Energy-Age: Breakthrough in hydrogen gas production

[Branduil]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20071112.../ussciencefuel

CHICAGO (AFP) - US researchers have developed a method of producing hydrogen gas from biodegradable organic material, potentially providing an abundant source of this clean-burning fuel, according to a study released Monday. The technology offers a way to cheaply and efficiently generate hydrogen gas from readily available and renewable biomass such as cellulose or glucose, and could be used for powering vehicles, making fertilizer and treating drinking water. Numerous public transportation systems are moving toward hydrogen-powered engines as an alternative to gasoline, but most hydrogen today is generated from nonrenewable fossil fuels such as natural gas.

In the past, the process, which is known as electrohydrogenesis, has had poor efficiency rates and low hydrogen yields. But the researchers at Pennsylvania State University were able to get around these problems by chemically modifying elements of the reactor. In laboratory experiments, their reactor generated hydrogen gas at nearly 99 percent of the theoretical maximum yield using aetic acid, a common dead-end product of glucose fermentation. "This process produces 288 percent more energy in hydrogen than the electrical energy that is added in the process," said Bruce Logan, a professor of environmental engineering at Penn State. The technology is economically viable now, which gives hydrogen an edge over another alternative biofuel which is grabbing more headlines, Logan said. "The energy focus is currently on ethanol as a fuel, but economical ethanol from cellulose is 10 years down the road," said Logan.

[Hitokage]

Fuel cells ftw

[ToxicAdam]

I read somewhere that they are testing electric cars (plug in type) in Seattle that are getting 100 mpg in city use.



http://www.discovery.org/scripts/vie...n%20the%20News


I think we are on the cusp of really pushing through to something new.

[Fuzzery]

That's like...taking basic battery chemistry, and basic mitochondrial biology, and PUTTING THEM TOGETHER!

Ingenious though.

I think i'll go stuff a loaf of bread in my hydrogen fuel cell car now.

[Dies Iræ]

Hydrogen fuel cells arent sources of energy in themselves. They're conduits and require an outside source of energy.

[DiatribeEQ]

Whatever helps us get off oil faster, wins.

[tnw]

Whatever helps us get off oil faster, wins.

fossil fuels you mean; let's not forget about china's special relationship with coal.

I suppose nuclear as a source of energy too.

[Fuzzery]

FUSION AND HYDROGEN FUEL CELLS ARE ALL WE NEED

Also, Fossil Fuels-> Refinery -> Oil

I mean while we do use the rest of fossil fuels for a bunch of shit, oil is definitely among the most important. Yeah, too bad that not using oil in our cars also doesn't mean that the other industries magically stop needing fossil fuels.

[Jon_Danger]

Whatever helps us get off oil faster, wins.

This is the exact way of thinking that we need!!

No more oil or oil substitutes.

[titiklabingapat]

It's much easier to turn that same biomass into ethanol.

[DiatribeEQ]

FUSION AND HYDROGEN FUEL CELLS ARE ALL WE NEED Also, Fossil Fuels-> Refinery -> Oil I mean while we do use the rest of fossil fuels for a bunch of shit, oil is definitely among the most important. Yeah, too bad that not using oil in our cars also doesn't mean that the other industries magically stop needing fossil fuels.

Fuuuuuu-sion.....HA!

[Xeke]

It's much easier to turn that same biomass into ethanol.

Not as clean as fuel cells though.

[titiklabingapat]

Not as clean as fuel cells though.

Yes it is. It's probably alot cleaner since it's more efficient than trying all those complicated stuff using special equipments to extract hydrogen.

Manufacturing those expensive fuel cells(and recycling them later on) probably produce more pollution than an engine that runs on ethanol(which can be easily recycled using existing metal recovery facilities already in place).

[Teh Hamburglar]

Mmmkay.

[SickBoy]

It's much easier to turn that same biomass into ethanol.

Now, allow me to preface this by saying I am not a scientist, but here's what the scientist says.

The technology is economically viable now, which gives hydrogen an edge over another alternative biofuel which is grabbing more headlines, Logan said. "The energy focus is currently on ethanol as a fuel, but economical ethanol from cellulose is 10 years down the road," said Logan. "First you need to break cellulose down to sugars and then bacteria can convert them to ethanol."

Is he full of it?

[Alien Bob]

the Organic Revolution has begun!

[Ghost]

Ok so hydrogen is sorted, where are we gonna get the catalyst required for all these fuel cells (ie platinum)?

[Fuzzery]

Ok so hydrogen is sorted, where are we gonna get the catalyst required for all these fuel cells?

WTF are you talking about? No special "catalyst" is needed for these fuel cells...

[Ghost]

WTF are you talking about? No special "catalyst" is needed for these fuel cells...

http://www.howstuffworks.com/fuel-cell2.htm

[Fuzzery]

The "fuel cell" they are talking about in the article is very different from the one on the howstuffworks. The one on howstuffworks is a fuel cell that generates electricity through hydrogenation of water (or, on the other hand, generating hydrogen gas from running electricity through the fuel cell and converting H2O to H2.)

The "fuel cell" they are talking about in the article is aimed PURELY towards the production of H2 gas from organic materials(acetic acid in this case); thus, you don't need any Pt or Pd catalyst since you aren't worried about hydrogenating oxygen to produce water, you're only producing hydrogen gas(or ethanol, if they decide that is a more viable fuel).

Think of this biological fuel cell as a one sided fuel cell. PEMFCs can go both ways, but this biological system for all intents and purposes, can only go one way, as of right now anyway.



Platinum on carbon (which is the catalyst used in a traditional fuel cell) is needed so that hydrogenation (of O2 in this case, but also of other stuff like alkanes) goes at a reasonable rate.


Edit: Let me add that the hydrogen or ethanol generated through this biological fuel cell would be used in COMBUSTION engine to generate power for the car. PEMFCs generate power from the conversion of Hydrogen to Oxygen(it's an exothermic reaction) THROUGH the fuel cell. You would then regenerate the hydrogen gas by plugging in your car to the wall or something, to convert the water back into hydrogen and oxygen.

[iamblades]

The "fuel cell" they are talking about in the article is very different from the one on the howstuffworks. The one on howstuffworks is a fuel cell that generates electricity through hydrogenation of water (or, on the other hand, generating hydrogen gas from running electricity through the fuel cell and converting H2O to H2.) The "fuel cell" they are talking about in the article is aimed PURELY towards the production of H2 gas from organic materials(acetic acid in this case); thus, you don't need any Pt or Pd catalyst since you aren't worried about hydrogenating oxygen to produce water, you're only producing hydrogen gas(or ethanol, if they decide that is a more viable fuel). Think of this biological fuel cell as a one sided fuel cell. PEMFCs can go both ways, but this biological system for all intents and purposes, can only go one way, as of right now anyway. Platinum on carbon (which is the catalyst used in a traditional fuel cell) is needed so that hydrogenation (of O2 in this case, but also of other stuff like alkanes) goes at a reasonable rate.

Plus there will be a lot of platinum freed up from all the catalytic converters that will no longer be needed.

The fuel cell tech isn't even that important really, you can build a hydrogen ICE car today.

The problem with hydrogen is energy density, not any major technological hurdles. Simply put, the volume of fuel required to do the same amount of work is much larger than with gasoline (by about a factor of four, even considering liquid hydrogen, and the problems inherent in storing and transporting a -423 degree liquid should be obvious).

What we need is a way to get the energy, which is what this is. It gets the stored energy from the biomass and turns it into hydrogen. Once we have the hydrogen we can use it however we like, IMO it would probably be best to use it in hydrogen burning power stations located adjacent to the plants making the hydrogen, thereby minimizing the storage/transport issue. While working on efficient high capacity electricity storage for electric cars, we could divert all the coal that's being used to make electricity to be converted into oil.

The question is one of scale, can this process work on a scale large enough to provide a substantial percentage of the electricity we need? Do we have that much paper, wood, food, and yard waste?

[Fuzzery]

We have a LOT of biodegradable wastes, but obviously not enough to completely stop using coal/nuclear/other. I believe they are already using biodegradable wastes in power plants overseas, like in Taiwan or or something, but not using this process.

But anyway, with this fuel cell, you would no longer have to actually store large amounts of hydrogen on the car anymore (as the energy needed to convert from your biomass to hydrogen is less than the the combustion of hydrogen would yield). In previous fuel cells, assuming you were using water, you would need to expend more energy converting that into hydrogen, so you had to actually have some place to store a sizable amount of hydrogen. Now you don't. You could just have a tank of acetic acid, and while you drive, the bacteria is converting this to hydrogen, which you are combusting in the engine. I don't know if the bacteria can convert it fast enough though..

[iamblades]

We have a LOT of biodegradable wastes, but obviously not enough to completely stop using coal/nuclear/other. I believe they are already using biodegradable wastes in power plants overseas, like in Taiwan or or something, but not using this process. But anyway, with this fuel cell, you would no longer have to actually store large amounts of hydrogen on the car anymore (as the energy needed to convert from your biomass to hydrogen is less than the the combustion of hydrogen would yield). In previous fuel cells, assuming you were using water, you would need to expend more energy converting that into hydrogen, so you had to actually have some place to store a sizable amount of hydrogen. Now you don't. You could just have a tank of acetic acid, and while you drive, the bacteria is converting this to hydrogen, which you are combusting in the engine. I don't know if the bacteria can convert it fast enough though..

Yeah, there are already some thermal depolymerization plants scattered around the world that convert organic waste into crude oil. Nothing on a huge scale yet though.

This thing in the article doesn't solve the energy density problem. It's not going to be installed into cars, it just makes the hydrogen to fuel the cars. Making your own fuel while driving down the road makes no sense at all really.

Think about it, if you need X amount of hydrogen to fuel a car and you are getting it from organic waste, you are going to been substantially more than X amount of organic waste(you can't get more hydrogen out of the waste than what is in there to begin with). So it doesn't really solve the problem, it would just mean carrying more fuel, at least in terms of weight.

[colinisation]

Powers stations, everyone seems to forget that we still have quite a few coal or gas powered electricity generation stations. If this is a cleaner way of generating electricity then yay for everyone.

[Fuzzery]

Hm yeah you're right

Heat of Combustion
Fuel MJ/kg Mcal/kg BTU/lb
Hydrogen 141.9 33.9 61,000
Gasoline 47 11.3 20,400
Diesel 45 10.7 19,300
Ethanol 29.8 7.1 12,800
Propane 49.9 11.9 21,500
Butane 49.2 11.8 21,200
Wood 15 3.6 6,500
Coal 15-27 4.4 - 7.8 8,000 - 14,000
Natural Gas ~54 ~13 ~23

In acetic acid's case, 1.049 g cm−3, liquid, at 60.05 g/mol. You would only get a mol of hydrogen for ever 2 moles of acetic acid and hydrogen has a lot lower kg/mol ratio, so yeah that doesn't work out.

But converting glucose or something to ethanol while on the road would definitely work though, at least just looking at this table :P


Also coal makes up 60% of all the power we generate in the US

[robochimp]

It's much easier to turn that same biomass into ethanol.

It is not

We still don't have the ability to do that efficiently yet.

In June 2006, a U.S. Senate hearing was told that the current cost of producing cellulosic ethanol is US $2.25 per US gallon (US $0.59/litre). This is primarily due to the current poor conversion efficiency.At that price it would cost about $120 to substitute a barrel of oil

[Timedog]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J9iWaCMbw60

Too bad theres been plenty of inventions that would kill off, or drastically reduce our dependence on oil, since oh, the 1970's. But instead we get these slow moving never get of the ground "breakthroughs" that give the oil companies more time to sell out of their ever diminishing crop.

[colinisation]

Also coal makes up 60% of all the power we generate in the US

I didn't know that the proportion was that high, no wonder politicians over here in Europe are blowing the nookoolear trumpet.

[Teh Hamburglar]

[siamesedreamer]

A huge break through without a massive tax hike?

[Phobophile]

Fuck polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells, it's all about solid-oxide fuel cells. We just gotta get them to run a lot cooler...

[Chrono]

No matter what breakthroughs happen we're not gong to see them outside of optimistic news stories. Maybe after a few more wars and all the billions to be made from oil are in the bank, yeah we'll finally buy cars with that tech. Or oil production can't keep up with energy demands, they'll allow technologies like this to make up the difference.

[FnordChan]

Shizuma Drive, check. Now let me know when we get the huge robots.

Fnord

[SRG01]

It's much easier to turn that same biomass into ethanol.

No, it's not. Converting biomass into ethanol is hard because the same process produces all sorts of junk as well. Not to mention you usually need enzymic or bacterial processes to do it, and those are hard to control.

[SRG01]

Fuck polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells, it's all about solid-oxide fuel cells. We just gotta get them to run a lot cooler...

Y'know, from being exposed to some research groups that are doing this type of work...








... Hydrogen fuel cells will never take off. Seriously.