Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Cheaper, Cleaner Hydrogen Without Platinum

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the fill-er-up dept.

keithww writes "Looks like the hydrogen economy may have gotten a whole lot cheaper. Wisconsin team engineers gas from biomass using common metals of tin, nickel, and aluminum instead of platinum. This looks like a good way to get rid of biowaste also." Of course, there's still a long way to go before the automotive industry is using it, but it is good news nonetheless.

8 of 295 comments (clear)

  1. Yeah, I gas from biomass too by millisa · · Score: 5, Funny

    Wisconsin team engineers gas from biomass

    Apparently I wasn't the only one to eat Taco Bell last night...

    1. Re:Yeah, I gas from biomass too by rootofevil · · Score: 5, Funny

      taco bell food has nothing biological in it, sorry.

      --
      turn up the jukebox and tell me a lie
  2. bah...we should screww H and just use this by the_2nd_coming · · Score: 5, Informative

    this is the future

    --



    I am the Alpha and the Omega-3
  3. Carbon nanorods by flend · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Work is being done on using carbon nanorods to store hydrogen (amongst others by the Renewable Energies Research Lab in Golden, CO). These would be cheap and safely disposable and probably represent the future of hydrogen fuel tech.

  4. The US is not the world by tarranp · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Even if the auto industry/petrochem industry did prevent the widespread adoption from being used in the US, there are other countries like Japan which have the capability to engineer complex systems, the discipline to deploy them, and who would welcome reducing their depndence on foreign oil.

  5. Cars... by nepheles · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Isn't it, perhaps, the whole idea of an automobile, which is inherently inefficient, which needs re-thinking? It seems that support for rail over long distances, and metro-like systems for shorter distances might be more beneficial to all. Trains do not require huge streets, they do not require huge areas for parking, they do not lead to massive congestion, they do not cause deaths on a huge scale. (More Americans are killed every year from road fatalities than were killed in the war in Vietnam).

    It may be that the car is too ingrained in the American psyche to dispense with it... but that's no reason to keep it either

    --
    ((lambda x ((x))) (lambda x ((x))))
  6. Re:Stop recycling! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    While your assessment is accurate for oil-based products, it doesn't apply to biomass.

    Burning things that have been produced by recently living organisms is not too bad, it's just another part of the normal carbon cycle.

    The problem with fossil fuels is that they are re-introducing carbon dioxide into the atmosphere that has been removed from the natural carbon cycle...

    An interesting question is how efficient can we make energy production based on plant farming, which is an indirect way of utilizing solar energy - plants transform carbon dioxide (+ water + sunlight) into hydrocarbons, hydrocarbons are processed into non-fossil fuel and utilized - can this be more efficient than solar panels? I believe photosynthesis is a pretty efficient process, especially for fast growing plants, but this is something that hasn't (AFAIK) been tried on a large scale.

  7. Re:The Hindenburg, Mark II by Weaselmancer · · Score: 5, Informative

    Argh but I get tired of people using the Hindenburg as proof hydrogen is dangerous.

    The Hindenburg burned because of the paint that was used, which is chemically similar to rocket fuel.

    Hydrogen burns with an invisible flame. Watch the footage - it's not the hydrogen that's the big problem.

    If I had to be in a car crash, I'd prefer a hydrogen car to do it in. Gas tank ruptures, hydrogen floats off. Gasoline lays in puddles underneath me.

    Weaselmancer

    --
    Weaselmancer
    rediculous.