Are EV’s really the way to go?

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

I was watching a vid the other day of a company that recover the batteries. Its a new tech (probably a tweak in reality) they shred batteries into a kind of course grit and via solutions recover 80% on average (varies by element)
Looks to be easy to scale up, no fancy stuff going on.

I don't think your local scrap yard is going to deal with it, but the industry makes a lot of sense, the costs to recover existing materials is a fraction of new.

The other thing is the sources are mainly limited and in often dubious regimes, if the russian oil/gas issues shows anything its that being in charge of your own destiny as much as possible is a massive boon in bad times.

 

[Stelly]

Not sure that EVs are the future, when working in General Motors they thought that the future would be Hydrogen based cars and to be honest I wouldnt be surprised. From what I understand Lithium mining is terrible for the environment, then shipping it, labour right in these mines are supposed to be terrible as well... I'm sorta thinking the same way that the future for cars will probably by hydrogen.

Stelly

 

[b0rn2sk8]

Is there any other reason why you say hydrogen will win out for passenger cars?

I always question that line of thinking because the cost of producing clean hydrogen will always be multiple times that of just electricity.

Hydrogen cars also have a reasonably sized battery in them, 15kwh or more in some cases. Fuel cells can’t quickly respond to demand and they need to buffer the electricity in batteries so you can’t really avoid the ethical issues with those (not that oil is any better on that front and no one seems to be concerned about that at all).

Hydrogen combustion will be a non-starter for passenger cars because they produce nox. Yes it’s small quantities but it’s still there and while there are alternatives that exist which don’t, I can’t see them being viable in a zero emission world. they have their place but you don’t really want any nox in towns and cities, a big mining machine in a mine in the middle of nowhere is a very different proposition to passenger cars.

 

[jpaul]

I always question that line of thinking because the cost of producing clean hydrogen will always be multiple times that of just electricity.

... as a complete carbon package,
I've not seen to what degree the smaller carbon cost of a hydrogen cars battery plus that of the fuel cell(i think they have platinum though), may offset the inefficiency in the Hydrogen production, compared to a pure bev with it's 20K+ miles for break-even( versus ice ) ... daddy or chips.
California at cop26 was saying the increased ownership of cars per se, in the future, means the net carbon cost with bev's will exceed todays ICE

I saw peugot/opel/citroen have a hydrogen light weight van this year ... whether they will have a mpv/suv version too

 

[Stelly]

Is there any other reason why you say hydrogen will win out for passenger cars?

I always question that line of thinking because the cost of producing clean hydrogen will always be multiple times that of just electricity.

Hydrogen cars also have a reasonably sized battery in them, 15kwh or more in some cases. Fuel cells can’t quickly respond to demand and they need to buffer the electricity in batteries so you can’t really avoid the ethical issues with those (not that oil is any better on that front and no one seems to be concerned about that at all).

Hydrogen combustion will be a non-starter for passenger cars because they produce nox. Yes it’s small quantities but it’s still there and while there are alternatives that exist which don’t, I can’t see them being viable in a zero emission world. they have their place but you don’t really want any nox in towns and cities, a big mining machine in a mine in the middle of nowhere is a very different proposition to passenger cars.

Could you not contain Nox and get rid of it later, like a DPF on a Diesel car?

Stelly

 

[SDK^]

I'm sure there will be an industry setup to deal with it but I think it is a stretch to think a 15 year old EV as being worth anything or not requiring expensive recycling of the batteries.

Battery recycling will happen - no one is dumping a battery worth £15k+ into landfill !

e.g.
I've just paid £7k for a 10 kWh battery for home solar storage. (the current going rate)
My EV has a 75 kWh battery, so even at 80% capacity after 'x' years in the car, it's worth a significant amount of money.

 

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

This is a year old but pretty good to go over the pros cons etc (hydrogen fuel cell, actual toyota converted GR yaris engine etc)

Fox would love the stopping to refuel part (not)

Toyota's Developing A Hydrogen Combustion Engine!

Could Toyota's hydrogen engine save combustion by converting engines?Subscribe to Engineering Explained for more videos! - https://goo.gl/VZstk7Recommended B...

www.youtube.com

 

[Simon]

Battery recycling will happen - no one is dumping a battery worth £15k+ into landfill !

e.g.
I've just paid £7k for a 10 kWh battery for home solar storage. (the current going rate)
My EV has a 75 kWh battery, so even at 80% capacity after 'x' years in the car, it's worth a significant amount of money.

Although your car is 400V and a house needs 240V so only half of it is useful. And not sure what BMS is going to manage it. But the principal is there. The cells are what are needed to be able to be built into new modules. Just don’t want them glued into the pack like some OEMs are doing now

 

[Jonnycoupe]

... as a complete carbon package,
I've not seen to what degree the smaller carbon cost of a hydrogen cars battery plus that of the fuel cell(i think they have platinum though), may offset the inefficiency in the Hydrogen production, compared to a pure bev with it's 20K+ miles for break-even( versus ice ) ... daddy or chips.
California at cop26 was saying the increased ownership of cars per se, in the future, means the net carbon cost with bev's will exceed todays ICE

I saw peugot/opel/citroen have a hydrogen light weight van this year ... whether they will have a mpv/suv version too

daddy or chips?

Seriously go for a walk and get some fresh air, this EV stuff is making you all giddy.

Yes Stellantis have a Hydrogen PHEV to realise local driving on eletric from the grid, flexibility for extra range with hyrdogen without impacting its primary role as a van carrying payload.

 

[dlockers]

The argument for hydrogen is mostly from firms like JCB, who haven't really gambled on electrification as much as others, and retooling their existing diesel lumps for hydrogen is really straight forward.

 

[Jonnycoupe]

The problem with the hydrogen side of the argument between EV cars and hydrogen is this...



No one is making them!

 

[jpaul]

daddy or chips?

a popular meme from a tv advert, for a moral dilemma. ... which is more environmentally friendly hydrogen or pure ev. ....
e: you know when you've been tangoed

I've just paid £7k for a 10 kWh battery for home solar storage. (the current going rate)

there is no burgeoning 2nd life car cells option yet ? ... many of the motor manufactures are using their old packs as back-up/time-shifting supplies in offices.

 

[b0rn2sk8]

Could you not contain Nox and get rid of it later, like a DPF on a Diesel car?

Stelly

The DPF doesn’t deal with NOX, it’s the adBlue system that does and to be honest, I don’t know the answer.

Existing adBlue systems do not entirely remove it from the exhaust.

The problem with the hydrogen side of the argument between EV cars and hydrogen is this...



No one is making them!

Well there is that and the complete lack of any real investment in the infrastructure needed to produce clean hydrogen, distribute and retail it it to the end customer.

By the time anyone actually starts building anything it will be far too late and will struggle to complete with BEV passenger cars.

 

[Jonnycoupe]

My 2001 Honda Insight has NOx capture - 3-4mins of lean burn then 15secs or of richer purge - its an expensive catalyst to use on big engines! The purge cycle meant it isnt SULEV compliant for the states and that was 2 decades ago!

 

[Simon]

Indeed. Same with Toyotas DPNR system

 

[touch]

Although your car is 400V and a house needs 240V so only half of it is useful.

Power = Voltage * Current.
If you lower the voltage, you can increase the current to provide the same power.
A 10kWh battery can provide 10kWh of energy. The capacity isn't halved because the voltage is halved.

 

[Simon]

How do you lower the voltage then ? It’s modules of cells and of a set voltage and so you need to restack the modules/cells. You can’t just turn 3.7v cells into 2v cells…

Eg a car with 16 modules in a pack you could take 10 out to turn into a 240v ish system.

Ps your maths fall over when you talk about energy using a power formula.

 

[touch]

How do you lower the voltage then ? It’s modules of cells and of a set voltage and so you need to restack the modules/cells. You can’t just turn 3.7v cells into 2v cells…

You use an inverter. There's no need to change the battery cells to provide exactly the same voltage as you want to use.

That's how things like UPS work. They have 12 volt batteries (usually) but can power mains voltage servers.

Eg a car with 16 modules in a pack you could take 10 out to turn into a 240v ish system.

If you did that then I'd agree you lose about half the capacity of the battery. Why would you chuck half of it away though?

Ps your maths fall over when you talk about energy using a power formula.

You're right, 'power' wasn't the correct word to use in that last sentence. I'll edit that post.

 

[d_brennen]

The building I work in has power delivered at something like 400v and then stepped down, so it is entirely possible. Not sure of the details, no a sparky and only know of this from a passing conversation with the site manager. Apparently it's more efficient than taking 240V from the general grid

 

[blun]

Well there is that and the complete lack of any real investment in the infrastructure needed to produce clean hydrogen, distribute and retail it it to the end customer.

By the time anyone actually starts building anything it will be far too late and will struggle to complete with BEV passenger cars.

This is a blessing in disguise too as there are hundreds of better uses for green hydrogen than cars, where BEV is a much better solution