The Future Fuel for Transportation

Fuel is one of the important resources in our society. We use the fuels to support our living, produce electricity, heat homes, and operate machinery. Since the fuel is a limited resource, the fuel scarcity will be a big issue in the future. The price of the gasoline is currently on the rise. NASCAR cut the volume of fuel cell from twenty gallons to thirteen gallons each car. There is a high demand for a new energy. After the issue of fuel crisis was brought up, the society started to be interested in hydrogen. Hydrogen is the strongest candidate for the fuel of the future. Hydrogen can be used for transportation more efficiently, safely, and effectively. Also they are environmentally friendly.

Since hydrogen is not a fundamental fuel, using hydrogen as energy source is a difficult subject. Hydrogen is a magnificent fuel because only water is used to operate the fuel cell, but it is costly to produce and difficult to store. Two of the methods of producing hydrogen are by reforming natural gas, or electrolysis of water. Reforming natural gas is a method to produce hydrogen by exposing natural gas to high temperature steam, and convert carbon monoxide with steam to produce additional hydrogen and carbon dioxide. The production process of electrolysis is to use electric energy to split water into hydrogen and oxygen gas. Two of the methods to store hydrogen are compressed gas storage tanks, or liquid hydrogen. Compressed gas storage tanks are the storage tanks that can hold hydrogen at high pressures. Compression of hydrogen into liquid hydrogen enables the storage and transportation of larger quantity of hydrogen.

Producing hydrogen requires more energy than burning the hydrogen product. For reforming natural gas method, it requires 1200 to 1400 Btu, British Thermal Units, of natural gas or electricity to produce 1000 Btu of hydrogen, which is inefficient. Electrolysis method needs even more energy than reforming natural gas. It is impossible to produce hydrogen efficiently by current technology. To improve its efficiency, scientists put the sun in perspective. Since sunlight is free, converting sun’s rays into electricity is very cheap and easy. It can help in reducing the cost of mass production of hydrogen. The scientists at National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Colorado came up with a method of using solar energy to split the hydrogen out of water. They claim that it will be more efficient than pulling hydrogen out of natural gas. At any rate, hydrogen can be used in various ways.

Hydrogen can provide clean energy and more efficient public transportation, such as cars and airplanes. Hydrogen vehicles are on the early stages of development. BMW has developed a tank that prevents evaporation of hydrogen for four days. BMW commented that hydrogen fueled cars are pollution-free, greater performance, and safer than gasoline. Hydrogen releases three times more energy per pound than gasoline, it can power the average car for six hundred miles. Hydrogen burns almost without radiation heat and evaporates much quicker than gasoline. All fuel is combustible and can be explosive. This means that it is not 100% safe. However, BMW performed a series of tests on a tank filled with liquid hydrogen. They placed the tank in the flames at 900 Celsius for 70 minutes, punched holes into it, and squashed it until it broke. Although the hydrogen leaked out sometimes, it never exploded. BMW, GM, DaimlerChrysler, Toyota, Honda, and Mazda introduced