Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

BMW Shows Off World's Fastest Hydrogen Car

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the saving-some-power-units dept.

loid_void writes "According to Reuters and others BMW unveiled the world's fastest hydrogen-powered car at the Paris auto show on Wednesday, dubbed the H2R, capable of exceeding 300 kilometers (185 miles) per hour. The are also working with Shell on hydrogen dispensing stations. '"Our drive toward the future is called hydrogen," BMW management board member Burkhard Goeschel said before the tarp slowly slipped off the teardrop-shaped body of the sleek race car.' All I want to know, does it come with an iPod hookup?"

2 of 400 comments (clear)

  1. Not if well designed and tested by stryders · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I wouldn't compare a giant bag full of hydrogen to a modern car engineered by a company well known for its safety engineering. Here's an older article that discusses their safety (scroll a bit) on CNN

  2. How to keep it cool? by Dog's_Breakfast · · Score: 5, Interesting

    From the BMW web site:

    "...the specially insulated 140-liter tank for the liquid hydrogen provides a range of 400 kilometers....By cooling hydrogen to -253 degrees Celsius, hydrogen is shrunk to a thousandth of its original volume. 70 layers of aluminum and fiberglass sheets between the exterior and interior vehicle walls insure that the liquid hydrogen remains at extremely low temperatures."

    What I don't understand is how they manage to keep it at such a low temperature. If the tank warmed up to the normal temperature of the surrounding environment, the pressure inside the tank would be 1000 times greater than sea level. Wouldn't that pose a danger of explosion?