Hydrogen availability

[SteveKTMer]

GT9 said:

The opposite actually.
All renewable options start from electricity, does that really need spelling out.
I've always maintained that the only 'renewable' option for cars is to use that electricity directly and NOT convert it to something else.

Only if the replacement fuel is made in the UK using UK electricity. Amonia could very easily be shipped in from countries with excess or plentiful green electricity, France for example with their ultra green nuclear electricity. Hydrogen is the same and is already available on global scale.

As I said, this government will not be ready for 2030, 2035 or probably even 2050. It requires too much investment for the parliamentary fixed term system to cope with. Do you think the Cons or Labour will invest for 20+ years time ? No, so we'd best source an alternative fuel, or several, now to be ready for the future.

[SteveKTMer]

Big Nanas said:

SteveKTMer said:

Hydrogen is the only option for heavy plant as we've all seen the JCB videos, unless they retain diesel. Amonia for cars and vans ? Maybe - as ever, it seems a mix of fuels is the answer, not just mass adoption of BEVs.

Not necessarily.
When Gridserve expanded the Scotch Corner services to 12 chargers, they used a battery powered digger, backed up with a solar power battery charging station. It's in the trial phase, but seemed to work well. It would easy enough to deploy these solar chargers to work sites, which would make sense.

https://projectplant.co.uk/2023/09/sustainable-ene...

Where would the hydrogen plant fill up their tanks? You wouldn't be able to deploy removable hydrogen storage facilities to work sites, after all.

So four hours operation for about the smallest digger you can buy, not very impressive. The work it did was what we did by hand 20 years ago. And what happens in the winter when the sun is behind clouds ? Does work have to stop because there's no charge ?

Hydrogen can be supplied in tanks, JCB have already got mobile versions of this working, watch the Harry's Garage videos with JCB, very interesting how one company that knows full well that battery diggers aren't viable for anything other than the smallest jobs, has designed an engine and fuel delivery system that works. We ought to be applauding this sort of enterprise !

[otolith]

SteveKTMer said:

Only if the replacement fuel is made in the UK using UK electricity. Amonia could very easily be shipped in from countries with excess or plentiful green electricity, France for example with their ultra green nuclear electricity.

Are they not going to need their green generating capacity to replace fossil fuels?

SteveKTMer said:

Hydrogen is the same and is already available on global scale.

Hydrogen made from fossil fuels.

[Big Nanas]

SteveKTMer said:

So four hours operation for about the smallest digger you can buy, not very impressive. The work it did was what we did by hand 20 years ago. And what happens in the winter when the sun is behind clouds ? Does work have to stop because there's no charge ?

Hydrogen can be supplied in tanks, JCB have already got mobile versions of this working, watch the Harry's Garage videos with JCB, very interesting how one company that knows full well that battery diggers aren't viable for anything other than the smallest jobs, has designed an engine and fuel delivery system that works. We ought to be applauding this sort of enterprise !

It IS just a trial after all. All those questions will presumably be answered in time.

JCB are currently selling their own range of electric plant equipment, too.

https://www.jcb.com/en-gb/campaigns/etech-range

[GT9]

SteveKTMer said:

Only if the replacement fuel is made in the UK using UK electricity. Amonia could very easily be shipped in from countries with excess or plentiful green electricity, France for example with their ultra green nuclear electricity. Hydrogen is the same and is already available on global scale.

As I said, this government will not be ready for 2030, 2035 or probably even 2050. It requires too much investment for the parliamentary fixed term system to cope with. Do you think the Cons or Labour will invest for 20+ years time ? No, so we'd best source an alternative fuel, or several, now to be ready for the future.

Shipping ammonia, I mean come on, we are not that desperate.
As for hydrogen, it is not a low carbon fuel, let's not pretend it is.
We are probably 20-30 years away from it being so for any new applications.
All present efforts to decarbonise hydrogen are not going to cover existing consumption, let alone tens of millions of cars lumped on top of that.
The grid capacity readiness for EVs is blown out of all proportion.
It's really very simply, all we need to do is add 1% capacity each year for 25 years.
That's just 300 MW of continuous extra capacity annually, a couple of hundred wind turbines a year, it's well within the realms of possibility.
As far as decarbonisation challenges goes, that's a walk in the park.
And no it's not lumping everything in one basket.
Electrification of cars is the enabler that allows OTHER industries to use the lower efficiency pathways.
On a whole of society level, it plays a crucial part in making the entirety of the decarbonisation efforts work.
If you fk up your strategy for cars and start over-consuming energy on a large scale, the whole thing fails.
What exactly is it about batteries that you are so afraid of anyway?
And please don't say 'weight', because I've debunked that 100 times over.

[GT9]

Steve, you should also be aware of this, if you've not seen it. 100,000 tons would be required for 1 million fuel cell cars, so we'd need to find over 100,000 tons a year of increased hydrogen capacity, reaching 3 million tons a year in total if we were to go down the hydrogen fuel cell route for passenger cars.



And then go and do bit of digging to find out about blue hydrogen's actual low-carbon credibility:

https://ieefa.org/articles/blue-hydrogen-not-clean...

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/e...

https://www.rechargenews.com/energy-transition/bar...

https://www.spglobal.com/marketintelligence/en/new...

[Evanivitch]

SteveKTMer said:

So four hours operation for about the smallest digger you can buy, not very impressive. The work it did was what we did by hand 20 years ago. And what happens in the winter when the sun is behind clouds ? Does work have to stop because there's no charge ?

Hydrogen can be supplied in tanks, JCB have already got mobile versions of this working, watch the Harry's Garage videos with JCB, very interesting how one company that knows full well that battery diggers aren't viable for anything other than the smallest jobs, has designed an engine and fuel delivery system that works. We ought to be applauding this sort of enterprise !

I applaud JCB developing a solution for their vehicles, but their system boundary stops at the fuel cap.

Just like HVO is advertised as being massively lower carbon than diesel, that only works if the hydrogen in both is green. And neither is it green currently or do they care when it will.be green, because in isolation they've ticked a box.

[GT9]

There's a brilliant fuel for car enthusiasts, it's called petrol.
Hydrogen is not a fuel for car enthusiasts unless you want a large-footprint 2-seater with a 50 mile range.
Electricity can be a fuel for some enthusiasts, but mostly for just getting from A-B with a lower environmental footprint.
Why do we need anything more?

[tamore]

Evanivitch said:

I applaud JCB developing a solution for their vehicles, but their system boundary stops at the fuel cap.

Just like HVO is advertised as being massively lower carbon than diesel, that only works if the hydrogen in both is green. And neither is it green currently or do they care when it will.be green, because in isolation they've ticked a box.

i think JCB went off too early on the hydrogen route and would have been better waiting for energy density to get to the point that batteries can easily power their machines for a day. is there even a ban date for such machines?

hydrogen is going to need some serious refilling kit to do it in the field, and it's not as if there's going to be refuelling stations all over the place.

[D4rez]

SteveKTMer said:

Only if the replacement fuel is made in the UK using UK electricity. Amonia could very easily be shipped in from countries with excess or plentiful green electricity, France for example with their ultra green nuclear electricity. Hydrogen is the same and is already available on global scale.

As I said, this government will not be ready for 2030, 2035 or probably even 2050. It requires too much investment for the parliamentary fixed term system to cope with. Do you think the Cons or Labour will invest for 20+ years time ? No, so we'd best source an alternative fuel, or several, now to be ready for the future.

Theoretically yes but in practice absolutely not. E-fuels don’t exist to most intents and purposes and won’t for the foreseeable. Even if they do they won’t be pleb priced as a drop in substitute for Joe average BMW owner

[dvs_dave]

SteveKTMer said:

So four hours operation for about the smallest digger you can buy, not very impressive. The work it did was what we did by hand 20 years ago. And what happens in the winter when the sun is behind clouds ? Does work have to stop because there's no charge ?

Hydrogen can be supplied in tanks, JCB have already got mobile versions of this working, watch the Harry's Garage videos with JCB, very interesting how one company that knows full well that battery diggers aren't viable for anything other than the smallest jobs, has designed an engine and fuel delivery system that works. We ought to be applauding this sort of enterprise !

JCB’s hydrogen ICE is just a publicity generating boondoggle to sucker in the simple thinkers. It’s simply not a serious solution given the very hard realities of hydrogen production/distribution/storage of any type.

By far the best option is to just stick with diesel ICE until battery tech matures sufficiently (which it will). Or if you want to get there sooner, this is one of the few niches where battery swap tech could make sense, as well as eFuels, depending on how soon you want to be able market your shiny new dancing green diggers.

Edited by dvs_dave on Thursday 19th October 18:03

[GT9]

dvs_dave said:

JCB’s hydrogen ICE is just a publicity generating boondoggle to sucker in the simple thinkers.

Probably the result of a liquid lunch between two billionaires celebrating their Brexitiness.