Future fuel sources

[Clark01]

46 minutes ago, turboplanner said:

Our governments are going to have to step in on range quoting. Australia's task is not 500 km at 80 km/hr, but around 800 km at 100 km/hr with a short motel stay in between legs. Airpower demand is exponentially higher with speed above 80 km/hr. That's not the requirement for all Applications, but it is a sizeable requirement for Australian operations.

 

Well... quoting range on cars is standardised. Across the world, using the WLTP cycle. The identical cycle is used for EVs and dyno-burners. And aero drag goes up exponentially (actually, its a cube-law-thing!) for all vehicles. 😀

 

In the WLTP cycle applicable here they go up to 131km/h. A variety of speeds & durations are used through the test, and you can argue whether this is "realistic", but it is standardised, and does allow like-for-like comparisons.

 

I just don't really buy the "long range" argument when plenty of EVs today approach 500km of range, at speed. Sure, there are edge cases of farmers and others who drive long distances, at speed, where there's no infrastructure, and they have a heavy load. Great, these guys can continue to use fossil-fuel cars. But the average daily distance a car drives in Australia is something like 60km. There is a huge number of vehicle use cases where EVs make sense today, albeit their economics are still a challenge.

 

50 minutes ago, turboplanner said:

The market share for Australia is very telling, and the biggest issue is pretty much the same as the reason buyers wiped out Australian built cars. If they can only just stretch to a $26,000.00 new car there's no use offering them a $40,000. The same issue goes up the price range - OK for rich people, not for families. The new car sales per month by model tells the story, and this same discussion has now been going on for years.

The top selling new car in Australia is the Toyota Hilux. Number 2 is the Ford Ranger. These aren't $26k vehicles. They're $50k+ vehicles.

 

 

56 minutes ago, turboplanner said:

These things are not insurmountable, but its wrong to suggest you can race into that market with undeveloped product designed for another country.

 

I think it reasonable to say that many American vehicles are used similarly to how we do in Australia. The Rivian R1T, the F150 Lightning, etc, are EVs that all have high GCMs, long range at high speed. The clincher is they will cost over $100k in Australia. But time will change that. 

 

In the meantime, there's plenty of families who have two cars, and an EV makes an easy replacement for the "runabout". 

 

I think I'm trying to say that this world is changing very quickly.

Long distance at heavy loads is hard. Flying a plane long distance at high speed as an EV is hard. Energy density is a thing! But these are edge cases.

 

There's a whole lot of cases in the middle that make sense, and we're going to see huge change here over the next few years.

 

 

 

 

[aro]

55 minutes ago, turboplanner said:

Australia's task is not 500 km at 80 km/hr, but around 800 km at 100 km/hr with a short motel stay in between legs.

The number of people who actually need that is a small proportion of the population. By the time that becomes an issue, EVs will be a the vast majority of the market.

 

1 hour ago, turboplanner said:

If they can only just stretch to a $26,000.00 new car there's no use offering them a $40,000.

Globally, the current demand for EVs is far greater than the supply. Why would you sell cars for 26K when there are people who will pay 40K, 50K, 75K+? As manufacturing moves away from ICE and supply starts to meet demand, prices will fall. In theory EVs should be cheaper because the engine and transmission is far simpler.

 

Many people are already saying they will never buy another ICE car. They are either driving electric cars, or waiting until they become more available. That trend is only going to accelerate.

[facthunter]

The GRID itself presents a reliability issue. No matter what type of power you are relying on at the time. If you get 20 odd Kms knocked out by an extreme storm event etc Excess solar (or wind) sourced power is a further source for anyone to purchase for a bargain price and store and supply back to the system at the right time  All along the east coast is suitable for pumped hydro to be set up and that gives you quick response standby power. No system can pay the cost of  a standby coal power station and it's too slow a response anyhow. New coal is generally for a life around 50 years. No one is going to fund that unless risks are underwritten and the sums don't add up. WE as Australians have the best wind and solar opportunity of any country in the world. Nev

[turboplanner]

11 minutes ago, Clark01 said:

 

Well... quoting range on cars is standardised. Across the world, using the WLTP cycle. The identical cycle is used for EVs and dyno-burners. And aero drag goes up exponentially (actually, its a cube-law-thing!) for all vehicles. 😀

You quoted a flat 500 K, the figures I've seen over the years are all flat ranges like this, and they all achieve that only by driving them slowly and carefully, so not relevabnt to driving at 100 km/hr, accelerating to pass or towing a caravan etc. There has been talk of range extenders, a second battery set, but the problem here is our light commercials are already marginal on GCM.

11 minutes ago, Clark01 said:

I don't really buy the "long range" argument when plenty of EVs today approach 500km of range, at speed. Sure, there are edge cases of farmers and others who drive long distances, at speed, where there's no infrastructure, and they have a heavy load. Great, these guys can continue to use fossil-fuel cars. But the average daily distance a car drives in Australia is something like 60

The EV story has always centred around the local commuter, your 60 km application. While no one is interfering with ICE there's not a problem, The EV buyer who can afford a $40,000 to $60,000 entry level and is happy with a small car will be a repeat buyer, but once you start talking penaties for ICE, politically you can't allow regional Australian access to transport to be wiped out, you can't just say "Well there might be a suitable EV one day"

11 minutes ago, Clark01 said:

 

The top selling new car in Australia is the Toyota Hilux. Number 2 is the Ford Ranger. These aren't $26k vehicles. They're $50k+ vehicles.

Correct but there are no EV equivalents and if there were, on present pricing, the cost would be$100,000 plus.

 

The Rivians and F150 Lighnings are in a level above the top sellers, currently filled by RHD conversions to Ram, Ford, Chevrolet - a tiny market.

 

What we've mentioned here is a tiny fraction of Australia's transport industry. I was driving Japanese electric pilot trucks in the mid 90's but they still haven't managed to get them into the markets. 

[Ian]

Change is a constant as much as it hurts at times. One of the hands on my uncle's farm hands used to moan about how unjust the drink driving laws were when he only drove from the pub down dirt roads on the way home. I don't think that many people would take his viewpoints with much sympathy today.

Getting caught up in the edge cases is also problematic, however what is clear is the for most people, most of the time EVs will work and are at present the most cost effective solution. From a business perspective edges cases are suicide you're either caught in a niche or trying to solve an unprofitable loss leader.

 

My main concerns relates to intermittency of wind and solar, both cyclical and random. How much oversupply do you need, how much dispatchable power to you need to throw into the mix, and the what fuels these systems batteries/gas/gravity or momentum.

One of the reasons that I thought systems like Molten Salt Reactors might be viable was their innate load following capacity. If I had a couple of billion to spare, liked dealing with dumb bureaucracies and wanted to waste a couple of decades, I might be tempted to go down this path. The other benefit for countries like Australia is that we don't have an an existing nuclear fuel industry to gum up the works. But that's just me because I'm one eyed when it comes to tech.

20 hours ago, Clark01 said:

I'm  not a smart man, but that makes the economics of FCEV vs EV pretty clear.

I'm crushed about fuel cells, I've always thought that the only chance for hydrogen was this pathway. Scratching a bit more a 30KW fuel cell you're looking at 125kg, so light plane is looking at about 600kg just for a component of the engine.

 

Relating the conversation back to planes could anyone bolt one of these onto their plane? It would probably run a treat on biodiesel

 

[Geoff_H]

I still think that hydrogen cryogenically stored in a lightweight tank.  I am not sure what the tank would need to be made from, but some lightweight epoxy type maybe possible.

[onetrack]

Ian - Both the Guiberson and Packard diesel radials were successful to a certain degree - but engine weight is always against any diesel engine, purely due to the extra thickness of materials to counter the much higher compression ratio, and the higher combustion pressures.

The Packard diesel died shortly after its introduction, not only because of the death of the Packard engineer who designed it (Woolson), but also because the engine still really needed a lot of design refinement.

The Guiberson diesel was more advanced in its design and engineering than the Packard diesel, but it too died, because gasoline radials improved their design and output considerably faster than the diesel radials in the early 1930's, largely due to improvements in octane ratings.

The Great Depression also sorted out a lot of unnecessary flights of fancy in design, the limited amount of monies available during the Depression ensured that "fat" was trimmed from every planned new design and every new design idea.

With todays technology, it is possible that a new diesel engine could be built to compete with petrol aviation engines - but no-one has done it yet, and the problem is simply the market is too small to support the level of development dollars required. The only moderately successful diesel aviation engine in current use, is based on an automotive engine.

Honda produce an all-alloy, low-friction design, 1.6L 4 cyl diesel (i-DTEC engine) that is lighter than any other of their diesel engines, and which has good output (118HP) for its size, thanks to turbocharging and intercooling. This engine could possibly be re-jigged to produce a viable engine for an ultralight aircraft.

Most diesels lend themselves to biodiesel fuel use, the problem is getting enough biodiesel that meets diesel fuel standards and which fuel can be handled by todays high-tech diesel fuel systems. Common rail diesels pressurise the fuel to extremely high pressures, this produces a lot of heat that must be dispensed with, via fuel cooling. Heating biodiesel by extreme pressurisation could lead to undesirable fuel system deposits.

Biodiesels can also tend to create deposits in fuel systems if the biodiesel has not been processed properly, and cold conditions can lead to fuel flow problems with pure biodiesel. Diesel blended with biodiesel seems to be an effective way of reducing diesel useage, whilst improving the overall combustion burn and reducing emissions.

 

The Packard diesel radial - https://www.dieselworldmag.com/diesel-engines/first-in-flight/

 

Using biodiesel in your engine - https://extension.psu.edu/using-biodiesel-fuel-in-your-engine

 

Edited December 4, 2021 by onetrack

[Old Koreelah]

I once saw an old radial (possibly a diesel) with an even number of cylinders.

I thought round engines needed odd numbers for smoothness.

[Flightrite]

18 Cyl radial has an even number of pots😉😉

[Old Koreelah]

As you probably already realise, I meant that the cylinders were mounted opposite each other; this one had, from memory, six.

[Ian]

50 minutes ago, Geoff_H said:

I still think that hydrogen cryogenically stored in a lightweight tank.  I am not sure what the tank would need to be made from, but some lightweight epoxy type maybe possible.

Why do you think this? Hydrogen is hard and physics is physics. It's telling the despite the investment this paper written in 2005 is still represents the status quo. 

Quote

Only liquid hydrogen (LH2) and high temperature hydrides (HTH) appear to have the potential to meet the combined near-term goals and none of the hydrogen storage technologies currently being developed seem to have the potential to meet the combined long-term goals.

Quote

Crygenic meaning:  relating to or involving the branch of physics that deals with the production and effects of very low temperatures.

You mention carbon fiber tanks and cryogenics. Carbon fibre gives the lowest weight and the technology is pretty simple. However the energy density is pretty poor even at 10000psi (Which isn't in production outside of a lab).

Cryogenics is refrigeration.

How is a car or plane going to store things at -252.9 (boiling point of liquid hydrogen) for weeks on end?  Even if you think that cryo-compressed H2 is an option how do you keep it cold because as soon as it warms up it will expand and offgass or burst the tank. Either one doesn't sound safe.

Here's another graph which show volumetric density which nobody wants to talk about. Liquid Hydrogen makes ethanol look good and everyone knows that ethanol reduces your range. The only way Hydrogen will work as a transport fuel is if someone develops a portable fusion reactor.

 

 

[Thruster88]

The Toyota Mirai is a hydrogen powered production car with acceptable range. It still has room in the boot.

[Geoff_H]

31 minutes ago, Ian said:

Why do you think this? Hydrogen is hard and physics is physics. It's telling the despite the investment this paper written in 2005 is still represents the status quo. 

You mention carbon fiber tanks and cryogenics. Carbon fibre gives the lowest weight and the technology is pretty simple. However the energy density is pretty poor even at 10000psi (Which isn't in production outside of a lab).

Cryogenics is refrigeration.

How is a car or plane going to store things at -252.9 (boiling point of liquid hydrogen) for weeks on end?  Even if you think that cryo-compressed H2 is an option how do you keep it cold because as soon as it warms up it will expand and offgass or burst the tank. Either one doesn't sound safe.

Here's another graph which show volumetric density which nobody wants to talk about. Liquid Hydrogen makes ethanol look good and everyone knows that ethanol reduces your range. The only way Hydrogen will work as a transport fuel is if someone develops a portable fusion reactor.

 

 

Cryogenic for aircraft.  Gas turbines can burn it with reduced put.  Sydney to London would require several stops at least.  Tank vented, some loss to atmosphere but lightweight tank ( done in space craft but with very high thermal resistance covering of tank....after all lead is used in passenger aircraft for sound absorption).

H2 Gas can be transmitted from generation plant close to nuclear power station ( well only if we have sense enough to realise that it is probably the only way that we can have power at night or after a long period without the sun like we have now.)

 

[Geoff_H]

Should have added that transmission from H2 generation to you via methane gas pipeline systems.

[onetrack]

Tesla has a new battery design. As with any technological race, the winner is the one with the most technological improvement in the fastest time period. The new Tesla battery shows a sizeable increase in efficiency, along with lower cost manufacturing. Tesla has even managed to eliminate cobalt from their new battery and substantially improve the silicon component effectiveness.

One can't help but admire Musk in one respect, his drive to ensure electric motive power wins out, is immense, and his commitment to a constant cost reduction and simplification, is laser-sharp.

Tesla has made some major design changes in their new battery design and car construction method - utilising the battery as a structural member - and these changes mean that electric motive power is steadily coming much closer to fossil fuel power, as regards cost, efficiency and energy density.

Aircraft motive power is a unique case in itself, but perhaps some kind of hybrid power for aircraft will be the next front-runner.

I personally feel the Japanese are backing a loser in the shape of hydrogen, despite their huge investment in the fuel and the associated technology.

Unless the Japanese can produce a hydrogen storage solution that is a major leap forward in technology, they will constantly struggle with the limitations of hydrogen storage.

 

Teslas new 4680 battery cell - https://cleantechnica.com/2020/09/22/everything-you-need-to-know-about-teslas-new-4680-battery-cell/

[Ian]

14 hours ago, Old Koreelah said:

I once saw an old radial (possibly a diesel) with an even number of cylinders.

Radial two stroke engines have been built with even numbers of cylinders http://www.zoche.de/

With the odd number of cylinders on a 4 stroke the power stroke is absorbed by the almost opposite compression stroke which doesn't occur with an even number of cylinders.

20 hours ago, onetrack said:

The Guiberson diesel was more advanced in its design and engineering than the Packard diesel, but it too died, because gasoline radials improved their design and output considerably faster than the diesel radials in the early 1930's, largely due to improvements in octane ratings.

The Guiberson design was interesting for a number of reasons, from a weight perspective it was comparable to the Wright R-760 Whirlwind however its fuel economy was much better. It was a fully certified engine and didn't complete it's bench tests until 1940.

[Clark01]

 

A real-world, in-practice fuel cell in a moving vehicle is only 30% efficient. Maybe slightly more, but basically the same as an internal combustion engine. That sucks, and makes Everything Hard. This article gives a bit of info (yes, its hardly impartial, but there's plenty of others.) Fuel cell proponents often get tricky and claim high efficiencies, but they are either for fuel cells operating at very high temperatures, which may work in a stationary application but doesn't in a vehicle. Or they are claiming utilisation of the waste heat from the fuel cell, which again, in a vehicle isn't realistic.

 

Cryogenic hydrogen is difficult for lots of reasons- its damn expensive (in energy terms, and thus also cost) to compress to that level. And when stored, you end up with significant wastage through boil-off. This is why a great deal of vehicular "hydrogen" work these days is looking at other carries for the H+, such as ammonia.

 

Yes, the Mirai exists. But it is crazy expensive (again, its an EV + a fuel cell + a storage tank + hydrogen safety gubbins). The volumetric "efficiency" of the car is nothing like an EV (damn tanks), and there's only one place in Australia you can refill it. I

[Clark01]

59 minutes ago, Geoff_H said:

Should have added that transmission from H2 generation to you via methane gas pipeline systems

You can do this at very low % of hydrogen- a few % at most, and the rest of the gas is methane. They've done this "hydrogen sweetening" successfully in the UK.

 

But as soon as you get to a higher % of hydrogen, you have big problems with metal embrittlement and leakage. Which means you need to rebuild the infrastructure with different materials.

[Ian]

56 minutes ago, Geoff_H said:

Should have added that transmission from H2 generation to you via methane gas pipeline systems.

There are issues associated with sending H2 via existing gas pipelines, the current view is that adding a small fraction can be tolerated however pipelines will need to be assessed on a case by case basis prior to sending significant amounts of H2. http://www.enginehistory.org/Piston/Diesels/Ch3.pdf

It will still be expensive, cheaper than a new gas grid but still expensive.

[Ian]

What I should emphasize here is that I'm a big fan of liquid fuels compared to batteries. However I've come to grudgingly admit that for most cases for ground based personal transport electric rechargeable will fit the bill.

I like fuel cells and given my penchant for liquid fuels I want it (liquid hydrogen) to work. But it's a bit like having a couple of pet tigers, for a moment you have that "wouldn't it be cool" brainfart and then you consider your wife, children and your own life and you go no that's a dumb idea.

But I still like reading stories about people who've had pets like that. Normally you read about it when the pet eats them.

 

Edited December 5, 2021 by Ian

[Geoff_H]

32 minutes ago, Clark01 said:

Cryogenic hydrogen is difficult for lots of reasons- its damn expensive (in energy terms, and thus also cost) to compress to that level. And when stored, you end up with significant wastage through boil-off. This is why a great deal of vehicular "hydrogen" work these days is looking at other carries for the H+, such as ammonia.

Got any real figures for your statements? My calculations do not support your statements particularly in respect of evaporation wastage.  One damn lot lighter than batteries.  

[Ian]

What are your calculations?

Just focusing on boil off gas, look at how much higher H2 is compared to it's peers.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352484720312312

Quote

The results of this study show that transportation costs of LNG, liquid ammonia, methanol, DME, and liquid hydrogen from natural gas accounting for BOG are 0.74 $/GJ, 1.09 $/GJ, 0.68 $/GJ, 0.53 $/GJ, and 3.24 $/GJ

 

Liquification Costs

https://www.hydrogen.energy.gov/pdfs/19001_hydrogen_liquefaction_costs.pdf

Quote

The entire liquid hydrogen supply chain (production, liquefaction, delivery, and dispensing)
associated with this capacity level (i.e., 27,000 kg/day plant) was also modeled, estimating a dispensed
cost of $14.25 per kilogram of hydrogen at the pump (including production, delivery, and dispensing,
untaxed) for fueling commercially available fuel cell cars.

One thing that I didn't know was that the liquification of H2 requires the conversion from ortho to para hydrogen, which relates to the orientation of the nuclear spins, special catalysts are required to speed this transition but it's still slow. Hydrogen just keeps getting easier 😉

Quote

Today’s industrial liquefiers, however, have an energy requirement in the range of 10–20 kWh/kg. In this
DOE Hydrogen and Fuel Cells Program Record, the Hydrogen Delivery Scenario Analysis Model

  Not that this is for fossil H2 not green H2, it assumed that the gas is delivered in a pressurized state from the conversion process.

[spacesailor]

Just read about a NEW ' ignition system ', utilising Plasma .

Have to have a special sparkplug, then all the extra electronic modules to bolt on an existing engine.

They say a increase in power,& economy plus, a decrease  in pollution.

Sounds interesting ' IF ' its not B S.

spacesailor

[Ian]

Whatever will they think of next.

And all this while I thought that a normal sparkplug ignition process created a plasma tunnel.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_spark

Quote

However, sparks with very low energy still produce a "plasma tunnel" through the air, through which electricity can pass. This plasma is heated to temperatures often greater than the surface of the sun

 

[spacesailor]

The company l read about is.

" Transient Plasma Systems ".

Just in case anyone is interested, !.

Can make your engine run very lean too.

spacesailor

 

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