.org/features/oiluses.htm


RE: Hydrogen can work
By texbrazos on 1/2/2009 5:26:09 PM , Rating: 1
yes there will always be a use for oil, but biodegrable plastics are on the way. Thank God. I am sick of seeing trash everywhere when we go to the beach.
Here is a link
http://www.livescience.com/technology/070327_seawa...


RE: Hydrogen can work
By William Gaatjes on 1/2/2009 5:36:05 PM , Rating: 2
I am amazed, it is surely usefull for disposable plastics.
But plastics are also used in for example house parts, furniture, electrical appliances. If these are plastics are replaced with biodegradable plastics they might start to fall apart as well when a storm comes and you live close to the sea or just in the salty air. Good for business, but not good for customers. I could not make up out of the text how the plastics respond in that scenario. Any information on that ?


RE: Hydrogen can work
By texbrazos on 1/2/2009 5:43:31 PM , Rating: 1
oh course you would not use the plastics for things that you want to last. You would use it for all of our use and throw away materials.


RE: Hydrogen can work
By William Gaatjes on 1/2/2009 6:28:55 PM , Rating: 2
That means we wll still be using petrochemicals for higher grade long lasting plastics. But not an issue. Diversity creates jobs. And the oil industry will not cease to exist in the future. Everybody happy.


RE: Hydrogen can work
By alphadog on 1/5/2009 5:10:37 PM , Rating: 2
"Hard" plastics do not have to come from oil.

For example, soy-based plastics are currently produced that can be used for structural applications.

In fact, Henry Ford made "all agricultural" cars with parts made from soy protein back in the 1930s. It's too bad that we went in another direction (low-hanging fruit thinking) over the subsequent years and built up a world strongly dependent on oil...


RE: Hydrogen can work
By Kary on 1/5/2009 4:41:02 PM , Rating: 2
Yes, you can make hydrogen from water using solar. No, they haven't stopped working on it. UNFORTUNATELY it takes more energy to make the hydrogen than it does to recharge a battery.

Sorry if I sound annoyed, but people seem to think this is the ultimate solution to saving the environment when it results in more green house gases (at the moment, maybe they will get the efficiency up enough to compete...some day) and possibly flooding heavily populated desert areas (kinda funny, but environmentalists are going to complain about that one, too :)

When they use the hydrogen in fission reliably and cheaply, then I will get excited (since we know you can get more energy out of fission of hydrogen than you can burning hydrogen that you just "unburned").


RE: Hydrogen can work
By jimbojimbo on 1/7/2009 11:46:22 AM , Rating: 2
Not to mention there's that extra energy that's required to pressurize that hydrogen into a viable container. Otherwise you'll need gigantic blimps attached to your car to get anywhere.


not likely
By poundsmack on 1/2/2009 1:57:51 PM , Rating: 2
The thought of an all solar car is a pipe dream.

That is any current car; even little 2 seaters with a 1k pound curb weight wouldn’t be able to do it using current technologies, both in energy conversion, intake, and most importantly how the car uses that energy to move itself.

What would be an interesting thing is to come up with a way to change the conventional engine/drive train and require far less power to move the car itself. This of course is rather difficult due to the laws of physics such as gravity, drag, wind resistance, friction, and so on.

What would be even more interesting (and either the most important creation of our time) would be to try and make a perpetual motion automobile. But that would be in violation of the "law of conservation of energy."

In the end its hydrogen that is going to make the most sense, and there are a lot of auto manufactures that have vehicles that are well past the design phase. http://www.bmw.com/com/en/insights/technology/effi...




RE: not likely
By toddnaomi7 on 1/3/2009 4:14:38 PM , Rating: 3
I like the energy density of hydrogen, but the infrastructure for electric is already in place: our current electric grid. That's a big plus. No conversion, compression, trucking, or high-tec refueling needed.

Plug any green energy source into the grid and voila, the electricity is to our homes and cars.

Granted, we could use some increased energy density from batteries, but I don't perceive that hurdle to be as great as those of hydrogen.

I hope they both succeed, but for now my money goes to electric.


Solar-powered car???
By androticus on 1/2/2009 4:31:19 PM , Rating: 3
I won't even stoop to posting the physics and technology limits on this.

Question: can we please have the ability to vote ARTICLES down until they disappear???




RE: Solar-powered car???
By Kougar on 1/3/2009 2:14:01 AM , Rating: 2
Nothing wrong with the article... just whomever at Toyota that is trying to design a solar powered car.

Last I checked the most efficient solar panels were utilized in satellites, and those were generally around 35% efficient. Not to mention also so prohibitively expensive to manufacture that only companies, organizations, or governments that could afford to launch a satellite in the first place could afford to buy them.

I think Toyota would be much better served putting those resources towards building their own hydrogen powered vehicle than something so far fetched as a solar powered car. Unless they plan to start selling solar-powered golf carts...


The numbers don't work
By toddnaomi7 on 1/3/2009 3:20:00 PM , Rating: 3
The shadow of a Prius is about 9 yd^2. At "high noon" the Prius would block about 9kW of sunlight. Lets assume you can catch 1/2 of that sunlight with 42.8% efficient (world record) solar cells. You now have less than 2kW of solar power at "high noon." If the 24-hour average sunlight is half of that (it would be much less), it would take 53 hours to charge the battery on the Tesla Roadster! That comes out to an average of 14 hours of charging for one hour of highway driving under ideal conditions. Even with impossible 100% efficient solar cells, the ratio would be about 7 hours of charging to one hour of driving.

Toyota engineers know this. I think it's a publicity stunt.




RE: The numbers don't work
By toddnaomi7 on 1/3/2009 4:02:02 PM , Rating: 2
clearification: "1/2 the sunlight" = half of the sunlight falls on solar cells


Solar is nonsense
By theBike45 on 1/2/2009 12:47:57 PM , Rating: 2
Anyone with even a tiny glimmer of knowledge about solar panels knows that a solar powered car is pure BS. The amount of sunlight that falls on the surface of a car is miniscule. I'm not surprised that the media repeats this nonsense - technology and journalism simply don't mix.




RE: Solar is nonsense
By TomZ on 1/2/2009 3:44:08 PM , Rating: 2
Agreed - the subject of this article is laughable, to say the least. Repeating rumors of such impossible feats simply reduces the author's credibility.


Repair Bills
By Ratinator on 1/2/2009 12:03:03 PM , Rating: 3
And you thought fixing that crack in the bumper costs a lot now....




Nuke plants and ...
By Noya on 1/2/2009 7:37:17 PM , Rating: 3
Nuke plants and hydrogen are the future IMO. If only we could get passed the eco freaks who shun nuclear power.




I will take a Volt...
By Screwballl on 1/2/2009 2:02:57 PM , Rating: 2
... plus a car port or garage with solar panels on the roof of it for free charging when car is not being driven.

Granted it may not put out a whole lot of juice but enough to prevent using my household power or taking a drive to let the gas powered engine charge it up for me.
I would assume they could make an adapter piece to fit almost any hybrid or battery powered vehicle. I use one that plugs into my 12V with a trickle charge in my rarely driven truck.




Solar cars already exist
By wordsworm on 1/4/2009 2:16:06 PM , Rating: 2
You know, all you conservative/Republican earth haters really should get a clue. All this FUD spewed on this article is retarded. Solar cars are already being produced in China:http://www.autobloggreen.com/2008/10/16/buy-a-sola...

30 hours of sun for 150km. Granted, that's probably for one 45-55kg Chinese person, not a 125kg westerner, nonetheless, it's some serious distance, and quite sufficient for many people's daily needs. Of course, this is simply proof of concept. As the article states, only 10 of them have been made. But to go out and suggest that Toyota is being moronic or is simply posing for the media by investing in an all solar vehicle has had his or her head stuck in the arse of the oil industry. There is huge potential for this market, and obvious benefits to the environment.




By Jeffk464 on 1/4/2009 9:18:47 PM , Rating: 2
With world population exploding and decreasing energy sources I don't think we will be able to use a system as wasteful as the automobile. We keep cramming more people into our cities, which already can't handle the traffic volume. The solution is in plain old boring mass transit.




get away from gas and oil
By texbrazos on 1/2/09, Rating: -1
RE: get away from gas and oil
By Gzus666 on 1/2/2009 12:53:53 PM , Rating: 4
There are so many things wrong with this, it almost seems silly to sit and refute them. I would recommend you look into all this crazy crap you spout and find out why it makes no sense. Windmill in the intake, that should be a quote on this website, just classic...


RE: get away from gas and oil
By texbrazos on 1/2/09, Rating: -1
RE: get away from gas and oil
By jRaskell on 1/2/2009 1:26:33 PM , Rating: 4
I prefer intelligence over imagination myself.

Hydrogen production isn't nearly as easy as you portray it. In fact, there currently doesn't exist any sort of technology at all that can produce hydrogen efficiently enough AND in large enough quantities to make it a global source of power.

In fact, your example of producing hydrogen via solar panels is rather pointless, because hydrogen production via electrolysis is a net energy loss process. In case you can't figure out what that actually means, the energy available in the hydrogen produced by this process is LESS than the energy used to generate the hydrogen. You're better off just using the electricity directly from the solar panel itself. You can imagine it's viable all you want, but go try building a business on it and you WILL fail miserably. It will have nothing to do with some other huge energy industry coming along and crushing you under it's foot. It'll just be the result of one fool's imagination running headfirst into the brick wall that is our real physical world.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By texbrazos on 1/2/09, Rating: -1
RE: get away from gas and oil
By ccmfreak2 on 1/2/2009 4:30:25 PM , Rating: 2
Look at the context, texbraxos! jRaskell is refering to current conditions. He stated, "hydrogen production via electrolysis is a net energy loss process." - As in present tense. Your arguing that it is the way of the future. Your not even making a case for the same time frame!

Sure hydrogen and solar are the ways of the future. I believe that. Sure President Bush has supported the RESEARCH of these fields. That doesn't mean that they are currently viable levels of energy. I'm sure you remember just a few months ago research finally hit the 25% effiency thresh hold - meaning that 75% of the energy collected by the most advanced solar panels are still being WASTED! For crying out loud, this article just stated that Toyota is doing RESEARCH into a solar powered electric car. If the technology was already here, why would they need to REASEARCH it?

No one argues that solar and hydrogen are not the way of the future, we just argue that they are NOT the way of the present.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By 9nails on 1/3/2009 4:48:33 PM , Rating: 2
I agree with ccmfreak2. Even the said Space Shuttle is fueled with Hydrogen liquid a few hours before lift-off. Even with the well insulated booster tanks, the hydrogen liquid boils off too quickly. If the tanks were filled any later, they wouldn't have enough fuel to reach space.

If there was some new method for storing hydrogen liquid that didn't involve the energy needed to keep it at 250° below zero, then hydrogen might be a plausible fuel source.

As a gas, hydrogen is just not dense enough to get our cars very far. It then requires storage at several thousand PSI to contain enough gas for a reasonable driving range. The pressures in themselves are frightening.

In the future, breakthroughs with carbon buckyballs or aerogel might open the road to this dream. For now, we don't have a workable solution. Not to worry, even the Wright Brother's "Kittyhawk" didn't look like it had any potential to carry 300 passengers across the Atlantic when they built it. But look at the airline industry now!

Wind turbines, regenerative breaking, and all other sorts of "free energy" ideas don't work well because require energy up-front before they can produce energy. Energy loss is a factor that has to be considered when converting energy. The process is always inefficient and never returns the same amount of energy that you put in to it. If free energy ideas worked, we could make synthetic rubber balls that bounced higher and higher each time they're dropped or pogo sticks that sprung up higher after each bounce.

If someone could find a way to make free energy, that is to convert water into hydrogen that didn't cost so much to store it and to initially split it from oxygen then they'd be rich beyond their lifetime.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By jimbojimbo on 1/7/2009 12:02:13 PM , Rating: 1
You call Bush an idiot but you're looking line one right now. Yes, making hydrogen is relatively easy. However, the efficiency of how you did is refutable. What everyone seems to neglect though is the difficulty that's required to pressurize that hydrogen into a tank. Sure, any kid can make hydrogen that'll fill up a balloon but do you really want to drive around with a gigantic zeplin floating along behind you attached to your car?

By the way, with the process you made hydrogen did you notice the metal contacts in the water started to corrode after some time? Yeah, really efficient all right.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By foolsgambit11 on 1/2/2009 4:30:08 PM , Rating: 2
The example of making hydrogen may not be completely pointless. You can accept energy losses for conversion if there's a reason for it. Like portability. Now, I don't know if batteries or hydrogen have better energy density. Also, you can accept certain losses (when you're talking about harnessing 'free' energy like solar) in order to reduce costs. A large battery bank is expensive, while hydrogen creation and storage may be cheaper, and is almost certainly more robust than battery storage, which loses capacity over time (again, I don't know the numbers now, much less what they may be in the future - I'm just throwing out possible reasons why it could make sense).

Hydrogen production and storage, though, in amounts needed for transportation, whether by individuals or industrially, is currently impractical, you're right. I've got a friend who bought a Mazda RX8 because its rotary engine can be converted to use hydrogen with very little modification. I told him it was currently a bad idea, but he bought it anyway.

But yes, the OP's idea of a wind turbine on the intake was absolutely ridiculous. Like powering a sailboat with a big fan. It should be immediately obvious to anyone posting here that the air resistance created by the turbine would be greater than the power generated by it. Laws of conservation, and all....


RE: get away from gas and oil
By texbrazos on 1/2/09, Rating: 0
RE: get away from gas and oil
By GeorgeH on 1/2/2009 8:07:03 PM , Rating: 2
Actually, it's an incredibly bad idea. If you put an "air turbine" anywhere on the vehicle, you will increase the vehicle's drag (i.e. wind resistance), meaning the engine will have to work harder. Neither an engine nor an "air turbine" are even close to 100% efficient, so you won't even break even, but actually lose energy by adding complexity.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By bebesito21 on 1/5/2009 6:21:03 PM , Rating: 2
i have an air turbine connected to my 2.0 liter boxer engine and it helps me make 378whp...its called a turbocharger and while not free energy, it does increase the efficiency of the engine and harnesses energy from spent ehaust gasses that would otherwise be wasted.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By jimbojimbo on 1/7/2009 12:08:35 PM , Rating: 2
Good idea, put something on the air intake that will decrease the efficiency that it takes in air. See how well your car runs after that.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By Alexvrb on 1/2/2009 10:09:15 PM , Rating: 2
There's no such thing as free power. Sure you'll generate electricity, but you're doing so by reducing the volumetric efficiency of the engine! This will result in a reduction in performance AND fuel economy.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By kyp275 on 1/3/2009 3:34:12 PM , Rating: 3
Yup, just like those "electric turbocharger" you see on sale on ebay all the time, putting stuff in your intake only reduces the efficiency of the engine.

and to think, this guy works in a dealership... oh wait, that actually explains a lot :P


RE: get away from gas and oil
By Alexvrb on 1/4/2009 11:46:09 PM , Rating: 2
Heh. The sad part is that there are some legitimate electric setups (like the TKT superchargers), but they're only good for very specific things, like drag racing.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By wordsworm on 1/4/2009 1:49:53 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
I prefer intelligence over imagination myself.


"Imagination is more important than knowledge."
- Einstein


RE: get away from gas and oil
By Mitch101 on 1/2/2009 1:30:11 PM , Rating: 2
How about pedal power to a generator for both the driver and passenger. You can get sweaty on your way to and from work and lose weight in the process. :)


RE: get away from gas and oil
By xsilver on 1/2/2009 7:28:42 PM , Rating: 2
I think what you're referring to is called a tandem bike lol

I dont actually know what the energy efficiency of a bike is but I suspect it is very high.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By jimbojimbo on 1/7/2009 11:58:19 AM , Rating: 2
Next thing he'll recommend putting gigantic fans behind the sails of sailboats to make them go faster.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By William Gaatjes on 1/2/2009 1:17:46 PM , Rating: 1
quote:
Hydrogen can be done as well. What do you think they launch the space shuttle with? I have made hydrogen at home with solar panels, it is easy. In fact, the fact that it is so easy to make is probably why it is not being used.


Hydrogen is very volatile and reactive.
A normal vehicle with a gastank can be a bomb in an accident. With hydrogen under high pressure a vehicle in a crash is for sure a bomb. Hydrogen is good for stationary storage but not good for a million vehicles and serious crashes happening every day. That is until some really smart people figure out all the missing links from quantum mechanics so we can design from scratch a solid or liquid form of material where hydrogen is highly compressed but still highly stable until a fast catalyst comes along and release hydrogen at a fast enough rate without much radation of heat or creating explosive scenario's. This research is already being done but has not come up with practical ready to produce solutions.

See these links for some information :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/03/08032...

http://www.primidi.com/2006/07/26.html

http://www.dailytech.com/Great+Buckyballs++Storing...

http://science.howstuffworks.com/oil-refining1.htm


RE: get away from gas and oil
By texbrazos on 1/2/2009 1:20:41 PM , Rating: 5
Here you go. Check out the hydrogen myths.
http://www.rmi.org/images/other/Energy/E03-05_20Hy...

it is very interesting.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By William Gaatjes on 1/2/2009 4:05:53 PM , Rating: 1
I still do not feel save with using tubes with -250 degrees celcius liquid hydrogen under pressure. If the flames do not burn me the cold will. Thinking of the space shuttle , if i have understood correctly, when the space shuttle is fueled it is a special task where only a few people are allowed and these people get very high wages for this task alone.
I think because of safety precautions it is not save but i am sure we have some expert reading the dailytech forum that can give some detailed inforation. Correct me if i am wrong please...

But MIT chemist Daniel Nocera and Michael Grätzel (professor of chemistry and chemical engineering at the École Polytechnique Fédérale in Lausanne, Switzerland) are working for an easy way to get hydrogen:

http://www.technologyreview.com/energy/21536/page1...

I am waiting for bacteria that produce hydrogen from waste :

http://www.wired.com/cars/energy/news/2007/11/hydr...

But i prefer a genetically altered plant or algea that capture sunlight and uses that sunlight to produce hydrogen directly through the use of enzymes as the bacteria do it. It would be fun if we could make a plant that splits hydrogen and then forces this into for example buckyballs. But this s al very much still science fiction, because we first have to know all the missing links and errors in quantum mechanics.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By jimbojimbo on 1/7/2009 12:11:34 PM , Rating: 2
You feel perfectly safe driving around with 10+ gallons of highly flammable gasoline encased in just milimeters of material?


RE: get away from gas and oil
By wordsworm on 1/4/2009 1:53:06 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
Here you go. Check out the hydrogen myths.


Apparently you don't watch Hollywood movies. Just about anything makes a car explode.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By bugzrrad on 1/2/2009 2:02:24 PM , Rating: 2
i thought the honda FCX clarity uses compressed/liquid nitrogen...? (standard being used in those los angeles/shell gas stations that have nitrogen)


RE: get away from gas and oil
By Gzus666 on 1/2/2009 4:16:55 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
i thought the honda FCX clarity uses compressed/liquid nitrogen...? (standard being used in those los angeles/shell gas stations that have nitrogen)


Nitrogen is inert, how would it do that?


RE: get away from gas and oil
By William Gaatjes on 1/2/2009 4:22:17 PM , Rating: 2
I would think like this:

http://www.hydrogencarsnow.com/blog2/index.php/com...

quote:
The air we breathe is made up of 78-percent nitrogen, 21-percent oxygen and 1-percent of other gases. This means that if liquid nitrogen is used for fuel and released back into the environment, it also becomes a zero emissions alternative. Just as the compression, liquefaction and cryogenic storage of hydrogen takes a great deal of energy for use in a vehicle such as the BMW Hydrogen 7 luxury automobile, so does this same process for nitrogen also take a lot of energy for use as a power source for vehicles. But, unlike hydrogen, nitrogen has primarily been used in turbine-type engines instead of internal combustion engines (ICE) or fuel cell vehicles. On the safety side, nitrogen is mostly an inert gas that does not have the combustion properties of other gases such as hydrogen or oxygen. The compressed liquid nitrogen for turbine engines is heated using the ambient heat of the vehicle and as it expands, this turns the turbine, which supplies power to the wheels of the vehicle.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By Gzus666 on 1/2/2009 5:19:24 PM , Rating: 2
I don't know this for a fact, but I think I can safely say that using this method would be horrendously inefficient compared to even burning a fuel.


By William Gaatjes on 1/2/2009 5:49:42 PM , Rating: 2
It sure depends on the turbine. They will need some novell turbine i think and heater. Maybe a hydrogen fueled gasturbine is more handy for some tasks if that is possible. Gasturbines have a higher efficiëncy then ice engines and can be used in combination with an electrical generator for electrical energy production.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By TomZ on 1/2/2009 3:47:05 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
With hydrogen under high pressure a vehicle in a crash is for sure a bomb.
I'm sure the same was said about gasoline before modern, relatively safe fuel tanks were developed.

And really, the question is not about whether it is possible to develop safe fuel tanks for hydrogen; instead, it is about whether or not they can be produced cost effectively at this point in time.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By William Gaatjes on 1/2/2009 4:09:39 PM , Rating: 3
Exaclty, a safe way that is cheap. Gasoline behaves a bit different then pressurerized hydrogen. And safe and cheap are not really good friends when these kinds of subjects arise. But feel free to correct me cause my knowledge is limited on this subject.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By Gzus666 on 1/2/2009 4:21:46 PM , Rating: 3
quote:
Exaclty, a safe way that is cheap. Gasoline behaves a bit different then pressurerized hydrogen. And safe and cheap are not really good friends when these kinds of subjects arise. But feel free to correct me cause my knowledge is limited on this subject.


Well, they behave very differently in that gasoline leaks onto the ground when punctured and becomes more flammable since the fumes, not the liquid burns. Compressed hydrogen on the other hand becomes non-volatile when it leaks. It will pretty much instantly turn into a gas if it is ruptured.

While this will produce a lot of force, most likely they would have a safety release valve that would automatically pop in an accident of this nature. On top of that, it isn't like a tank of that strength will be as flimsy as a regular gasoline tank, take into consideration the pressure it would be under. And really, how many gas tanks have ever exploded in a wreck? It is more of a Hollywood thing than a reality.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By William Gaatjes on 1/2/2009 4:29:12 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
it isn't like a tank of that strength will be as flimsy as a regular gasoline tank, take into consideration the pressure it would be under. And really, how many gas tanks have ever exploded in a wreck? It is more of a Hollywood thing than a reality.
It is a whole different kind of field. An ambient pressure gas tank compared to a high pressure thermally isolated hydrogen tank. I am afraid for the errors that happen in mass production.

I do have a question...
I do not know all details, chemistry is not my field.
But when does 1 m^3 hydrogen have the same amount of energy as 1 M^3 ordinary gasoline ? What conditions does the hydrogen have to comply too, to have the same amount of energy ? Cause it is also important for fuel cells, i am thinking. Anybody has any numbers on that ?


RE: get away from gas and oil
By texbrazos on 1/2/2009 4:51:04 PM , Rating: 2
I posted this link earlier, I am not sure how many have looked at it. Here are some pretty good answers to alot myths and questions about hydrogen.
http://www.rmi.org/images/other/Energy/E03-05_20Hy...


RE: get away from gas and oil
By William Gaatjes on 1/2/2009 5:15:28 PM , Rating: 2
I did, i am still reading through it. And i saved a copy. I am waiting for other people to acknowledge it or to debunk it. I know a lot when it comes to electronics (LF analog and digital)hence my strong motivation for going electric when it comes to cars. But this is not my field of epertice although i too prefer that hydrogen has a future place in our sociëty. Because it is perfecr for local electricity production and water production. It would be great for the continent of Africa for example. Sun induced hydrogen and water. That would be all you need for to build a modern clean sociëty there. There are some countries there that still have no infrastructure and thus are perfect for a hydrogen based sociëty. As are the very sunny parts of the US are perfect for it.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By JediJeb on 1/2/2009 6:02:28 PM , Rating: 2
It would depend on the design of the tank as to the safety in a collision. But one difference that my chemistry professor pointed out years ago, gasoline spills on the ground, then burns and the fire is all around you, while the hydrogen is lighter than air, and floats away above you so the fire would be above you, or most likely just a flame shooting out of the rupture like a torch, confining the damage. To get an explosion of either you have to have a specific ratio of air to fuel in the gaseous form and a spark, otherwise you just get a fire or nothing at all like when the mythbusters tried to explode a gastank after shooting a hole in it.

Power per volume is less, but so is the polution per volume. If you make the hydrogen from a source of electricity such as solar or hydroelectric you could burn more hydrogen to get the same power as gasoline but still have nearly zero emissions( you will always have a little oil from the crankcase that gets burned but that is insignificant). The exhaust from a combustion engine running on hydrogen is pretty much drinkable water. But you need to make the engine parts corrosion proof so they dont rust from the water after you turn off the engine, so really ceramic coating are needed.

You can make hydrogen at home using solar cells as said above, but you won't make nearly enough to power a car without and industrial sized power plant. We use hydrogen in our lab, and our supplier makes it from compressing air into a liquid then distilling off the separate gasses and recompressing them. That takes a very large plant to produce what would be needed as a common fuel for cars.


By William Gaatjes on 1/3/2009 7:28:34 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
But one difference that my chemistry professor pointed out years ago, gasoline spills on the ground, then burns and the fire is all around you, while the hydrogen is lighter than air, and floats away above you so the fire would be above you, or most likely just a flame shooting out of the rupture like a torch, confining the damage.


If the contents from that tank burn like a torch it would be very concentrated heat not ? I think then what Gzus666 mentioned would work if a weakened part of the tank is in a direction where likely no people are like for example a venting part under the fender where for example the left rear wheel is located. It would destroy the wheel and part of the fender but that is not really an issue when you are in a crash. Maybe something similair like airbag technology.
Or some detection circuit that as soon as it records heat buildup because of hydrogen burning it blows a safety part of the tank in the fender together with a chemical that binds the hydrogen as to prevent an explosion. Maybe to create some foam that will almost not burn. Would that not be possible ?

quote:
You can make hydrogen at home using solar cells as said above, but you won't make nearly enough to power a car without and industrial sized power plant. We use hydrogen in our lab, and our supplier makes it from compressing air into a liquid then distilling off the separate gasses and recompressing them. That takes a very large plant to produce what would be needed as a common fuel for cars.


I prefer the biological way of making hydrogen.

But how does it get captured and pressurized ? Because to have those kind of devices at home. I think dedicated fuelstations as we have for gasoline is much more safe, thinking of proper maintenance and usage. But the future will bring som novell way to capture and store hydrogen in a safe and payable way. I am sure of it.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By Gzus666 on 1/2/2009 5:14:46 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
It is a whole different kind of field. An ambient pressure gas tank compared to a high pressure thermally isolated hydrogen tank. I am afraid for the errors that happen in mass production.


They do it all the time with oxygen tanks, propane tanks, welding tanks, liquid nitrogen tanks, helium tanks, etc.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By William Gaatjes on 1/2/2009 5:20:32 PM , Rating: 2
What are the weights of those things when storing an equal amount of energy compared to a gasoline tank of 60 liters ?
I am just wondering how it compares.


By William Gaatjes on 1/2/2009 5:26:16 PM , Rating: 2
With those things i mean tanks filled with hydrogen to have the same amount of energy for starters.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By foolsgambit11 on 1/2/2009 5:31:44 PM , Rating: 2
I believe that, even in liquid form, 1 cubic meter of hydrogen does not have as much energy as gasoline. Gas is about 34 MJ/L. Liquid hydrogen is about 10 MJ/L.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Energy_density.s...

Offsetting this is the fact that a hydrogen fuel cell drive train is 2-3 times more efficient than an ICE. So when evaluating miles per gallon, hydrogen fuel cells are roughly equivalent. Check out that '20 myths about hydrogen' that somebody linked to in this thread. The first 3 or 4 myths explained talk about overall efficiency and how to evaluate it for transportation.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By William Gaatjes on 1/2/2009 6:21:24 PM , Rating: 2
I think this quote from myth 7 says it all.

quote:
Such carbon-fiber tanks could be mass-produced for just a few hundred dollars, and at the currently U.S.-approved safety factor of 2.25, they can hold ~11–12% hydrogen by mass. A 350-bar hydrogen tank (2.7 MJ/L at LHV and 300 K) is nearly ten times the size of a gasoline tank for the same energy content. However, the 2–3-fold efficiency advantage of the fuel cell, i.e., less energy expended per mile, compared to a gasoline engine reduces this enlargement to ~3.2–4.8- fold — even less when you include the saved size and weight of other parts of the car that are no longer needed, such as the catalytic converter. That factor shrinks still further — making the hydrogen tank only modestly bigger than a samerange gasoline tank in today’s cars, but far lighter — when cars are designed to use two-thirds less power to move them, hence two-thirds less stored hydrogen for the same driving range. This requires cars with much lower aerodynamic drag, rolling resistance (energy losses to heating tires and road), and especially weight. Their weight can be halved, yet they can maintain superior crash safety even when hitting a heavy metal car, by making them from carbon-fiber composites. These space-age materials can absorb up to five times as much crash energy per pound as steel, and can crush more smoothly, using the crush length up to twice as effectively. Carbon-fiber racecars are expensively handmade, but a new patent-pending manufacturing process79 is expected to be affordable at automotive volumes (~10,000–100,000 cars per year). In 2000, its developer, Hypercar, Inc. — a technology development firm spun off from Rocky Mountain Institute in 1999 to commercialize lightweight and efficient vehicle technology — designed an ultralight concept car called the Revolution (see sidebar) to illustrate the implications of ultralight autobodies and highly integrated design. This conceptual midsize SUV would have the size, safety, comfort, and performance of a Lexus RX300, yet with five times its efficiency — a modeled average of 99 mpg equivalent.80 Detailed production cost analysis suggests that such a concept car could be manufactured at mid-volume (~50,000/year) at a cost competitive with comparable-class vehicles in today’s market.


If we want from current vehicles to just replace the drivetrain /ice and fueltank we would not drive the same distance as an gastank. Because next to the bigger sized hydrogen tank we need a fuelcell that can deliver something like 100 KW /134 horsepowers for example. Then we need space for 4 electrical hubmotors or 2 electrical motors with 2 differentials for 4x4 drive. Add electricity, the usual stuff like air conditioning. Add all safety precautions. Maybe we all drive suv or truck size cars in the future but at least they are polutant free :).


RE: get away from gas and oil
By William Gaatjes on 1/3/2009 4:43:32 AM , Rating: 2
I found this document abou fuel cell efficiëncy.
It does not calculates the numbers of the latest technology.

But it's good reading stuff and the numbers can be adjusted
For modern day 2009 numbers.

http://www.efcf.com/reports/E04.pdf


By William Gaatjes on 1/3/2009 5:26:13 AM , Rating: 2
I do find it funny that for electrical fuel cell vehicles the efficiëncy of the whole process from hydrogen generation to torque at the wheels is calculated in the overal efficiëncy number while this is not done for ice engines running on gas or on biofuel. For ice engines only the energy loss of the engine is calculated. Not how much energy is required to get the oil, process and it to make fuel. Nor do i see these numbers for biofuels. I wonder if there is always a fair comparison made and presented as fair.

Fuelcells or batteries, there will always be a need for supercapacitors used for recuperative breaking because we cannot charge batteries that fast or generate hydrogen in the vehicle. We also need peak power to start moving and this peak burst can be delivered from the supercapacitor. Recuperative breaking increases efficiëncy of the total electrical vehicle. The supercapacitors are perfect when short bursts of high power are needed or have to be stored.


By William Gaatjes on 1/3/2009 7:35:40 AM , Rating: 2
When a pressurized liquid as hydrogen at a certain moment decreases in pressure and increases in size, i mean it evaporates, does it not get extremely cold ? It is already extremely cold and then it even start to evaporate. It would get colder. Would that not mean severe cases of frostbite could happen ? Because that would happen when you blow a safety valve on a pressurized gas.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By deadrats on 1/2/2009 6:08:35 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
I wonder why they do not put a small wind turbine on the intake or make a second intake.


what you describe has already been done, though not quite the way you describe or for the reasons you would want to, but before i get into that allow me to explain that it's not possible to have a "second intake".

as for the wind turbine on the intake, it wouldn't be possible to power the car via a turbine since the car would have to be moving in the first place in order to power the turbine in the first place.

what is possible would be to incorporate a wind turbine within the intake, similar to how a "ram air" intake system works for the purposes of recharging a battery that runs a small electric motor for use in a hybrid vehicle.

you could also build a sort of turbo/intake hybrid intake that instead of using exhaust gases to spin an internal turbine that forces more are into the intake thereby allowing it to burn more fuel, you could house the turbine within the intake and use a "ram air" style system to force air into the turbine that in turn would spin and itself force more air into the intake thereby allowing more fuel to be burned and more power to be produced. such a design however would do nothing for fuel economy and the power generated would be proportional to the velocity of the vehicle, great if you want a top speed run, bad for a daily driver.


RE: get away from gas and oil
By 9nails on 1/3/2009 5:23:11 PM , Rating: 3
quote:
you could also build a sort of turbo/intake hybrid


Isn't that called a "Super Charger"? A device with takes several horsepower from the motor, but compresses gases going into the intake and actually creates some power gains?

I think one of the problems with them is; now that you have more gases going in the cylinder, you're going to have higher compression. And regular gas is going to detonate too soon under that compression. So now you need higher octane gas to resist early detonation, and that costs more to refine... At some point you're going to get diminishing returns.


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