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That's cool but still limiting, the infrastructure is going to be expensive and not easily available in remote places. Batteries that could be charged by "refu

by 2rsf 6y ago

That's cool but still limiting, the infrastructure is going to be expensive and not easily available in remote places. Batteries that could be charged by "refueling" [1], or fuel cells that require hydrogen are a much more feasible solution and environmentally safe for the long term [1] https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/battery-recharges-your-electric-car-instantly-180963621/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/battery-recharges-...

pedrocr 6y ago
This is a common objection by people that haven't lived with an EV. In reality convenient very slow charging is what you really want. Cars spend 90%+ of their time parked. Connecting them to a common outlet at those times is more than enough for charging to be something you stop thinking about. Going to a gas station becomes a strange inconvenience you used to have to do. In a few cases you then go on a road trip and use a fast charger. What we actually have to build out is all that slow and simple infrastructure in city parking and other convenient places. The grid is already everywhere. Losing all that convenience, 2/3 of your energy, and having to build out a completely new fueling infrastructure to use hydrogen fuel cells just makes no sense.
- deergomoo 6y ago
  > In reality convenient very slow charging is what you really want Which can also be an obstacle of its own—something like 60% of homes in the UK only have on-street parking, making overnight charging difficult to say the least.
- paul_f 6y ago
  I live in a suburban neighborhood Florida and less than half of the all cars here live inside of a garage. Many people who live in apartments or condominiums do not have a garage at all. I don't think slow overnight charging is feasible for even half of the cars here, and we're not even in a dense location.
  - audunw 6y ago
    I don't see why this is a big problem. There are lots of apartments in Norway without a garage, yet overnight charging has been implemented in every kind of parking arrangement by now. In Oslo, where a lot of parking is handled by the municipality, they've put up charging poles and charge a small fee for the electricity. That's about the hardest case, it's a PITA to dig up the street in a dense city to install these things. My friend lives in an apartment complex with outdoor parking, where the parking is managed by the HOA. Owners/renters can pay to have a small charging outlet installed at their parking spot. Funny thing is these parking spots already had outlets for engine heaters (it can be hard to start ICE cars in winter), but I'm pretty sure they had to lay new wire for charging since the current can be higher. Same deal with our home. It's a garage, but managed by the HOA. They decided to renovate the fuse box and electric wiring to facility installing chargers, since wiring was old and needed to be renovated anyway. Owners pay for the charging box and installation. There's a small load balancer that insures that the chargers don't overload the main power supply to the garage. It's a challenge, sure. But faaar from impossible. I get that the US has a problem with doing shared infrastructure in general. But I think this will solve itself once there's enough money to be made. Similar to how internet/cable is rolled out. Companies will offer the owners of the apartment complex to install the chargers for free, in exchange for charging a fee on the electricity sold to people charging with them.
gambiting 6y ago
>>fuel cells that require hydrogen are a much more feasible solution and environmentally safe for the long term I honestly, hand on heart, don't understand how anyone still believes this. Honestly. Hydrogen is a PAIN to work with. We don't have any elemental hydrogen on earth. Nearly 100% of hydrogen available in commercial supply comes from fossil fuel production and while it could still be produced by electrolysis it's a stupidly inefficient process, especially since the resulting gas then has to be compressed for transport. And most importantly, no one has answered a simple question - with hydrogen being the smallest element of all, it leaks out of any container you put it in, making it brittle as it does so. 70kg lead bottles only store 1L of hydrogen, and all of it naturally evaporates through the metal within few weeks. Woven carbon fibre tanks are better at this, but it still evaporates with time and the tanks are incredibly expensive to manufacture. I'd argue it's not feasible at all. It's a pipe dream that people keep bringing up for some reason because it looks great on paper. In practice the production and transportation and then safe usage of hydrogen are significant obstacles, where batteries have none of them - the only advantage is the fueling speed, but even then I'm not so sure - have you seen videos of any commercial fueling stations for hydrogen? The Toyota Mirai with its tiny tank takes about 10 minutes to refuel since the process has to be done so carefully. Yes it's faster than electric charging, but the speeds we're seeing on some cars(Porsche Taycan, Tesla Model 3) are already crazy, like 60 miles of range added in 5 minutes crazy.
- Hypx 6y ago
  Considering that we run thousands of hydrogen powered vehicles every day, this is increasingly a viewpoint that is out of touch. If anything, we know that it will work without much fuss. Most of the issues you describe no longer exist anymore. 60 miles in 5 minutes is far slower than 400 miles in 5 minutes. Even better, you can consistently go from 0-100% and not 10-80% or whatever. It also scales to larger vehicles, something that simply won't work with batteries. Not unless you're consider elaborate solutions like overhead catenaries.

by 2rsf 6y ago

pedrocr 6y ago

This is a common objection by people that haven't lived with an EV. In reality convenient very slow charging is what you really want. Cars spend 90%+ of their time parked. Connecting them to a common outlet at those times is more than enough for charging to be something you stop thinking about. Going to a gas station becomes a strange inconvenience you used to have to do. In a few cases you then go on a road trip and use a fast charger. What we actually have to build out is all that slow and simple infrastructure in city parking and other convenient places. The grid is already everywhere. Losing all that convenience, 2/3 of your energy, and having to build out a completely new fueling infrastructure to use hydrogen fuel cells just makes no sense.

deergomoo 6y ago
> In reality convenient very slow charging is what you really want Which can also be an obstacle of its own—something like 60% of homes in the UK only have on-street parking, making overnight charging difficult to say the least.
paul_f 6y ago
I live in a suburban neighborhood Florida and less than half of the all cars here live inside of a garage. Many people who live in apartments or condominiums do not have a garage at all. I don't think slow overnight charging is feasible for even half of the cars here, and we're not even in a dense location.
- audunw 6y ago
  I don't see why this is a big problem. There are lots of apartments in Norway without a garage, yet overnight charging has been implemented in every kind of parking arrangement by now. In Oslo, where a lot of parking is handled by the municipality, they've put up charging poles and charge a small fee for the electricity. That's about the hardest case, it's a PITA to dig up the street in a dense city to install these things. My friend lives in an apartment complex with outdoor parking, where the parking is managed by the HOA. Owners/renters can pay to have a small charging outlet installed at their parking spot. Funny thing is these parking spots already had outlets for engine heaters (it can be hard to start ICE cars in winter), but I'm pretty sure they had to lay new wire for charging since the current can be higher. Same deal with our home. It's a garage, but managed by the HOA. They decided to renovate the fuse box and electric wiring to facility installing chargers, since wiring was old and needed to be renovated anyway. Owners pay for the charging box and installation. There's a small load balancer that insures that the chargers don't overload the main power supply to the garage. It's a challenge, sure. But faaar from impossible. I get that the US has a problem with doing shared infrastructure in general. But I think this will solve itself once there's enough money to be made. Similar to how internet/cable is rolled out. Companies will offer the owners of the apartment complex to install the chargers for free, in exchange for charging a fee on the electricity sold to people charging with them.

gambiting 6y ago

>>fuel cells that require hydrogen are a much more feasible solution and environmentally safe for the long term I honestly, hand on heart, don't understand how anyone still believes this. Honestly. Hydrogen is a PAIN to work with. We don't have any elemental hydrogen on earth. Nearly 100% of hydrogen available in commercial supply comes from fossil fuel production and while it could still be produced by electrolysis it's a stupidly inefficient process, especially since the resulting gas then has to be compressed for transport. And most importantly, no one has answered a simple question - with hydrogen being the smallest element of all, it leaks out of any container you put it in, making it brittle as it does so. 70kg lead bottles only store 1L of hydrogen, and all of it naturally evaporates through the metal within few weeks. Woven carbon fibre tanks are better at this, but it still evaporates with time and the tanks are incredibly expensive to manufacture. I'd argue it's not feasible at all. It's a pipe dream that people keep bringing up for some reason because it looks great on paper. In practice the production and transportation and then safe usage of hydrogen are significant obstacles, where batteries have none of them - the only advantage is the fueling speed, but even then I'm not so sure - have you seen videos of any commercial fueling stations for hydrogen? The Toyota Mirai with its tiny tank takes about 10 minutes to refuel since the process has to be done so carefully. Yes it's faster than electric charging, but the speeds we're seeing on some cars(Porsche Taycan, Tesla Model 3) are already crazy, like 60 miles of range added in 5 minutes crazy.

Hypx 6y ago
Considering that we run thousands of hydrogen powered vehicles every day, this is increasingly a viewpoint that is out of touch. If anything, we know that it will work without much fuss. Most of the issues you describe no longer exist anymore. 60 miles in 5 minutes is far slower than 400 miles in 5 minutes. Even better, you can consistently go from 0-100% and not 10-80% or whatever. It also scales to larger vehicles, something that simply won't work with batteries. Not unless you're consider elaborate solutions like overhead catenaries.