ClichéGuevara
Legendary Member
- Location
- Kingston upon the River Hull
Are we being forced to go electric?
- Thread starter gavroche
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BrumJim
Forum Stalwart (won't take the hint and leave...)
- Location
- Selly Oak, Birmingham
We're not getting energy from CO2, are we? All the above look fascinating, but they are just mechaisms for using renewable energy to generate a portable fuel source.
ClichéGuevara
Legendary Member
- Location
- Kingston upon the River Hull
Even if it's only forming part of the process, it's still producing energy from CO2.
BrumJim
Forum Stalwart (won't take the hint and leave...)
- Location
- Selly Oak, Birmingham
Can't agree with you there. To claim that you are getting energy from the CO2 is misleading. The energy is coming from somewhere else. If anything, the CO2 is 'destroying' some of the energy, because you will never get back what you have put in to split it.
ClichéGuevara
Legendary Member
- Location
- Kingston upon the River Hull
Alex321
Guru
- Location
- South Wales
Not really.
CO2 is being used as a way of (inefficiently) temporarily storing some of the energy created by other means, until it is released back.
You are no more producing energy from CO2 than you are producing energy from a battery.
figbat
Slippery scientist
- Location
- South Oxfordshire, UK
Chemistry and thermodynamics are against you. The reason why hydrocarbons end up as CO2 is because CO2 is the most energetically stable compound that forms in oxidation. Hence to 'undo' CO2 requires a huge energy input, more than you will ever recover from using whatever fuel you generate from it. In most schemes like this, CO2 is being used as a carbon source, as an alternative to hydrocarbon, in order to rebuild hydrocarbon molecules for use as combustion fuel. The energy used to do this is usually solar or some other sustainable source, reducing the overall carbon impact of the process but ultimately you are still cycling CO2 through the atmosphere and CO2 is still emitted at the point of use.
harlechjoe
Guest
I think you make a really good point and its got me thinking - do bear in mind though that my thoughts and knowledge about this are not well informed; perhaps the commercial benefits of charging an e-car provide revenues for lots of people so businesses that can profiteer want to promote them. I am led to understand that hydrogen powered motors just need a garden tap but may be wrong. Regardless of the rights and wrongs I would much prefer a hydrogen vehicle as this avoids waiting for hours for a battery to recharge.
nickyboy
Norven Mankey
- Location
- You want hills? We got hills
All new builds must come with an EV charging pointThere's a lot of building going on around me including some at £625,000 which for Cumbria makes them mansions lol.
I don't think any of them have any car charging points. I have one though but no EV
BrumJim
Forum Stalwart (won't take the hint and leave...)
- Location
- Selly Oak, Birmingham
Just a garden tap? Storing hydrogen in the form of water is probably the safest thing you can do, but as soon as you split it from water, you have a massive hazard that needs great care and attention. More so than your current gas supply, car fuel tank or garden shed with paint brush cleaner, etc. Much more so.
Electricity, on the other hand, is already sufficiently well controlled for the moment, and with a process for improving safety as we get more picky.
harlechjoe
Guest
Looking at the photo that appears above your name I can see Edward Elgar with his Sunbeam Bicycle. In its day the Sunbeam was arguably the best bike around and had an enclosure/oil bath encasing the chain. The Sunbeam factory still stands - although repurposed - on the Wolverhampton Ring Road and Elgar's sculpture was made by Jemma Pearson who produced an equally impressive one of Charles Darwin that stands inside the grounds of Shrewsbury school. Bon Velo BrumJim
roubaixtuesday
self serving virtue signaller
You can never be sure, but hydrogen cars are probably a dead end for a few reasons. Most tellingly, it's a hugely inefficient technology compared to battery electric, so you need factors more electricity generation.
From a renewable generator (eg wind turbine), you need to compress the hydrogen to very high pressure for storage (very high pressure to overcome the very low density). Big losses.
Then you need to transport around the country.
Then you need to convert either to electricity (fuel cell) or in a hydrogen ICE direct to mechanical power. More losses - huge if via ICE.
From the VW summary:
"a hydrogen car consumes two to three times more electricity for the same distance than a battery car"
https://www.volkswagenag.com/en/new...tery-or-fuel-cell--that-is-the-question.html#
BrumJim
Forum Stalwart (won't take the hint and leave...)
- Location
- Selly Oak, Birmingham
Thank you. Appropriately for this thread, the photo was taken in Hereford on the day that I went to pick up my second-hand electric car.Looking at the photo that appears above your name I can see Edward Elgar with his Sunbeam Bicycle. In its day the Sunbeam was arguably the best bike around and had an enclosure/oil bath encasing the chain. The Sunbeam factory still stands - although repurposed - on the Wolverhampton Ring Road and Elgar's sculpture was made by Jemma Pearson who produced an equally impressive one of Charles Darwin that stands inside the grounds of Shrewsbury school. Bon Velo BrumJim
midlife
Guru
I think that only came into building regs 2022
classic33
Leg End Member
What about filling your (pressurised) tank with propane, or just swapping cylinders?
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