Hydrogen Cars
Hydrogen and hydrogen powered fuel cells have the potential to eradicate the scarcity of oil largely faced by the world in the present times. The other benifits of using hydrogen as fuel are:
- Dependance on petroleum
- Better air due to reduction of harmful gas emissions from gasoline powered cars
- Greenhouse effect
Hydrogen is simplest element and is available in abundance. Hydrogen combines with other gases like oxygen or carbon and never occur on its own. It can however be produced by coal, natural gas, biomass or water by using different processes. In present times 90% of hydrogen produced comes from reforming natural gas. The remainder, high-purity hydrogen from water electrolysis, is produced using electricity mainly generated by burning fossil fuels.
Lot of research is going on to make hydrogen as a viable fuel and reach masses. The internal combustion engine in gasoline powered cars could be converted to run on hydrogen. However, this is not the most efficient method of using hydrogen. The better option is to use hydrogen powered fuel cells in conjuction with electric motors. Hydrogen in these fuel cells reacts with oxygen which produces electricity to power the motors. The primary challenges before the engineers working on hydrogen powered fuel cells are:
- Better hydrogen storage
- Increasing the range of hydrogen vehicles
- Reduce the weight
- Reduce complexity of the storage systems
- energy consumption