3 ms·
It doesn't say anything about range, but it seems it's a pretty small ferry. There are already much larger ferries that are battery-electric (largest one is the
by hannob 5y ago
It doesn't say anything about range, but it seems it's a pretty small ferry. There are already much larger ferries that are battery-electric (largest one is the Bastø Electric in Norway, which can deliver 600 passengers and 200 cars), so I'm wondering a bit what the point is.
Hydrogen is a less efficient way of using renewable energy than using electricity directly via batteries. The only reason to use it in shipping is that for larger ships and larger distances batteries are not feasible.
DFDS is planning to convert a large ferry between copenhagen and Oslo to hydrogen:
https://www.dfds.com/en/about/media/news/hydrogen-ferry-for-oslo-copenhagen https://www.dfds.com/en/about/media/news/hydrogen-ferry-for-...
That's the kind of project where hydrogen makes sense.
- Already__Taken 5y agogot to remember small ferries do not have long stops to top off batteries. river crossing ferries night only load 4 cars in 2 minutes and then swap sides
- Forge36 5y agoWhat are the refule time comparisons?
- tallowen 5y agoI agree with what you're saying - hydrogen propulsion will make the most difference for large fleets over long distances. Right now, in the pacific northwest BC Ferries and Washington State ferries are moving to electrify their fleets. The crossing distances of these boats are much larger (The most popular BC ferries route looking to be more than 20x longer). As I recall, the procurement process for these much larger boats that go much further distances didn't include all battery (because the weight/space would have been prohibitive) or hydrogen electric (because the technology is too immature). I don't think it's reasonable to be experimenting with new technologies on 200 car ferries so even if hydrogen is not the ideal use case for this crossing, I'm excited to see this technology build a track record so it becomes a more feasible option for the large scale where it does make sense.
- formvoltron 5y agoLess efficient, but when the energy is used, the weight is gone. And that turns out to be important for efficiency. What I'm curious about his how long will they last in that harsh salty environment?
- m4rtink 5y agoSure, aircraft work with this a lot (some can't even safely land with full fuel load) but I wonder how important this is for boats ? Also for boats you need to account for shifting center of mass as the fuel gets used up, which is not an issue with batteries.
- kfprt 5y agoI don't understand this thinking at all. Hydrogen itself doesn't weigh much but the containment does. The actual change in mass due to hydrogen being used up should be <1% of the ship mass. This is entirely unlike aircraft.
- teh_klev 5y agoFrom my reading of the article I think the ferry is intended to service inter-island hops on Orkney where a 200 car ferry would be overkill. Also as the article reports, Orkney has an idiotically huge amount of renewable power available, far more than the islands can consume, and far more than the interconnect from Orkney to mainland Scotland can handle. So using it to create hydrogen seems like a fair use of that surplus power.