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So Where Are The Fuel Cells?
prostoalex writes: "While fuel cells have been touted as a revolutionary innovation for the electronics industry, they have not hit the market yet. This article in eWeek talks about the current problems with fuel cells, and claims that 'these devices, designed to last as much as 10 times longer than a standard lithium-ion battery, should hit the market by 2004.'" There are a few fuel-cell devices on the market, but this article points out a few reasons they're not yet more widespread.
powering all the damn flying cars, where else?
I've heard about fuel cells powering the 21st Century about as long as I've heard that I should have gotten a flying car for my birthday last year. First things first. Fuel cells have a lot of potential, but why waste all that extra energy on an Intel-powered notebook? Seriously, why don't the leading developers of fuel cells team up with Transmeta to make an invincible laptop that would blow Dell and Compaq-HP out of the water? That would mark one giant leap for the little guys, who greatly deserve a boost in success right about now.
Calm down, it's *only* ones and zeroes.
There's the rub. Micro fuel cells may not be allowed on airplanes because the hydrogen-based devices use a highly flammable gas, while the methanol-based devices include an inflammable liquid.
No thanks, I'll stick to my shitty laptop with the one battery that lasts about two hours. Better to have a laptop that sucks down the battery than one that EXPLODES IN YOUR LAP.
While everyone is quick to cheer on fuel cells as being über enviromentally friendly, as the process only produces water, etc. etc... people fail to remember that it takes a great deal of power to generate the hydrogen in these cells, and this power has to come from somewhere. Therefore, if we're running around with cars, laptops, etc., running these fuel cells and we are still relying on coal/oil power generation, then we are really no further ahead.
Nuclear is my vote for meeting the needs of the future, but i suppose your millage may vary.
I know this is slightly off topic, but it is something that should be kept in mind when discussing hydrogen fuel cells.
-legolas.
I do own a fuel cell. To be exact, it's a small direct methanol cell, which runs on a 3% methanol and 97% water solution. I'm damn sure that 3% methanol is not too flamable.
My guess is that the number one thing keeping fuel cells off the mainstream market is the cost of production. Specifically, the poles of the cell have to be made of platinum. Last time I checked platinum isn't too cheap.
Visit
tcd004
The idea itself is much older than that. It is just that we are slowly approaching feasibilty.
The safety concerns of alternative fuels are highly overrated. Contrary to popular belief, hydrogen is NOT explosive except in some pretty odd geometries, which you are never going to attain in any type of fuel cell, nor in the environment around it, should the hydrogen leak out. It is indeed flammable, but much less dangerous than, say, gasoline, or lighter fluid. Before someone makes some lame crack about hydrogen-filled zeppelins, it is extremely important to note that it was NOT the hydrogen that exploded/burned in disasters such as the Hindenberg, but rather the magnesium-based paint that was coating the hydrogen envelope. Methanol is a bit more exciting, but still a perfectly safe chemical to use with the proper safegaurds. You would think that your laptop would cease to be a useful computational device long before you subjected it to enough force to crack open a high impact plastic shell intended to contain flammable materials.
New materials are beginning to make fuel cells feasible. They will happen once everything falls into place.
Look at handhelds: the Palm was not the first by a long shot, nor technically the best, but Palm was lucky that when they came to market, all the pieces had fallen into place and they hit the right price point (and, yes, it was luck).
So, are we completely giving up on flywheels? They may not be too mainstream, but they hold the promise of incredibly light devices (at least they can be) with the ability to hold incredible ammounts of energy, and store it with practically no loss, for a very long period.
That would also relieve the long charging times necessecary with batteries (at least they could).
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
The real reason they won't release fuel cells isn't because of problems. The article itself says they last 10x longer than a regular Li. Duh. They won't release them because then noone will want the older batteries. Then they can't gouge the fuck out of us at the register (those things are damned expensive for all the longer they last in my DC3200).
/. knows what the god damn Smithsonian is! (And I looked for Edison, and I didn't see anything about a "super long-life bulb" there.)
/. (It's unlikely though--the government has, historicaly, gotten the best innovation through competition of private companies, and the public-known computational power of the US gov't is allready among the best in the world.)
That implies collusion in the market. Trust me--if a company could make a standard-form-size fuel cell, they'd sell them and blow the pants off of their competition. If a company could put them in their laptops with no problems, they'd do so and sell the pants off of their "twelve-hour laptop with no weight increase."
Edison invented a light bulb that will last 10x longer than even today's four and five year bulbs. You can go to the Smithsonian [smithsonian.org] and see it for yourself. But why won't GE and Sylvania, or even Philips, spit one out on the consumer market? Because then they couldn't rope us into buying the nasty bulbs that don't last very long at all. We buy more, they make more money. Simple as that.
Sheesh. If you're going to post a link, find a relevant page and then post that. Everyone who reads
But let me take your statement as true--there are at least two alternate possibilties as to why it's not in the mass market. One: It's too god damn expensive / ineffecient. If the bulbs only put out a max of 10 watts, they're useless; if the bulbs cost $100 each, they're useless. Two: If you take a modern lightbulb, under-whatt it, and never turn it off, it'll last for a god damn long time.
And I'm sure the government has computers that far outdo anything that any PC or Server that's commercially available could do. When will we see that kind of power? When they decide that they don't have to charge $10G for a toilet seat to cover this stuff (aka none too soon).
I don't even know where to start picking that one apart....
The government no doubt has the most powerful computers in the world; it's even possible that they have black-project chip designs that far outpace anything heard about on
As for the $10,000 toliet seat--that was the military paying for a seat on a battle-craft (not sure if it was naval or air force.) And I think it was a case of corruption / fraud, to boot.
The automobile industry is not in cahoots with the oil companies to keep back fuel-efficient cars. Intel and AMD are most ceratinly not in cahoots to keep real chip power down (if Moore's law suddenly stopped, sales would collapse. If Moore's law could be leapfrogged, they'd do it to beat the other.)
Fuel cell producers are not--I repeat, not--purposfully sabatoging their work for fiscal gain. Selling a new car to every family in America of a brand-new, patented design could make or break any car company. Once one goes to market, everyone else is going to have to pay catchup or try and leapfrog. (Hybrid cars are just a stopgap measure, because the converters to get hydrogen from gasoline are rediculously expensive.)
We live in a capitalist civilization. If there's a real good out there that can be built that will out do what the other guy is making in all measurements, it will be built. If fuel cells aren't sitting in our laptops yet, there are a dozen easy ways that someone with just a high school diplomay could figure out, aside from willfull obstruction, as to their not taking off in the market. Heck, read the rest of the posts on this article, and you'll find plenty.
in that crater over there with the dead scientists...
remember kids, don't play with presurized hydrogen!
Jesus saves souls and redeems them for valuable cash prizes
No I think it works something like this.
scenario 1:
stupid consumer who only buys at walmart:This light bulb is $3.99 this one is $3.75 and this one is #$!22.99? I think I will get the $3.75 one thank you.
scenario 2:
Walmart executive: (relizing how dumb consumers are)$22.99! Mark it down to $3.99 or we wont stock it. This can't sell at that price.
The corporate world is not out to screw people for a few lousy bucks. The long lasting light bulbs have been out for years and did not sell well. It had nothing to do with some conspiracy. On the other hand Microsoft and alot of tech companies are an exception due to the power they have with binary only code in their products. Any real product can be disassembled and so forth but not a compilied binary code which is only licensed and not sold. You are at mercy with the vendor even for interopibility which can be a federal crime( reversed engineered) under the dmca act or be in violation of the EULA. The rest of the world is different.
If the fuel cell idea was economical, I am sure a few engineers partnered with some potential investors could start a company and make these. If the big laptop battery companies do not implement this then a small company could obtain a patent and do this. This hasn't happened due to the scenario's mentioned above or it would be so expensive and potentially dangerous( hydrogen used) that it is not economical enough to construct such a device at this time. As evident with the light bulbs, people do not see long term and only short term costs sadly enough.
http://saveie6.com/
I almost believed your message until I got to the part about the goverment and their amazingly superior computers... anyone who has done consulting for the government knows they actually have an assortment of banged-up relics from the cold war days.
Maybe the superior computers are in the top secret hangar at Area 51.
It's Slashdot's evil twin... SlashNOT
I have some of those bulbs and you know what, the suck unless you have them perfectly upright.
If you place pointing at the ground they burn out with in 6 or so months. Also if you place them in anything that vibrates, like a fan, they burn out very quickly. I have tried several brands of flourescent bulbs and nothing last very long. Now my GE Revel bulbs work great in the above two applications.
You'd need something similar to that to provide the kind of energy needed to accelerate and power an automobile at a reasonable rate.
-
You're probably thinking mainly of the Hindenburg disaster when talking about something with hydrogen in it exploding. The problem with that is, A) the Hindenburg didn't explode, and B) it is highly unlikely that the fire that did consume the craft was caused by hydrogen being ignited by a spark. I got this from my dad and then later saw a report on it on PBS. Through a quick search on Google, I found the most relevant page I could, here.
The gist of it is that the skin of the Hindenburg was made of fabric and coated with laquers and metal based paints, and the material itself was highly flammable. (The guy on the PBS documentary had a piece of the original fabric and showed how nicely it burned.) That's why the entire surface of the dirigible burned within seconds and it crashed to the ground, and that's also why it burned with a bright orange flame. A hydrogen flame is nearly invisible in daylight; in darkness it's a pale blue. Hydrogen is lighter than air, thus always burns upwards, not in all directions. The long and short of it is that there were many indicators that a few thousand observant engineers and scientists over the decades should have picked up on, that should have told them their assumptions about hydrogen's involvment in that disaster were wrong. But to this day, the Hindenburg "explosion" is used in books and courses to show how "dangerous" hydrogen is. Just goes to show that just because something has been "known" a for a long time, doesn't mean it's correct.
While we were talking about this (dad and I), he also told me about some experiments he'd seen and/or done many years ago with hydrogen. For example, if you have a tank filled with hydrogen and poke a hole in the side, and light the stream of hydrogen that's coming out with a match, guess what happens? No, it doesn't explode. If it's dark, you'll see a blue flame right at the edge of the hole. You'll see it until there isn't any gas left in the bottle. The pressure of the escaping gas is always just enough to keep it from burning back into the bottle. But there's also another reason it doesn't burn back into the bottle and blow up. Say you stick that match into the hole, guess what happens? The hydrogen will put it out. Poof. Not enough oxygen. See, hydrogen is only flammable in the presence of oxygen. And it's only explosive in tightly confined spaces. So inside you're battery's fuel cell, you'd first have to mix it with a certain percentage of oxygen, while it's still sealed, and then somehow introduce a spark, inside the case, aslo while it's still sealed. Good luck.
Anyway, I just wanted to spread some updated information on the Hindenburg, and I've always thought that whole pure-hydrogen-puts-out-a-match thing really interesting.
What happens to the byproducts created by these laptop cells (water, water vapor). Is it stored for later removal?
I don't know about you but I would not want water dripping from my laptop
I'm never going to achieve Nirvana with my Karma
That's an interesting observation, yet planes are routinely filled with highly flammable liquids that make them go.
I suppose it will be interesting as to how they implement a fully-insulated cell.
This sig no verb.
There once was a US company who built a hybrid car which used a shoe-box sized turbine engine and a small flywheel. They designed both components from scratch and debugged it to the point where they drove the car across country. I don't even think it broke down once (unlike that fuelcell car that just made it's trip x-country and broke down many times).
r dw are.htmi ne/fall97 /9_25/Benrosen.html
http://www.awl.com/englishpages/tech_talking_ha
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/business/botl
there were more links a couple of years ago but now many are no longer posted. There used to be a good one with illustrations and pictures. Anyway, none of the Big Three would buy into their design so they closed shop. Capstone still makes compact turbine engines though.....
Could be a good time to auction off the car on ebay?
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
Actually, the bit about $10,000 toilet seats -- I had read from a couple different sources that the reason you always hear about these hideously expensive toilets and hammers and so on was that the listed purchase price was based on a much larger order of items, including things that cost several hundred thousand, or millions of dollars. Take all the items in the list, divide into the cost, and the average cost per item was $10,000 (or whatever convenient number it was). So the $20 toilet seat cost $10,000, but so did the $5 million supercomputer. Basically, it was lazy government accounting. :)
"Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
Remember that a fuel cell is just a battery that stores its fuel externally. Also, fuel cells are seldom designed to be reversible, i.e., you can't apply electricity and produce fuel.
The usual proposal is to store the fuel in some sort of cartridge that you replace when it's used up. Presumably you'd have to go to the local store to buy these cartridges.
But isn't that what you already do now with devices that use primary (non-rechargeable) batteries? This is exactly why secondary (rechargeable) batteries are so popular. It's a lot more convenient to just plug your depleted batteries into a charger where they'll be ready by morning. No store trip required.
So the only advantage I can see for the fuel cell is when the device requires so much energy that conventional (primary or secondary) batteries are too heavy or bulky, and you don't have frequent access to external power for recharging. This may be the case for some laptop users, but is it really that hard to carry a few spare batteries and swap them out as needed?
Sure, I'd like to see a safe, inexpensive consumer fuel cell on the market. But it will have to compete more with primary (nonrechargeable) batteries than with secondary (rechargeable) batteries. And primary battery chemistries (e.g., lithium) are already available that have much higher energy densities than any secondary battery. So unless those fuel cartridges are a lot cheaper (and no less safe) than alkaline or lithium batteries, they won't have much of a market.
They were promptly bought out by gillette together with all their patents, then shut down. This was more than a decade ago. I only know this because my grandfather was telling me about it recently, he still has some. To this day I still have to buy razor blades that last for less than a month.
Go figure.
I had the argument about the lightbulb with my physics teacher. I lost. Do some research. Cheap efficient lightbulbs that last for decades aren't hard to produce. The parent poster is right when he says the companies who make lightbulbs aren't interested and destroy anyone who attempts it.
Capitalism in practice does not work like you think. Monopolies and cartels are a dime a dozen in this world, stiffling competition and using power and influence to maintain outdated buisness models.
Liberty.
A few facts about flywheels for you morons posting stupid replies.
First, you could use a lightweight material, and simply have it spinning much faster. Doubling the weight may double the power, but doubling the speed quadruples the power... Think fast, not heavy.
Second, even if it is so poorly designed that it is a common occurance that they shatter, a kevlar jacket could be put around each one, or a group of them...
As far as a battery for your laptop... What the hell are you talking about?! Flywheels wouldn't work too well in a light-weight object that needs lots of power. But we were talking about fuel cells. Most people aren't going to be too happy using a fuel cell, since it will leak a great deal of water while in use.
As for applications... There was a slashdot story some time ago that flywheels were going to be put to use in the international space station. No place on earth would it be as dangerous to have the risk of projectiles, so NASA apparently seems to think the risk isn't very high.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
.. is not that they last only two-four hours with laptop use. The real problem is that they only last two years before they are totally worn out and you can toss them away. Not too long ago, my dad had to get a new cellular phone because he couldn't find batteries to his Nokia 8110 anymore. The phone was perfectly good for his use and the only reason why he had to get a new phone was because the battery would only last 15 minutes. That's how dead it has gotten in three years. Most of the 2+ year old laptops I've seen have the same problem. PDA's, CD and MD players, same thing. They get a lifespan of 2-3 years simply because their batteries will go dead in that time and you won't find replacements because the stores and factories have moved on to new products.
Appreciate the links. It's a good idea, but maybe they didn't go far enough.
They say they simply used unleaded fuel to turn the turbine, but why? With a turbine, you don't need the high grade fuels that you do with a piston engine. They could have used any flamable liquid (or any combination of liquids) to generate power.
It would be a good transition vehicle. You fill it up with clean fuel XYZ when you are at a station which carries it, but can just as well use gasoline when you don't have the option. The fact that less refining would be needed would drop fuel prices to dirt-cheap.
That's just the beginning. A turbine really doesn't have anything that could break down, so your car could (possibly) run practically forever without maitenance. In addition, since the type of fuel can be anything, you might have fuel competitions! So much for bombing middle-eastern countries...
Umm, did I mention I am an engineer? I've never designed a vehicle before, but a turbine-driven car has great potential (to get someone assinated by the 'powers that be' anyhow). I might just consider doing some more with this idea.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
BTW, if anyone wants to buy flourescent bulbs, be sure to buy the newer designs with a high-frequency lighter and a gas mix that gives a more natural light; they're a bit more expensive, but gives a much nicer light.
/Janne
Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
I'm actually rather pleased with the new split in laptop designs. You have 'portables', large, relatively inexpensive laptops with desktop-class performance but only an hour or so of battery life; and ultraportables, small, light laptops - perhaps powered by a Crusoe chip - with long battery life and easy to tag along wherever you go. For the daily commute, you have your entire desktop with you. When travelling light, the ultraportable will still be able to handle most computing needs. Of course, fuel-cells would improve both designs considerably.
/Janne
Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
Don't know about the razor blade or the lightbulb,
but this behaviour is very common in industries.
For instance when Dyson took is patent for a
bagless vacuum cleaner to Hoover and the other
big companies, then told him to get lost as the
bags and sundries where a big part of there
profit. In the end the only way he could bring
them to market was to finance and start his
own company.
Just think... the just fill 'er up and long duration flights of glow plug engines without the mess and noise, with the the quietness and (hopefully) cleanness of electric motors, without having to worry about having four charged battery sets because you've only got 5 minutes flight time/ battery...
G.E. sells CFL's (Compact Flourescent Lights) with an average lifetime of 12,000 hours (8 years). There are also a number of places that sell incandescent bulbs with a 20,000 hour lifetime. The filament is about as thick as a pencil; there are several theatre supply stores which sell them online. Here is the G.E. reference:
f l_ release.html
http://www.gelighting.com/na/pressroom/pr_all_c
The Berkeley Fire Station also has a 40 watt bulb (also a G.E. bulb) that has ben burning continuously for 100 years now. This has been verified boh by G.E. and by Ripleys and the Guiness book of records (direct linking not possible; sorry).
-- Terry
I don't even know where to start taking your analysis apart.
You assume that companies will compete vigorously without question, and that from being the best product, they get the most money.
The fact is, there have been a number of conspiracies on record where the competition gets together and does a number of things to keep the prices high.
You assume one would just reveal their latest technology and beat the other. I'm afraid that that's just not the case. Think of competing identical products. Each one could continue to lower their prices, but the other companies would match those prices, thus killing any profits that might have been earned. Not to mention that once the price drops, the margins get thinner, making nobody (but the consumers) happy.
Intel's fastest chip is always orders of magnitude more expensive, so AMD and Intel might get together and decide that they will only match each other, and not try to push to be the fastest. Then, they can sell a chip they can make cheaply, for much more than it would otherwise be worth. One jumping ship would just provide momentary profits, then losses as the competition matched them, with both again getting smaller margins.
The same could be said for lightbulb manufacturers. They see everyone else only makes crappy lightbulbs, so they stick with making crap. They are able to gouge the consumer for more than if they made a bulb that lasted forever.
Finally, I would like to say that I don't know any of this is happening, just that it is possible, and has happened in the past. Also, a 20 watt lightbulb would be very useful. Many lighting fixtures use several lower-power bulbs, rather than a single, more powerful bulb. Additionally, I have seen a documentary (a few years ago) of Edison's home (now a museum). The lightbulbs Edison made have never been changed. They are on for many hours a day, going on for 80-90 years now, IIRC.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
That's not the issue. You just need a very thin layer of platinum spread to get the catalyzing effect.
And anyway, most high tech devices cost more than gold per weight.
...I meant obscelesence. As someone who has recently gone through the painful process of cleaning up a flooded basement due to hot water heater giving out, it's quite clear. Devices have built in obscelesence otherwise people woudl not purchase more. Batteries die in a given amount of time and people run to the store to buy more. Where is the incentive for Energizer or Duracel to make their batteries 10x more efficient? Cares with 100mpg have been built but the patents have been bought by the big three and locked away. Look what happened to Tucker and his automobiles. I'm not condoning this practice but obscelesence is a common factor in a capitalistic society.
I can walk into any Riders Hobby shop and pick up a fuel cell. They are in the educational kits section. It has both a way to generate your own hydrogen+oxygen from a solar cell and then you can run the fuel cell from the gasses you just created to spin a motor.
Granted HIGH power fuel cells and an abundance of hydrogen and a safe way to transport it are not here... but I can buy fuel cells at a regular store all day long.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Back in the 80s Pop was playing with a home darkroom and I helped out a bit and learned most of it. He bought a product called "ParColor" out of a small ad in a photography mag which claimed it was a color print process that was only two steps and had a fairly wide temp range.
Damned if it didn't work as advertised. I can personally testify to that. I helped print them and one hung on the wall in the living room until fire destroyed the old house in 2000.
But the on topic part is when he called to order more they told him they had just been bought be Kodak and couldn't take any more orders. Never heard of that process again.
Democrat delenda est
Not explosive except in pretty odd geometries, you say?
Do you mean odd geometries like high school chemistry experiments at standard temperature and pressure?
You know, the one in which you pass a current through water (a bit like charging a hydrogen fuel cell really), then collect the product gases in test tubes and check the contents of each test tube with a glowing splint of wood?
Do you remember what the effects of O2 and H2 on the splint were? That's right my friend. The O2 caused the splint to glow brighter (and possibly re-ignite), while the H2 caused a very definite "POP!".
That "POP!", in case you have not yet realised, was a small scale *explosion*.
Now, I rather imagine that a *destructive* explosion is a very small risk when dealing with fuel cells for small devices like laptops, but I would take the risk more seriously for larger batteries.
Ahh - My eye!
The doctor said I'm not supposed to get Slashdot in it!
We live in a capitalist civilization. If there's a real good out there that can be built that will out do what the other guy is making in all measurements, it will be built.
Not necessarilly. While I agree the person you responded to is a little more cynical about people's motives (particularly the scientists) than reality probably warrants, there is no question that, as a result of the patent system and the ability to 'own' excusive rights to an idea for an extended period of time (previously, 17 years from getting the patent, now 20 years from filing), good ideas do routinely get purchased and suppressed by their entrenched competitors.
Oil companies have bought patents on alternative fuel technologies and sat on them. Indeed, the fact that we now have fuel cells even available for consideration is due in no small part to some of those patents expiring.
Razer companies have bought the patents to self-sharpening razers, and buried them. The consumer will not see that technology until the patent expires, and perhaps not even then as Gillette is likely to patent other aspects of the manufacturing process for another 20 years, processess that may be relatively obvious, but are difficult or impossible to avoid if you want to make the device.
This disgusting habit of purchasing patents and suppressing new innovation is common, quite possibly widespread, and ultimately results in the kinds of things the original poster was ranting about.
Their rant however was misdirected.
It is not the capitalist system that is 'conspiring' to prevent technological innovation, it is the patent system that is facilitating it, and indeed making the practice quite profitable to entrenched corporations. Capitalism is as much a victim of the patent system as the typical inventor[1] and consumer are.
Until the mythical notion that patents somehow 'encourage' innovation rather than stifle it has been thoroughly debunked in the popular mind, and the notion of granting monopolies, which are antithetical to free markets and competition, is replaced with something less destructive to the marketplace of ideas and the deployment of technolgoies, we will continue to see numerous promising improvements like this buried and suppressed.
Until then, your optimism will, I'm afraid, be as off-base as the venom the person you responded to was.
[1]The typical inventor doesn't own his invention, his employer does. The typical inventor has no rights to his work, or his invention, and will suffer civil penalties if he or she goes off and impliments their invention on their own.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
Paragraphs would be good...
Until the mythical notion that patents somehow 'encourage' innovation rather than stifle it has been thoroughly debunked in the popular mind, and the notion of granting monopolies, which are antithetical to free markets and competition, is replaced with something less destructive to the marketplace of ideas and the deployment of technolgoies, we will continue to see numerous promising improvements like this buried and suppressed.
;)
Wouldn't it be easier to just render "Buried" patents unenforceable? i.e., Gilette buys the patent, but the patent is worthless if they are not engaged in acts that a reasonable man would find to be conducive to getting the razor to market.
Until then, your optimism will, I'm afraid, be as off-base as the venom the person you responded to was.
Probably. But between the two of us, we come somewhere closer to the truth.
hydrogen is NOT explosive except in some pretty odd geometries
Sorry, but hydrogen is a very dangerous material, and should not be used without extreme caution.
Hydrogen gas has the widest explosive mixture range in air of ANY known material. Ignition of a hydrogen gas - air mixture is also possible with the lowest energy spark of any other fuel-air mixture.
Not only that, but the energy released by such an explosion is greater per gram of hydrogen than any other fuel.
In addition hydrogen gas is completely odorless, meaning that there is no obvious warning that you are in a dangerous environment.
And that's a limited resource on planes, isn't it? What happens when you get 10-20 of these things going at once, and start using more O2 than was designed for? Or am I missing something fundamental? (like planes recycle air, or take air in from the atmosphere, and presurize it?)
Zapman
However you've missed a few points:
a) quite a lot of the fuel cells plan to use alcohol, that's about as dangerous as a bottle of whisky.
b) hydrogen is only an issue in strong concentrations below a certain concentration it doesn't combust- ventilation is important, but then it's important anyway with laptops
c) both Hindenburg and Challenger, the H2 wasn't the issue. In both cases they were already very screwed before the hydrogen even caught. Those solid rocket boosters were/are disasters waiting to happen. The SSMEs can be shut down. SSRBs cannot.
d) hydrogen isn't much more dangerous than natural gas
e) there's a difference between detonation and conflagration. The LH2/LOX mixture wasn't a detonation- it was only a conflagration.
f) there's far, far, far more energy in your car fuel tank than in a laptop... think about it.
-WolfWithoutAClause
"Gravity is only a theory, not a fact!"Think of competing identical products. Each one could continue to lower their prices, but the other companies would match those prices, thus killing any profits that might have been earned. Not to mention that once the price drops, the margins get thinner, making nobody (but the consumers) happy.
I don't see what you're getting at. If the margins are getting slimmer and slimmer, they can introduce the better project at a higher margin, and boost their profitability without undercutting their main product.
It's happened with light bulbs, and there are obvious reasons why it can't quite work with x86 chips or gasoline-powered cars. (No, wait, the "better product" is happening with gasoline powered cars. [I'd link to Honda, but their !$#ing website spits Mozilla an error message.] )
I'll readilly admit that pure capitalism is often set back by short-term profits. But that doesn't mean that there are oogles of goodies in every catagory we care about that are far better than what we've got just sitting on the shelf not doing anything.
I think they used unleaded fuel because it was readily available and showed how you could still use the existing infrastructure. I like your idea of a multi-fuel system though. Mainly because of the competitive nature of it.
;/
Capstone is still in business and if you are REALLY interested, you might still find someone there willing to work with you on it.
Also, I recall reading up on how they built the flywheel and it really looked like most of the R&D time/effort went into the flywheel. With shock absorbsion, floating bearings, explosion capturing, etc.
I'm still of the mind that fuelcells and flywheels belong in the home power system FIRST and not in automobiles. I think the competition in the auto industry makes it more "approachable". Kinda like in the computer industry where you have to see if there is even a snow balls chance in hell that Microsoft would be interested in your product. If they are, there's no/little future for YOU to make a profit. Other than purely selling out for less than what it's worth.
Didn't the oil industry purchase the patent on NiMH batteries????? I thought I remember hearing Toyota and Panasonic were being sued over the SHAPE of the NiMH batteries in the Prius.... Ah, progress.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
Mind you, it is a solar charger that will peak at 2 watts, so running a laptop would be somewhat excessive. You are able to daisy-chain these devices to get more power. Information on the iSun is here.
At least you don't worry about having consumables with you. I'd imagine that on a long trip, you'd probably want to carry extra fuel for a fuel cell, which probably wouldn't go over well with the airlines.
It's very problematic doing anything with automobiles if not for the engineering but also because of the lawyers who love blaming things like 'clients running into light poles while drunk and sueing the light pole manufacturer and installation crew for negligence'.
BUT, why not use some of these new ideas in safer places? Like putting flywheels in subway stations to help stop incoming trains AND starting them off. The flywheel is stationary and there's always energy to put into it and very soon a need for that energy. And it could be purely mechanical or mechanical on braking and use as electrical energy on starting by adding shunting into the existing elecrical system.
Modern electronics can now control secondary braking systems if the flywheel system isn't effective or fails.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
And what is the difference between an explosion, and say something burning "really really fast"?
this is not a troll, I'm really asking. Is there a certain burn rate where something can then be deemed as an explosion? Does there have to be a high pressure shockwave created?
As for the $10,000 toliet seat--that was the military paying for a seat on a battle-craft (not sure if it was naval or air force.) And I think it was a case of corruption / fraud, to boot.
The seat was for the P-3 Orion (anti-sub craft that I used to crew on). I believe the cost was so high because they only ordered a small number of this highly custom piece of plastic.
The only good weather is bad weather.
Actually, the NSA was influential in the past in getting private companies to advance the state of the art in computing. I believe the IBM stretch was one of the early ones that they funded.
The NSA is still using private companies to develop advanced technology. The CIA even has a not-secret venture capital firm! And the NRO also funded a lot of stuff using the CIA as cover (NRO's existence was classified until congress blew their cover a few years ago).
And NSA may indeed have some sort of supercomputer - probably a highly specialized goodie for cryptography. Hell, probably acres of these things. But they also probably have no significant commercial use.
The government isn't all idiots... it's just that the system selects for idiots at too many decision making positions, and it also cripples anyone with brains that actually makes it into those positions.
Oh, keep in mind that the FBI, our pre-eminent law enforcement agency, as of 9/11 only equipped its agents with poorly networked 486's!
The only good weather is bad weather.
Yes, but bright efficient lightbulbs that last for decades are. Check out this link to the nightlight that's been burning since 1901. The secret to that light's longevity is that it is - like so many /. posters - a dim bulb. :-)
I play Nerd-Folk!
Kinda. You can take a block of TNT and set it on fire. It won't explode. IANAC (chemist) but I believe the difference is that fire requires fuel, oxygen, and heat to ignite while a high explosive required fuel and a good shockwave to detonate. This is why dynamite requires a blasting cap - the blasting cap explodes, creating a sufficient shockwave to detonate the dynamite. Black powder, on the other hand, burns rather than detonates.
I'm sure google is your friend at this point...
Well, the real problem with fuel cells is that, as hydrogen is readily available from water in more ways than I can count (electrolysis, bouncing a powerful laser beam, whatever), the use of it would derail the economies of the oil producing companies (but the US doesn't really care).
More importantly, it would destroy the oil companies of the US (and these are fueling politicians on all sides)
Thus, fuel cells will not fly unless laws are passed to get rid of the oil
Link? Or is this just another unsubstantiated urban legend?
Perhaps the Internet does not in fact contain all the information in the world? Or if so, it's not all in a language we all can understand?
Or, perhaps the only people who put up websites about this sort of thing aren't very trustworthy, even if what they're saying may be true? What kind of website would you trust to push this thing past the "urban legend" level? A major newspaper would be sufficient, but almost anything else could just be some random wacko making up facts.
I don't understand the chemistry (count me as one geek who never really understood stochiometry/balancing of chemical reactions), but it utilises something called "sodium borohydride" which is made from borax, which is supposedly abundant. Now, one thing I haven't managed to figure out from the site is whether the hydrogen exist naturally in the borax derivative (and released by the reaction with water), or if the hydrogen has to be put there (ie, chemical reaction to create it, then water releases it). If someone could tell me, that would be great.
Let's suppose it needs to be put there (or you need a way to get hydrogen cheaply). You need a source of borax, but you also want hydrogen. One method of obtaining hydrogen from water (though I don't quite understand the process - though I know a version of it is used in commercial production of hydrogen) is to pass superheated steam over hot iron (red hot? dunno). This method was used back in the early 1800's to produce hydrogen (called at the time "combustible air") for gas ballooning - it is what caused gas ballooning to win out over hot air balloons (well, that and coal gas). Prior to that, hydrogen could only be made with iron and dilute sulferic acid mixes, that didn't produce hydrogen quickly enough (had to wait days to fill a balloon).
So, if you need to put the hydrogen in the borax - what do you do? Build a production plant near Barstow, California! This area is very near to the town of Boron - a major borax producer, and Barstow hosts a major solar generating plant (solar tower using steam and focused mirrors). Now, use two such plants or systems - one superheating water to steam, then pass the steam over the other heating iron very hot, thus obtaining hydrogen from water using the sun's energy.
I am NOT saying you will get more energy - that isn't my claim. I am saying that this would be a method to get a large hydrogen production plant going, that would be non-poluting in production (the industrial processes I was speaking of that do a similar job utilise petroleum systems and some kind of water mix to produce the hydrogen), and using the energy of the sun - it would be a method of storing solar energy in the production of hydrogen (which could be stored in the borax, or if that isn't what happens, used in some other manner).
Is this thinking flawed - ie, the method of producing hydrogen using solar energy? If so, why? If not - then WHY ARE WE NOT DOING THIS (outside of startup costs, etc)?
We are talk 100 year old technology...
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
Theres nothing stopping them from putting some kind of scent into the hydrogen so you can tell when its leaking. Propane is also an odorless gas if i remember correctly. It smells like rotten eggs when its leaking because they add that scent to the gas so you can identify by scent when its leaking
Um, you do know that in a laptop battery (or a CD / MP3) player something that small couldn't leak out too much smelly gas too quickly. The response to a leak would be "Alright! Who farted?" or "Hey! Who crapped their pants?" and then the problem would remain ignored as someone says, "Hey buddy, light a match!"
You've got to remember that we are dealing with average human beings here.
"Face it, a nation that maintains a 72% approval rating on George W. Bush is a nation with a very loose grip on reality.
There's lots to be done first.
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For example for car fuel cells:
http://www.cartech.doe.gov/research/fuelc
Lots of things from the fuel cells themselves to filters to reformers to catalysts to coming up with standardized fuels for testing so that people can compare experiments meaningfully.
Fine, but what reactions are you considering. The flywheel melting, shattering, spinning out of control and crashing through it's casing? etc.
Hmm, you seem to be stuck on the idea that you can't have more than a single flywheel containing all the energy necessary.
Besides that, I still think you underestimate how good air is at dispersing very high temperatures (if melting is in fact what you are talking about).
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
The claim was that there are self-sharpening razor blades and that the technology is being held down by Gillette. I don't think I'm going too far out on a limb by saying that if this was true there should be information out on the net that will shed some light on the issue.
When was the last time you saw a report on a product which is specifically not going to market? That sort of thing doesn't get reported, does it? Even if it did, would it be reported in an American paper, or a Brazilian one? (And can you read Portuguese?)
Sorry, but I still think you put too much trust in the 'net (and probably the English-language part of the 'net, at that). The original claim was that Gillette bought a Brazilian company over a decade ago, including all their patents, and then shut them down. So what? Companies buy out other companies all the time. As for the self-sharpening razors, Gillette may even now be improving the product for eventual release (or they may have released it already -- see below). They're not supporting the old products anymore (that's a reasonable interpretation of "shut them down"). This would be consistent with the original poster's claim, and yet so commonplace that nobody would bother to report it, except in passing. Heard anything about what nVidia is doing with 3dfx's video card technology lately?
This is not to say that the original poster's claim is true, by the way. In fact, I consider it uninteresting. Self-sharpening razors have existed for decades (one was patented in 1917), razor manufacturers offer them today, and corporate buyouts (with patents) happen all the time. Again, so what?