What will be powering our cars in the future?
I think that we can all agree that one day in the future, the world’s supply of oil will run out. We may however disagree on the actual day the oil runs dry. Some experts believe that this may happen in a couple of years from while others believe there is enough oil in the ground to supply the world’s needs for generations. Either way, oil is not a resource that is either renewable nor replenish-able.
I will give two pseudo-concrete reasons for the depletion of oil.
Saudi Arabia (one of the world’s largest suppliers of oil) has not made a major discovery of an oil field in at least a couple of decades. In order to keep the pressure of their current oil fields in check, the Saudis have resorted to pumping water into their oil fields (a common tool for depleted fields) and the rate of pumped water has skyrocketed over the last couple of years. However, they also admit that they have previously underestimated the amount of oil in each of their fields and have, year after year, increased their oil reserves. Their actual numbers and techniques for this may not be up to par with what the West may consider truly accurate and therefore we must take these numbers with a grain of salt.
Second, there is this famous gaussian curve or bell curve that was able to predict the decline in reserves in Texas. The author of this paper stated that there exists a second bell curve that relates production of oil from the wells. These two curves, one for the discovery of wells and the production from wells are separated by a couple of years. He was able to predict the exact year when oil production in Texas would begin to decline. This technique has been recently used on the world’s supply of oil and has been predicted that around 2010 that supply of oil would begin to drop.
So what will be the world’s next source of energy. Solar, wind, nuclear (fission), fusion, coal, etc.
One tool could be the use of coal. There is more coal in the state of Pennsylvania then oil in the Middle East. Nazi Germany constructed a way to make gasoline from coal. This technique is still in the early stages but is beginning to ramp up. Colorado is another state that has a lot of coal and is closely watching the research that is going on in Pennsylvania to see if it is profitable for them to invest in this “new” technology.
Solar power at this moment is an inefficient way of gathering energy. It takes more energy to produce the solar power cells than the cells themselves bring in. However, in the last decade new technologies have increased the efficiency of the cells for them to become more productive. Same goes for wind driven windmills. Lighter, more efficient materials are being created for windmills, which have driven up their efficiency.
Nuclear energy is extremely efficent, but the byproducts of the Uranium has very long lifetimes. These byproducts go through alpha decay (releasing helium atoms), beta decay (releasing electrons), and gamma-decay (releasing gamma-rays). These byproducts of the byproducts can cause cancer is exposed for a long enough time. And it is not just the byproducts of Uranium that is dangerous, disposal of the reactor core is a huge problem because it is extremely radioactive.
The only and real saviour will be cold fusion. I love just saying those words. So fusion is when you take two atoms and collide them together to form another atom. This is what fuels our sun. To make a long story short, the sun takes 4 hydrogen atoms to make 1 helium atom plus energy. Humans have been doing the same for years in particle accelerators FermiLab in Chicago and CERN in Switzerland to name a couple.
The problem is that we need to put so much energy into the process to get very little energy out (electromagnets etc). Hence the name “cold” part in cold fusion. Think of spider-man 2 if you will. How do we control the reaction without putting as much energy into the system while efficiently taking the heat out of the system?
Now I will go back to the original topic of the blog…What will be powering out cars in the future? The answer my friend is hydrogen.
The hydrogen in water or H2O is a chemical bond formed by the attraction between the electronegative region of an oxygen molecule and the electropositive region of a proton that is bonded to an oxygen. It is weaker than a covalent bond, having a binding energy of about 2-10 kcal/mol. So in order for us to power our cars with hydrogen we must put energy into breaking hydrogen from water.
Mixtures of hydrogen gas and air do not react unless ignited with a flame or spark, in which case the result is a fire or explosion with a characteristic reddish flame whose only products are water. 2H2 + O2 leads to 2H2O
So hydrogen isn’t the holy grail that we all think about. Oil is running out…don’t worry we will use hydrogen to power our cars. The problem is we get as much energy out as we put into the system. The holy grails are the forms of energy that we release the hydrogen from the water. It is the gasoline from coal that we may use or nuclear or fusion type reactors that will eventually “save” man-kind from a second dark ages.
Nuclear energy has another problem, which is the security costs to protect the materials from terrorists. Even non-Bomb radioactive materials can be highly poisonous; just disperse them into the air and watch the death rates soar. So we don’t want any of that stuff in the wrong hands. (I wonder how good security on the nuclear plants is…especially from the water’s edge - that is, from boats. The ports aren’t exactly security wonders, after all, and chemical plants remain lovely and largely unprotected targets, despite the disaster of Bhopal proving that a chemical release can be quite fatal.)
You do point out that hydrogen is more an energy movement system than a fuel - it’s a way to get energy derived from some other system out into the car, more conveniently than batteries.
Conservation is of course the easiest technology since it’s already here, but nobody wants to hear that. If we reduced the SUV content on the roads, we would not need so strong, sturdy, HEAVY cars, and we could get better acceleration with far better gas mileage. Likewise, there are all those computers using CRTs instead of LCD monitors; all those old and inefficient refrigerators and a/c units; and for that matter all those new and inefficient units. Computers are a major energy issue as well, with server farms gulping down the fuel for both processors and air conditioning; some newer processors use MUCH less power (I’m getting one myself, a Mac Mini Core Duo which should cut my computer energy in half or in one quarter - one quarter since I can run Windows software when needed and won’t need to fire up ye olde AMD-powered beige box.) Then there’s the entire disposal-crap industry wasting petrochemicals and energy to make plastic rubbish - toys for children, toys for adults, cheap printers that are thrown out when the ink runs out, disposable shavers, you name it. If Americans didn’t act like energy was free, we could save more energy than all the windmills in the country produce.
Nuclear power, by the way, is currently very, very expensive. The plants cost a fortune, and by the way, if you convert a nuclear plant to natural gas, I understand they are much more efficient than standard gas plants - I don’t recall why. Anyway, the plants cost a fortune, there’s a constant need to dispose of radioactive material, and there are security issues, and safety is rather pricey. There’s been a history in the US of problems around nuclear plant safety, which fortunately have yet to result in disaster, but the fact that corporations have shown themselves willing to cheat and fudge around nuclear reactors is bad, especially at a time when we can’t even regulate the relatively simple coal-mine technologies effectively. I used to be very gung-ho on nuclear power, before I learned more about it. Now I’m into cogeneration, conservation, solar research, biodiesel…everything that doesn’t involve materials that kill people.
Nice article.
I got the idea for the blog by a thread http://www.allpar.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=73066 created by 12solider.
Wonderful comments you made. You are correct about the expense issues, with security, building, disposal of waste. But we has humans need to start looking forward. There are also a lot of other issues that come into play if we do drain oil from the world. Oil is used in so many products that I don’t know how we could live without.
Conservation is the best tactic in order for the “survival” of oil.
But I am glad you that got the point of the article. Because my english is bad at times…I don’t know if I really can convey my thoughts in writing. But hydrogen is not a “fuel” but a mechanism for running cars. Once we have the hydrogen then it is great…but to get the hydrogen we need some other form of energy.
And again thanks for the comments.
No other comments on hydrogen powered cars????
Yes. I think Hydrogen is sort of like pie in the sky, unless we get very serious about perfecting it in applications that are as practical as a “fill up” at the ol’ gas station. Otherwise, we should be expending our engineering talent into some things that are currently more obtainable like ethanol based fuels.
You bring up a good point Curtis.
Does anyone know the types of molecules that are released into the air when ethanol based fuels are used for combustion engines?
Are the same type, worse then gasoline particles, or better for the environment?
Believe you me, I am no chemist. Blew up a car battery once though…and not intentionally either. In any case, the stuff that is known as “E85″ is just a blend so the same sort of noxious (obnoxious?) elements associated with gasoline combustion are still present, catalytic convertor notwithstanding. I may be well misinformed, however, alcohol combusts into water vapor. OK, I said I wasn’t a chemist. Not even a well informed amatuer. The only thing I do know is that alcohol based fuels are readily more available, and can be made in quantities far greater than we have been lead to believe. Grass, newspaper, and other associated “wastes” around your own home grown still could produce about 200 gallons a week. That ought to be able to get you shooting out to the local grocer, with a quick pit stop at your friendly neighborhood tavern to pick up a little “lightening” for yourself to consume while watching alcohol powered NASCAR types going roundy-round at the track. Not as efficient you say as gasoline. Yes, you are right. Always something isn’t there? But, even if your 60 mpg hybrid Turtle Top Dancer gets 30 mpg, because alcohol doesn’t produce as much BTUs, you aren’t paying for the stuff you brewed at home. Ah ha! Now we begin to see a glimmer of big brother and big oil leering with evil eyes at your little ol’ still that you are not even sharing with anyone yet. No taxes. No profits. What are you? Anti-American!! Probably our American Farmers could produce enough say sugar beets, which are hardy and can grow about anywhere there is arable land, that we could build distilleries, create new jobs, and pump some life into the economy along the way, while slowly turned off that spigot from the far east. New research could probably develop fuels from this stuff that would power diesels and aircraft. It certainly would go a long way to energy independence, which in this world today, we truly need to be. OK, gone far enough off track here. Alcohol would be better for the atmosphere. Less nasty stuff, because in nature, alcohol, after a fashion is a naturually occurring substance. It might even help the economy.
[...] I had previously written a blog entitled What Will be Powering Our Cars in the Future? and since them some people have asked me to produce/write a second blog exanding the on the ideas presented in the first blog. In this particular blog I will discuss in more detail certain aspects presented the previous blog as well as presenting new information like the pros and cons on the use of Ethanol based fuels. [...]
Well guys, I’m from a place called Europe where about 50% of the new cars are diesels and can use Biodiesel (mixed with normal diesel in different proportions) as an alternative source of energy, getting 35 to 55 mpg and a reduced effect on environment.
[...] Previously I have written two blogs that have attempted to explain/understand why there is a need for Alternative Fuels and what where some of the pros and cons of each of the different technologies. The first blog was titled What Will be Powering Our Cars in the Future? and the second was called Alternative Forms of Energy : Part II in which I was a co-author with allpar member jstwe314. [...]