If a majority of our automobiles were replaced with vehicles which operate on hydrogen powered fuel cells, how could massive amounts of hydrogen be stored safely for refueling? How safe are these cars when the fuel tank ruptures due to collision compared to current gasoline/diesel ones currently in use? How many miles will the vehicles be able to go before refueling?
Let's think outside the box for a moment shall we? You don't specify the form that the hydrogen needs to stored in to use this system. How about we assume hydrogen is created by combining to perfectly stable elements in a catalyzing method to generate the hydrogen. Then we don't have to worry about storage safety. These cars would then be perfectly safe if there is a rupture in the tank because we have two stable catalyst agents and we only have to worry about making sure they don't combine. Miles before refueling is of course determined by how much fuel we have in the vehicle. The only limiting parameters would be storage weight and bulk of the fuel in relation to the vehicle, so we could theoretically have a vehicle go thousands of miles before refueling. I'm not saying this will be the system that is created, I'm just saying it's possible as we learn to develop new technologies. Let's think BIG!
Hydrogen, even as a liquid, just isn't dense enough to be able to carry much, so range sucks. Right now you can carry more energy in a battery than you can in a hydrogen tank. Gasoline and diesel are very efficient fuels when you need a lot of range and quick refueling. Liquefied natural gas sometimes makes sense.They pack a lot of power per cubic foot and per pound, and we've learned to deal with the fire hazards.Hybrids make that more efficient unless you're doing a lot of constant high-speed transport. For shorter range or stop and go, hybrids can act as pure electrics, putting the burden of clean burning or non-fuel sources on the electric supply. We seem to be advancing battery storage, sometimes in ways that are moving hydrogen around, faster than we are advancing hydrogen storage. Fossil fuel is an extremely efficient and easy way to carry energy around. We just don't need to waste near as much of it as we do.
Fuel cell cars will probably be out sooner. No need to have pure hydrogen in storage. Some fuel cells can split the hydrogen off of easily obtainable hydrocarbons like methane or LPG. Since fuel cells are more than twice as efficient as internal combustion engines people will wonder how we ever got along with just having a 400 or so mile range before having to refuel.
Hyrogren is unique in that it's main byproduct is water. Thus, a hydrogen fuel cell should be able to be made which more or less recycles itelf. One doesn't need to store massive amounts of hydrogen. The problem is getting them efficient enough. We'd like to see them working for electric plants, also, but the problem is getting them to produce enough hydrogen for the incredible amount of electricty modern life demands. Safety isn't a great issue with hydrogen. We're not talking bombs here. But more work needs to be done before they are practicable on a large scale. Something we forget in America is that a lot of countries don't need the enormous amounts of fuel we do, being smaller, and having a greater variety of transportation available. Iceland is in the forefront of this movement. And it works well for them in busses. Personally, I'm all for it if it can be worked out. Right now I drive Honda Civic Hybrid. Maggie
Look at the Hindenberg explosion. No, no, really. Look closer. Nobody got burned by the hydrogen fire, which was going straight up. Because hydrogen is lighter than air, and wants to go up. The gondola was on the bottom, and most people survived. However, the hydrogen set gasoline on fire (the Hindenberg carried gasoline to run the engines). Gasoline does what it does, flow all over the ground in great big puddles of flame. Many people suffered burns from the gasoline.
