NEWS: The Smoginator: Fuel-cell Cars to Hit California Roads

GEEK: The Smoginator: Fuel-cell Cars to Hit California Roads

It seems Arnold Schwarzenegger is targeting a new enemy: Gasoline/Smog. With the ever rising gas prices rising every day it seems, California is preparing for the new age of cars.

Hydrogen technology has been around for awhile, and it is finally going to be available to the public. Hydrogen vehicles produce only water emissions, and can go close to 500 miles with out refueling.

I just hope they make it affordable, but with new technology the price is ridiculous, and only the rich can afford it. On the other hand, it is better then paying $3.05 for gas.

I can just imagine. In a hundred years we're going to be complaining about flooding streets fron hydrogen cars. ICE engines were first greeted as a great alternative to all the pollution on the streets at the time...horse shit.

Woah, wait a sec there... hydrogen cars are lucky if they can get even half the range of a current gas car, not anywhere near 500 miles to a tank. Plus the amount of energy used to produce hydrogen makes it a very poor means of transportation. This is from the UNH's biodiesel group:

Hydrogen has a looooooong way to go if it is ever going to be used as a mainstream fuel source. Methinks the governator is a fucking idiot.

How is a couple of billion cars pumping out water vapour from their exhausts helping the environment? Surely you'd just be subbing smog for fog?

There are advantages.

As we run out of oil, portable power sources will have to be based on the energy sources we have left. Basically, nuclear power.

They're talking about building nuclear reactors to crack water for the tar sands in Alberta (as they currently use natural gas and this is running out), and that hydrogen can go to towards cars directly as well.

As a fuel source for commuter vehicles, it has advantages. As poor as the energy density is, it's much better than batteries. Also, hydrogen doesn't have to be stored as a gas. I don't know the chemistry, but it's possible to store it safely at more than half the density of liquid hydrogen without the pressure and temperature constraints.

Are these figures for a vehicle combusting hydrogen, or using a hydrogen fuel cell? They're completely different approaches.

The person I work for drives a hydro-electric Prius. The man makes millions of dollars a year. He can afford as much gas as he wants to.

But for me to drive to work and back to home monday-friday, its in all, probably half a tank in gas. To fill up half a tank, it costs me almost $20, thats roughly 1/7 of my weekly paycheck. So I spend 1/7 of my paycheck just going to work to earn a paycheck....and HE gets the gas-saving car?!

Driving a Prius isn't just about saving money, it's about saving gas (meaning, you're conusming less of a precious resource), reducing pollution, and helping fund further progress. I drive a Prius, but could afford to drive a Hummer. But Hummers are wasteful, and I don't like waste. If I just wanted to save money I would have bought a Civic or another inexpensive fuel-efficient car.

$3.05 for gas

LOL we pay about the equivalent of $6.30 per US gallon for petrol in the UK

I dunno, I just imagine a future of highways crammed with cars all steaming from their exhausts...

Fog is a tad bit less harmful than smog.

Also, last I heard on the hydrogen and bio-fuels, there is no feasable way to produce enough to keep things running the way we do with oil. Eventualy we are going to run out of oil or it will become too expencive for everybody to use as much as they do now.
You need to consider that maybe in the future not everybody will have their own personl vehicle other than a horse or a bike.
There for there will be far fewer cars of any type, gasoline or hydrogen to contirbute to the any enviromental problems like the ones that occour now or as side effects of another emmission.

Yeah hyrdogen cells are more expencive, all new technology is. But hey, We've had 100 years to find an alternate fuel source and it's taken (at least in canada) our three digit gas price signs becomming obsolete to get people thinking about it.
It's a pretty good sign when the rich people pitch in for it. If they all do maybe it'll be easier for everybody else to afford it eventualy.

I run on biodiesel now. Smog is actually the one place where it's worse than petroleum, because it produces excess oxides of nitrogen.

As for quantities, I read an article recently in which a scientist describes producing biodiesel from a certain algae which could be grown in sufficient amounts to supply a smooth transition.

We Were talking about this at work today, in general if a person spends more than 3% of their disposable income on fuel, then the economic crunch is becoming difficult to bear, we passed that mark like last week. Fuel prices increasing as quickly as they have, with no releif in sight, begin to have a trickle down and trickle up effect on the economy. Companies transporting food and goods need to increase their prices to compensate for the increase in fuel spending, suddenly bread is $4.00 and milk is $5.00, people can afford to buy less. Mom and Dad are spending more on gas shuffling everyone to and fro and now they can't go out to dinner on Thursday or they have to pass on a movie, they have less disposable income, less to spend. Instead of tapping the strategic oil reserves, how about we ask people to use less, just a bit from everyone could make a difference. We as americans haven't seen rationing since World WarII, we live in a earn and spend country, if you want it buy it, and soon it becomes a right more than a privelage. I have no problem with this idea, it's your money, spend it how you will, but in dire situations when it is possible that one more storm could crush the economy wouldn't it be better to know we've tried everything to avoid that end. If everyone could learn to do without the frills for a bit perhaps it would be for the greater good of us all, slowing economic decline, perhaps or saving the markets from a crash, maybe, but things that would benefit us all. My fear is that we are a bit too focused on personal right and not focused enough on personal responsability.

And we don't have mass transit that's worth half a shit like you guys do. At least around where I am, if you don't own a car, you're fucked. In the ass. With a tree branch. And no lube.

No its pretty much the same here, unless you liv and work in a major city

Ya know, when I see stuff like this, and I see people talking about how we're going to cut down on emissions and smog and all that other crap by switching to hydrogen fuel cells, I laugh heartily.

Why? Where does hydrogen come from? We don't just pull it out of our butt. You know that stuff coming out the tail pipe of the car? That's where the hydrogen goes. That's also where we get it from. We generate electricity and we run it through water and we get oxygen and hydrogen. So how do we generate electricity? By burning oil, some nuke stations, some natural gas, a tiny bit of wind/solar/etc, and a LOT of COAL.

So we don't have smoke coming out of the ass of our car... we just have it coming out of tons of new power plants that will have to be built to sustain it. Oh well, here in America, we're all about "not in my backyard."

So what's your solution, dude? You can carp on the hydrogen solution all you want, but fossil fuel is a dead end. It's not a matter of if it will run out, it's a matter of when. Hydrogen is the most likely solution. Yes, it will require power coming from somewhere - but even ardent environmentalists are starting to realize that nuclear energy will need to be part of at least the short term solution.

And as far as "not in my backyard" goes - I can see the steam coming off our local nuclear reactor from my house, and I don't have any problem with it.

Fossil fuel and oil are two different things. Fossil fuel will run out, we can produce oil efficiently though.

That article is long on bullshit speculation and very short on any facts at all.

I can issue a press release saying monkeys will fly out of Arnie's butt, but that won't make it happen.

Did the Terminator ever "green up" his Hummer? Last I had heard was his people indicating that he was considering it...back around the time he was running for election.

Huh? Check your Earth Science textbooks... Oil most def. = Fossil Fuel

I'm a little bit more up to date than a 13 year old textbook...

Fossil fuels are one *source* of oil, but they aren't the same thing. We can get oil from other sources, and can currently produce the same type of oil that we get from fossil sources efficiently and competitively.

Diesel, sure - but is there a solution for the vast majority of personal vehicles that don't use diesel? Even at this point bio-diesel solves the supply problem, but not emissions problems - I'm not sure where technology will be able to take us as far as that is concerned, however.

no, we can make regular old oil, the same stuff that we pull out of the the ground, and turn into gasoline, from standard organic waste. We're already doing it in fact.

[Edited on Sep 01, 2005 by Helter]

So if we can produce it efficiently and competitively, why isn't someone cashing in on it already?