As time goes on, technological advances require more efficient sources of power. At the forefront of research for these power sources are hydrogen fuel cells. This power source takes in the most abundant element in the universe, Hydrogen, and yields immense power without combustion or pollution. The three aspects of this scientific breakthrough are the fuel cells, hydrogen production, and hydrogen storage.
Fuel cells are the devices with which Hydrogen is made into electricity. These use a technology much similar to that of something we are very familiar with: the battery. According to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, or NREL, like the battery, fuel cells use chemical reactions to generate electricity rather than combustion. Unlike the battery, however, the "ingredients" for this reaction are not stored within the cell, rather they are taken in from outside, making their potential so much more efficient and giving them a longer time span to power whatever happens to be connected to them. According to the United States Department of Energy, within the fuel cell, two reactions occur. One is an oxidation half-reaction at an anode and the other is a reduction half-reaction at a cathode. Under normal conditions, this process would be very slow. The manufacturers speed this up by adding a catalyst to one side of the anode and cathode each. The most common of these catalysts consists of platinum powder very thinly coated onto a carbon paper or cloth. The reactions that occur give off very large amounts of energy and do so without releasing pollutants. The only byproduct is water vapor.
Hydrogen is in fact the most abundant element in the universe, although it is usually found in compounds. Since the fuel cells require pure hydrogen, it must be separated from these compounds in a manner in which it creates renewable energy. According to NREL, the four most promising of ways to do this are the following.
Thermochemical hydrogen is produced by heating biomass with limited or no oxygen, either gasifying it to what is called syngas, a mixture of hydrogen and carbon monoxide, or liquefying it into pryolysis oil. Syngas then goes through what is referred to as a water-gas-shift reaction to increase the amount of hydrogen. Pryolysis oil uses a steam reformation technique in conjunction with the water-gas shift reaction.
hydrocarbons that forms during the extraction of natural gas and is used as a thinning
Hydrogen lies in one of the copious replacements for gasoline. It is not an energy source such as oil, but an energy carrier that is produced instead of digging and finding it underground. Though replacing fossil fuels by hydrogen fuel cell is very hard and costs a great deal, for the most part, hydrogen fuel cell is a zero carbon emission fuel which highly reduces the carbon emissions that causes pandemic global warming. Hydrogen is very helpful for nature by cause of replacing fossil fuels with hydrogen fuel cells might end global warming once and for all.
In most cases, hydrogen cannot be stored by itself. Because of this, hydrogen is usually stored in forms of hydrides. One example of a hydride is called a fuel cell. Although other forms of storing hydrogen are found to be difficult, Eisenstien (2000) has found that the cell is not a very complicated device (Eisenstien, 2000, p.22). This is because all that there is to do is to pump hydrogen into one side and then pump oxygen on the other (Eisenstien, March 2000, p.22). This results to the gases combining to form energy and water vapor, which can be used to run electric motors (Eisenstien, March 2000, p.22). Another type of hydride is called a reformer. A reformer is simply a chemical pla...
I think this will happen because there are more bonds in the large hydrocarbons, so it will take more energy to break them all. By having more energy acting on the hydrocarbon, means when the bonds are broken more energy will be released (an exothermic reaction). This reaction will heat the water. As the larger hydrocarbons release more energy than the smaller ones (i.e. methane) it means less hydrocarbons have to react to produce the same amount of heat energy, so less fuel is consumed.
For our project, our client, gave us the task of designing and developing a teaching aid that uses hydrogen to power a mechanical device. This task led us to the construction of a hybrid fuel cell/battery-powered model hovercraft. The hovercraft, which we call “Hovercraftica”, uses a battery to power the lift fan and two hydrogen fuel cells to power the fan that provides thrust. Hovercraftica is a self-contained demonstration unit with every aspect of its propulsion onboard. The hydrogen for the fuel cells is produced through the electrolysis of water. This is achieved by collecting light energy via a solar panel and sending it through the fuel cells.
After the oil/gas mixture is drawn from the ground, it is then stored into a storage tank and allowed to rest for a while. Then the gas is piped off to a set of distillation columns to clean up the ethane. In order to activate the chemical reaction necessary to separate the ethane, a thermal cracking unit (a sort of long heated tube) i.e. a plug flow reactor is used. After a series of distillations, ethylene exits the tube.
In this recent century, there is ease into taking our technology as something for granted. After all, technology has opened up our abilities to instantly connect to the other side of the world, instantly retrieve information from the Internet, and instantly listen to digital content if desired. However, while a cell phone, laptop, and iPod has many differences from one another, all of those three devices share one item in common at the very least and that is a Lithium-Ion Battery.
The Olefins II Unit makes hydrocarbons from naphtha or natural gas using furnaces. After distillation, the p...
In the search engine “Google dictionary” the author announces, “Fuel cell: a cell producing an electric current directly from a chemical reaction.” Fuel cells were thought of in 1839 by Sir William Grove who was known as “Father of the Fuel Cell.” In the article “History of
The present global economy is nearly entirely dependent on petroleum and crude oil imports from the Middle East. Where the current situation stands now, oil prices will continue to skyrocket and the environmental impact will continue becoming greater if no form of alternative energy is implemented to a greater extent within the coming years. However, to this effect, the industrial cost of producing such forms of alternative energy is in itself primarily composed of coal and petroleum. In this light, I will investigate the practicality of hydrogen fuel cells based upon hydrogen consumption and exploitation. Hydrogen holds enormous promise for the future regarding alternative energy sources. To this point, its ability to be used in cars, weapons, and as miniature batteries has been demonstrated by many companies. However, if this is the case, hydrogen should be the leading supplier of power around the world. What prevents it from being so?
...ch is used to replace natural gas. He also stated that, among the equipment used to burn the biofuel, the suspension burner have the ability to exceed 99% efficiency and whole-tree burner can reduce the cost of harvesting and handling woody fuels by about 35% (Brown, 2003). Moreover, the usage of bio-energy in long term is to provide a degree of ecological balance and climate change, avoid acid rain, reduce soil erosion and minimize water pollution (Gevorkian, 2007). Therefore, biomass is environmental friendly like solar energy. Based on the research that has been carried out regarding the synthesis of gas from biomass, the gas gasifies in the internal combustion engine. The relative energy density of synthesis gas is higher than the fossil fuel under certain conditions. In addition, the relative flame speed of synthesis gas can reduce the time for spark ignition.
Gasification products can be divided in fuel gases and non-fuel gases. The fuel gas (mixture of Carbon monoxide, Hydrogen and traces of Methane) is called producer gas. In particular, section 2.2 focuses on the non-fuel gases such as Carbon dioxide, Nitrogen, some hydrocarbons and water steam which cannot be utilized for combustion. Table 1 shows that according to the gasifier system and the gasifier agent, the biogas composition
The process need toluene and hydrogen as a main reactor. Then, toluene and hydrogen are converted in a reactor packed with catalyst to produce benzene and methane. This reaction is exothermic and the operating conditions are 500 0C to 660 0C, and 20 to 60 bar of pressure. This process begins with mixing fresh toluene with a stream of recycle unreacted toluene, and the mixing is achieved in a storage tank. Then, the toluene is pumped to combine it with a stream of mixed hydrogen and fresh hydrogen gas. The mixture of toluene and hydrogen is preheated before it is introduce to the heater or furnace. In the furnace, the stream is heated to 600 0C, then introduced into the reactor. Basically, the main reactions occurs in the reactor.
Hart, David. " Hydrogen: A Truly Sustainable Transport Fuel?" Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment 1.3 (2003): 138-45. Web. Kühne, Reinhart. "
Hydrogen is one of the most abundant elements on the earth. It can be found in the oceans as well as the atmosphere. Over the last few years, talk about the future of hydrogen power has grown from a whisper to a roar. The use of hydrogen is not just the burning of the gas, but of its use in a fuel cell. Fuel cells might be the device that causes the extinction of the internal combustion engine. A fuel cell is a device that produces electricity from a fuel and an oxidizer, a substance that combines with the fuel. The fuel and oxidizer react chemically at two separate electrodes to produce the direct electric current; These cells use hydrogen as the fuel and oxygen as the oxidizer. Hydrogen power could be the silver bullet to the current and future energy situation.