Colours Of Hydrogen (2)

A REMINDER : fbbs eyes are not too bad, but they do get tired if he is doing a lot of close work. Mistooks can slop through the nut and are corrected hoopfully next mourning. Please be patient rather than annoyed!

So Can I, Can You?

That's the kiddies version. Here are the "correct" words.

There is absolutely no doubt that buses with a hydrogen fuel cell are very good with their emissions. There aren't any. Water droplets or vapour are all that the fuel cell produces ...

... although not as much as the above which was a picture of a malfunctioning car!

There are two ways of cooking up a vat of hydrogen. One is electrolysis which we all remember from GCSE science. 

Electricity plus water and some other stuff makes Hydrogen and Oxygen to collect in test tubes. You can set light to the hydrogen - it goes pop - and the oxygen will cause a smouldering taper to burst into flame.

When this experiment was dome for fbb at school it did not work. Zilch happened. But, as usual in science lessons, fbb had to write it up as if it had functioned perfectly.

Seemples! 

fbb can understand that and will call it "electrical processing".

But there is a snag. Somebody has to make the electricity. And for hydrogen, you need lots of it!

There is another set of hydrogen producing processes with various incomprehensible names.

Steam Reforming

Steam Methane Reformation

Gasification

Methane Pyrolysis

These are terms which fbb doesn't fully understand, but he thinks you squirt high pressure steam at a typical hydrocarbon (petrol, diesel, vaseline or candle wax - remember?). The process looks more complex than electrolysis and, no, fbb does not understand the diagram.

So to help himself and his readers, fbb will offer "chemical processing" as a very general term.

But there is a snag. Someone has to make the steam!

So we can do the imaginary "sums".

Electrical Processing

1. Uses fuel usually  with emissions ...

2. to make electricity ...

3. ... to make hydrogen out of water.

4. The hydrogen is liquefied, transported and stored with emissions.

5. In the bus the hydrogen goes through a fuel cell manufactured with emissions ...

6. ... where the hydrogen is turned into electricity ...

7. ... which drives a motor manufactured with emissions.

8. Ultimately the equipment has to be recycled with emissions.

Chemical Processing

1. Uses fuel with emissions ...

2. ... to make hydrogen out of hydrocarbons and steam with emissions.

3. The process has greenhouse gases (emissions) as a waste product

4. The hydrogen is liquefied, transported and stored with emissions.

5. In the bus the hydrogen goes through a fuel cell manufactured with emissions ...

6. ... where the hydrogen is turned into electricity ...

7. ... which drives a motor manufactured with emissions.

8. Ultimately the equipment has to be recycled with emissions.

This video explains some of the downsides of using hydrogen in cars, the most notable being the high cost at every stage of the process.

Depressing - you bet!

But there may be an answer with one of the hydrogen colours.

But beware ...

"No such thing as a free lunch"  is a popular adage communicating the idea that it is impossible to get something for nothing. The phrase was in use by the 1930s, but its first appearance is unknown. The "free lunch" in the saying refers to the formerly common practice in American bars of offering a "free lunch" in order to entice drinking customers.

The phrase is central to Robert A. Heinlein's 1966 science-fiction novel The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress, which helped popularize it The free-market economist Milton Friedman also increased its exposure and use, by paraphrasing it as the title of a 1975 book.

On A Nostalgic Note

Do you remember the X43? It was a Monday to Friday peak hour route from North Finchley ...

... to London Bridge. Oddly return journeys only ran back to Archway!

A similar imbalance operated in the opposite direction at evening peak. But, as you see, as well as its own livery, which did stray onto other routes ...

... there was a smart leaflet which has a touch of early Ray Stenning about it!

"Fast to the City and Back" - Humm! Not if you wanted to get back to Highgate, Muswell Hill, Friern Barnet or North Finchley "in the wrong direction".

Of course, were the X43 still running today it would be part of the Superloop branding but not part of the Superloop.

 Next Hydrogen blog : Sunday 23rd July