Does This Hydrogen-Powered Road Trip Show possibility of Clean Camping Potential? (1 Viewer)

[Jim]

A Dutch couple, André and Els Molengraaf, have embarked on a 12,000 km road trip across Europe with a customised caravan storing hydrogen to power a fuel cell. This fuel cell charges their electric Ford F-150 Lightning pickup truck, allowing them to travel with zero emissions.

Their caravan holds 28 kg of hydrogen, enabling a range of 1,100 km before refuelling. The fuel cell also powers the caravan's amenities like hot water and cooking, supplemented by solar panels.

During the 100-day, 12-country journey from the Netherlands to Istanbul, Turkey, they will host events promoting hydrogen's viability as a fuel for camping and long road trips,

The Molengraafs aim to demonstrate that "the future has started" for hydrogen as a clean energy solution, aligning with the Paris climate agreement goals. Their project highlights hydrogen's current feasibility for powering vehicles and campers through high-pressure storage and fuel cells.

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[starquake]

I'm not sure I'd want them parked next to me with a H2 tank that large containing presumably 80psi H2.

 

[starquake]

Just calling out that 28kg of Hydrogen is also 441 euro of fuel at current German prices too.. Its 15.75 euro a kilo in Germany at moment.

 

[busby]

I'm not sure I'd want them parked next to me with a H2 tank that large containing presumably 80psi H2.

Is the problem the pressure or the hydrogen or both ?.BUSBY..

 

[Gromett]

I'm not sure I'd want them parked next to me with a H2 tank that large containing presumably 80psi H2.

80PSI? I highly doubt it is that low?

My back of the fag packet calcs would be 28KG at 80psi would require over 50,000 Litres of volume.

I suspect the pressure is more likely to be in the 400-800 Bar range or 6000 - 12,000 psi range.

So would you like to park next to something with 12,000 psi of pressure in it, but not only a highly explosive gas?


I am not going anywhere near how much that costs and the inefficiency of electric -> Hydrogen ->fuel cell ->BEV. Seems a bit nuts to me.

But, proving it can be done is worth it in it's own right for bragging rights I suppose.

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[Gromett]

I caved and searched through the site. They are working with 700 bar of pressure or 10,152 PSI

 

[Coolcats]

A Dutch couple, André and Els Molengraaf, have embarked on a 12,000 km road trip across Europe with a customised caravan storing hydrogen to power a fuel cell. This fuel cell charges their electric Ford F-150 Lightning pickup truck, allowing them to travel with zero emissions.

Their caravan holds 28 kg of hydrogen, enabling a range of 1,100 km before refuelling. The fuel cell also powers the caravan's amenities like hot water and cooking, supplemented by solar panels.

During the 100-day, 12-country journey from the Netherlands to Istanbul, Turkey, they will host events promoting hydrogen's viability as a fuel for camping and long road trips,

The Molengraafs aim to demonstrate that "the future has started" for hydrogen as a clean energy solution, aligning with the Paris climate agreement goals. Their project highlights hydrogen's current feasibility for powering vehicles and campers through high-pressure storage and fuel cells.

Home - H2roadtrip

h2roadtrip.com

View attachment 892027

Jim thanks for posting, unless companies and people start using alternate fuels we will be stuck with just one option.

The cost of generating Hydrogen is between $3-8 per litre at the moment the more that it is used the lower the cost......

I can imagine the cost of Petrol or diesel would be high if only a few vehicles were around to use it and I am not including government tax's

 

[Gromett]

The cost of generating Hydrogen is between $3-8 per litre at the moment the more that it is used the lower the cost......

Only if you extract it from Natural gas and it is measure in KG not Litres as the volume depends on the pressure, the weight doesn't.

 

[Guigsy]

I wonder if the 1100km range includes the battery charge in the truck? They might have used quite a lot more hydrogen than the article implies.

 

[eddie]

And before Hydrogen they put batteries in their cars

And the batteries were very heavy

And we're charged by diesel generators when they ran out

BUT PEOPLE STILL BOUGHT THEM!!

Sorry Grommet!

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[starquake]

I caved and searched through the site. They are working with 700 bar of pressure or 10,152 PSI

Christ, I wonder if the 6m site spacing will need evolving to a few hundred metres with that kind of pressure.
700 bar is ludicrious -> a leak (and ignition from someone using lpg) there will likely take out an entire campsite.

But I think the pricing is what makes it questionable 440 euro for the fuel for 1100 km so 40 euro cents a km .... about double diesel at the rates at the pumps in Germany today (for Hydrogen, it's 15.75 nationwide at moment as mentioned).

 

[L' Hobo]

A Dutch couple, André and Els Molengraaf, have embarked on a 12,000 km road trip across Europe with a customised caravan storing hydrogen to power a fuel cell. This fuel cell charges their electric Ford F-150 Lightning pickup truck, allowing them to travel with zero emissions.

Their caravan holds 28 kg of UK hydrogen, enabling a range of 1,100 km before refuelling. The fuel cell also powers the caravan's amenities like hot water and cooking, supplemented by solar panels.

During the 100-day, 12-country journey from the Netherlands to Istanbul, Turkey, they will host events promoting hydrogen's viability as a fuel for camping and long road trips,

The Molengraafs aim to demonstrate that "the future has started" for hydrogen as a clean energy solution, aligning with the Paris climate agreement goals. Their project highlights hydrogen's current feasibility for powering vehicles and campers through high-pressure storage and fuel cells.

Home - H2roadtrip

h2roadtrip.com

View attachment 892027

I hope they succeed, there has to be a better way than wind farms!
Too much wind, they stop the turbines, too little and the sails don't turn.

I still say, with 12000 miles of UK coastline, numerous small tidal generating plants, serving the local community and hooked up to the National Grid, is the only, RELIABLE way forward.

 

[jockaneezer]

I wonder if they dose the hydrogen with mercaptan to give it a smell like they do with other fuel gasses ?
Just thought of a technical issue too, using hydrogen, your "gas drop vents" would need to be in the roof !

 

[starquake]

hope they succeed, there has to be a better way than wind farms!
Too much wind, they stop the turbines, too little and the sails don't turn.

Tidal is unproven rubbish -> theres not been much deployed (about 40MW). Thats only slightly more than one of the single wind farms I'm invested in -> it's also expensive per MW.

Wind is in comparison I dont believe there has been a day in past 12 months it's been less than 1GW, and it's most commonly significantly more, and exceeds Nuclear signficantly on the majority of days. The average wind genration in UK this year is above our gas generation so far ... blue below is wind, and you can count so far, 2 days of lulls there. At that point wind was still above for majority of time both coal, and biomass, despite being low!

Wind isnt' the entire future, but when you compare with Solar (induding on peoples houses (the yellow in above) it's still significantly larger than anything other "green" energy, and also signficiantly very very reliable at the scale the UK grid now has it at. In above graph the orange is gas generation...

If you put Tidal on every tidal esturary, you'd be lucky to get 1GW in comparison.

 

[tacr2man]

I would think a hydrogen leak a lot safer than lpg as it would not pool and less likely reach a suitable ign ratio unless contained ?

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[Gromett]

I wonder if they dose the hydrogen with mercaptan to give it a smell like they do with other fuel gasses ?

You can't. For a fuel cell the Hydrogen needs to be ULTRA pure. I don't think they have found a suitable dopant that doesn't degrade the fuel cell.
So ordeless and colourless and goes boom across a very wide mix of air/gas ratios. Added in extremely high pressures and very high costs. I just don't get it

 

[Gromett]

Tidal is unproven rubbish

I completely disagree. The Swansea tidal barrage should have been given the go ahead and publicly subsides. It would have allowed all the problems to be ironed out.

 

[Gromett]

I would think a hydrogen leak a lot safer than lpg as it would not pool and less likely reach a suitable ign ratio unless contained ?

The problem with hydrogen is that it can ignite across a much wider range of ratios. And when it does go it is more explosive than propane.
If a leak were to occur and a vehicle were to fill it would become an effective pipe bomb. I know it hasn't happened yet but I think that is due to the lower numbers of them on the road rather than anything else.
Once you mix these with poor maintenance or the diyer who thinks they know better I hate to think what will happen (not I said will not may)

 

[starquake]

The problem with hydrogen is that it can ignite across a much wider range of ratios. And when it does go it is more explosive than propane.
If a leak were to occur and a vehicle were to fill it would become an effective pipe bomb. I know it hasn't happened yet but I think that is due to the lower numbers of them on the road rather than anything else.
Once you mix these with poor maintenance or the diyer who thinks they know better I hate to think what will happen (not I said will not may)

Indeed, and combine with fact the H2 tanks (like LPG) only are rated for 10 years. Removing in this caravans case = easy. Less so in most vechicles I'd say too. Tank replacement every 10 years will make battery replacement costs look cheap (tanks able to hold that kind of pressure tend towards the expensive side).

Edit I should add the numers I've been able to find on this are roughly $1000 USD per kilo stored with . So yeah, that nice tank costs $28k every 10 years unless of course this becomes mass market.

 

[Guigsy]

View attachment 892067
And before Hydrogen they put batteries in their cars

View attachment 892068
And the batteries were very heavy

View attachment 892069
And we're charged by diesel generators when they ran out

View attachment 892071
BUT PEOPLE STILL BOUGHT THEM!!

Sorry Grommet!

Look at the Toyota Mirai and the Hyundai Nexo. Both over 1.8t. Same as a Model S. Which has a similar range. But far more space inside because hydrogen tanks are so hard to package.

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[Gromett]

Indeed, and combine with fact the H2 tanks (like LPG) only are rated for 10 years.

That is for portable propane. The hydrogen built in tanks will be rated for the lifetime of the vehicle. There are enough problems with hydrogen without fear mongering and spreading things that are not accurate.

 

[L' Hobo]

Tidal is unproven rubbish -> theres not been much deployed (about 40MW). Thats only slightly more than one of the single wind farms I'm invested in -> it's also expensive per MW.

Wind is in comparison I dont believe there has been a day in past 12 months it's been less than 1GW, and it's most commonly significantly more, and exceeds Nuclear signficantly on the majority of days. The average wind genration in UK this year is above our gas generation so far ... blue below is wind, and you can count so far, 2 days of lulls there. At that point wind was still above for majority of time both coal, and biomass, despite being low!
View attachment 892104

Wind isnt' the entire future, but when you compare with Solar (induding on peoples houses (the yellow in above) it's still significantly larger than anything other "green" energy, and also signficiantly very very reliable at the scale the UK grid now has it at. In above graph the orange is gas generation...

If you put Tidal on every tidal esturary, you'd be lucky to get 1GW in comparison.

I wonder why the French have been generating electricity with water on one of their rivers for the past 3+4 decades and the Scots have had a similar scheme on the Clyde for over a hundred years?
Perhaps someone should tell them it's a waste of time?

Why is water power unproven, because all the money has been thrown at wind power, what a waste unless you are a share holder collecting Government subsidiaries like Drax from their billion pound 'Green' scheme pot.

PS. This, so called, Green windpower is proposing to dig up hundreds of acres of highly productive land in East Anglia so, with the help of diesel guzzling bulldozers, lorries JCB's etc. they can put in cables and build substations to transfer the electricity.
Another Green scheme no doubt?

 

[starquake]

That is for portable propane. The hydrogen built in tanks will be rated for the lifetime of the vehicle. There are enough problems with hydrogen without fear mongering and spreading things that are not accurate.

Thats not what the side of the Hyundai and Toyota vehicles says. I'll have to find the picture, but their refill nozzles clearly state tank usable until date X and thats 10 years from manufacture.

 

[Gromett]

Thats not what the side of the Hyundai and Toyota vehicles says. I'll have to find the picture, but their refill nozzles clearly state tank usable until date X and thats 10 years from manufacture.

Just did a search and it seems it is an American or Californian thing. I suspect the latter as they go nuts on safety legislation to the point of idiocy.
Toyota state 15 years on the marketing which is longer than the lifespan of the average car.

 

[starquake]

I wonder why the French have been generating electricity with water on one of their rivers for the past 3+4 decades and the Scots have had a similar scheme on the Clyde for over a hundred years?
Perhaps someone should tell them it's a waste of time?

Why is water power unproven, because all the money has been thrown at wind power, what a waste unless you are a share holder collecting Government subsidiaries like Drax from their billion pound 'Green' scheme pot.

So water/hydro is proven. Tidal is the piece not -> but it's still relatively small scale in generation capacity compared with even a single Wind turbine these days. (per turbine, you get 2.5MW. The water wheels on many rivers generate more in kw scale, I actually visited one in Camrbrige the other week and it had 20kw generation in comparison (and that was the replacement replacing one of 3kw that came before). 20kw was the maximum they could manage in that location. All of these are reasonably significant (in GW) in the UK -> about 2-3GW peak generation for reference. It's still less than wind.

River generation with water wheels is fine in effect.

But the point is it's still relative small generation. Even the largest water movement (which is a lake in scotland) has a max generation of 1GW for ~ 24 hours until they have to refill it.

Tidal however has had a reasonable amount of money thrown at it, and I agree with Gromett actually the Severn should have been targetted as it's one where it could work very well, but that isn't true of every river estuary. In some, the flow moves dramitically year to year, making it less useful for larger scale generation. The Severn is the only site where it could potentially generate even remotely close to a (single) turbine.

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[starquake]

Just did a search and it seems it is an American or Californian thing. I suspect the latter as they go nuts on safety legislation to the point of idiocy.
Toyota state 15 years on the marketing which is longer than the lifespan of the average car.

Yeah, I've only ever seen (and been driven in a H2 car) in California. A taxi we took in San Fransico about 4 years ago was Hydrogen. It was a question I asked the driver, but his view was his car would go back to Toyota (wasn't being sold then) before it became an issue.

 

[starquake]

PS. This, so called, Green windpower is proposing to dig up hundreds of acres of highly productive land in East Anglia so, with the help of diesel guzzling bulldozers, lorries JCB's etc. they can put in cables and build substations to transfer the electricity.
Another Green scheme no doubt?

Should add as didn't respond to this, if it was Hydro, where do you think the same cables would go... would be same place.

As we move away from single big gas generation plants in one location (and coal) it is inevitable the grid needs to expand to where the generation is, regardless of what that generation is. Theres a big reason my father was employed pre retirement by a local utility network to work on private networks on farms in east anglia where they can't get suffient grid capacity today to deal with the farms needs. This expansion of the grid will help with that. Worth noting the people in some of those farms also support the grid expansion, as it's a hellova lot better than them continuing with their gas turbines (and cheaper). Worth noting, I fully expect planning for the Sizewell (C) cable expansion to start soon too, it's not just wind needing the grid expansion. Having generation off coast of east anglia helps with the wind lull situation as it's notable most wind is off East Yorks and Scotland today -> by having in multiple places you increase the reliablity and reduce the intermitanncy you complained about earlier in Wind. Worth noting a single cable route moves the equivalent of multiple Nuclear plants of energy, so this is quite a lot of power we are talking about unlocked by the East Anglian route. (To caveat a "normal" UK Nuclear plant is 500MW or so. Sizewell (B) is 1000MW. (C) will be 3200MW, so the existing 1GW cables won't be large enough for another 3.2GW (which incidentally is about same as all the Nuclear in UK today))

Overhead wires have lower costs, and to be honest personally living in East Anglia along one of these cable routes I'm of exact opposite opinion please do it, the burying of the wire comes with huge costs (AC->DC converters for one) and I'd personally prefer the cables to the 3-4 times cost not be on my bill -> burying them means another dig if they need to add more capacity, where overhead, they can just add more wires until they at the limit of the frame (which is the issue right now, there is no high capacity 400,000v path up to norfolk, it's all 30,000v max). They should bury in Dedham vale due to the Constaple thing, but living here and having been near one of the major cable routes for some time, another cable doesn't make a huge difference (they are joining the new route near my town to the existing path down to Tilbury). I susppose thats what comes from growing up near Ipswich and the existing Sizewell route though.

Once built, the land is retored and crops grow under it like today..

But thats my views, and we all have our own. I'd invest in a wind farm in East Anglia if any came available for investment, but at moment only Scotland and Wales seem to be happy to build wind farms at moment.

 

[L' Hobo]

Should add as didn't respond to this, if it was Hydro, where do you think the same cables would go... would be same place.

As we move away from single big gas generation plants in one location (and coal) it is inevitable the grid needs to expand to where the generation is, regardless of what that generation is. Theres a big reason my father was employed pre retirement by a local utility network to work on private networks on farms in east anglia where they can't get suffient grid capacity today to deal with the farms needs. This expansion of the grid will help with that. Worth noting the people in some of those farms also support the grid expansion, as it's a hellova lot better than them continuing with their gas turbines (and cheaper). Worth noting, I fully expect planning for the Sizewell (C) cable expansion to start soon too, it's not just wind needing the grid expansion. Having generation off coast of east anglia helps with the wind lull situation as it's notable most wind is off East Yorks and Scotland today -> by having in multiple places you increase the reliablity and reduce the intermitanncy you complained about earlier in Wind. Worth noting a single cable route moves the equivalent of multiple Nuclear plants of energy, so this is quite a lot of power we are talking about unlocked by the East Anglian route. (To caveat a "normal" UK Nuclear plant is 500MW or so. Sizewell (B) is 1000MW. (C) will be 3200MW, so the existing 1GW cables won't be large enough for another 3.2GW (which incidentally is about same as all the Nuclear in UK today))

Overhead wires have lower costs, and to be honest personally living in East Anglia along one of these cable routes I'm of exact opposite opinion please do it, the burying of the wire comes with huge costs (AC->DC converters for one) and I'd personally prefer the cables to the 3-4 times cost not be on my bill -> burying them means another dig if they need to add more capacity, where overhead, they can just add more wires until they at the limit of the frame (which is the issue right now, there is no high capacity 400,000v path up to norfolk, it's all 30,000v max). They should bury in Dedham vale due to the Constaple thing, but living here and having been near one of the major cable routes for some time, another cable doesn't make a huge difference (they are joining the new route near my town to the existing path down to Tilbury). I susppose thats what comes from growing up near Ipswich and the existing Sizewell route though.

Once built, the land is retored and crops grow under it like today..

But thats my views, and we all have our own. I'd invest in a wind farm in East Anglia if any came available for investment, but at moment only Scotland and Wales seem to be happy to build wind farms at moment.

It would appear, you prefer to believe in unreliable things, wind.

I am the opposite.
I love reliability in everything from people to vehicles and, with the tide, I can plan days, years and even centuries ahead because I can guarantee it twice a day and know when it's at it's most powerful.

Sadly, I doubt you will ever change and I'm too old to have a long argument so I will leave you in your confusion! Bye.

PS. Love the bit about the Constable 'thing'?

 

[starquake]

It would appear, you prefer to believe in unreliable things, wind.

Yes, I am an not only a believer, I'm actually an invester and co-owner in 2 wind co-operative farms. So far the one that is producing (the second one had first production yesterday) has produced EXACTLY the amount the wind predictions month on month it should have. For 2 entire years. It's actually slightly above average prediction at moment as April was such a windy month it's actually hit figures that were "beyond" 150% of the predicted winds for April.

If anything the actual evidence from the farm I own that is producing is wind is actually VERY reliable, and VERY predictable. I will eat my words if the second farm in Scotland (first was in Wales) doesn't produce to expectations over next 12 months. I'm more than happy to share graphs against production expectations with you, but I doubt you will believe actual evidence from an actual wind farm owner.

 

[gus-lopez]

The F-150 has been modified to charge on the move.It needed it as otherwise towing that trailer it would be struggling for 100miles range.
1100kms before refilling so it will have to be refilled twice?

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