Hydrogen Microreactor Eliminates Classic Motors
12 April 2008
11 Comments
Based on the same principle as the large plants that can extract hydrogen from a fluid, Innovatek succeeded to compact all this technology in a palm size microreactor able to continuously produce hydrogen from any hydrocarbon source. This might have a positive impact on hydrogen based vehicles, because offers a more viable solution than storing and transporting highly pressurized hydrogen. This minireactor could use most any liquid fuel to provide a greener one. Innovatek specialist developed the alternative of linking more of these devices to obtain interconnected systems able to produce up to 160 gallons H/min. Innovatek hopes to integrate this new automotive technology by 2010.
This tech will definitely be picked up as it keeps the oil companies in the loop.
The article says “any hydrocarbon source”. Does it work at all with plain old water? I’d love to be able to use just water to “fill ‘er up” I realize water may not produce as much hydrogen per gallon as other hydrocarbon liquids, but come on, it’s water. Besides, the other gas produced is oxygen. What byproducts do “other fuels” produce?
Water(H20) isn’t a hydrocarbon(CxHy). A hydrocarbon is a chain of carbons held together by single/double/triple bonds with hydrogens attached to each carbon (except at most triple bond sites). For example, Propane is a hydrocarbon because it has 3 carbons in the main chain with 8 hydrogens attached to various carbons. Water isn’t a hydrocarbon because it lacks the Carbon backbone.
Water(H20) isn’t a hydrocarbon(CxHy). A hydrocarbon is a chain of carbons held together by single/double/triple bonds with hydrogens attached to each carbon (except at most triple bond sites). For example, Propane is a hydrocarbon because it has 3 carbons in the main chain with 8 hydrogens attached to various carbons. Water isn’t a hydrocarbon because it lacks the Carbon backbone.
Nice thought, but water isn’t a hydrocarbon - it has no carbon in it (well, dirty water probably does, but it’s still not a hydrocarbon.) In terms of this technology, hydrocarbons are things like methane, paraffin, benzene etc.
There are plenty of hydrocarbon sources available in the everyday world though, it can’t run on water, but it could probably run on food waste, or used cooking oil.
Unfortunately, this microreactor would (I’m pretty sure) require energy to convert hydrocarbons (and, as SuperSparky is suggesting, water) to hydrogen gas and carbon–in the form of graphite, I’d expect, unless you’re planning on seeing diamonds pop out of your car in the near future. In the case of hydrocarbons, they’d be split into hydrogen gas and graphite, and the hydrogen gas would then react with oxygen to form water. Hopefully, the energy released in the burning of hydrogen is more than the energy required to pull the carbon out of it. In the case of water, on the other hand, you’d be turning the water into hydrogen gas and oxygen gas and turning those back into water, releasing no energy at all.
If I’m right about this process producing graphite instead of carbon dioxide, then it produces less energy than simply burning (assuming graphite is still flammable), but it would produce no carbon dioxide. I suppose the graphite could then be buried somewhere, or used in whatever we use graphite for nowadays. Maybe we could find a plant that loves the stuff.
If you need serious power, as for a vehicle, why not just *burn* the hydrocarbon and harvest the energy from oxidizing all that carbon, too. Reforming hydrocarbons to yield hydrogen also yields carbon monoxide, which you have to get rid of, typically by oxidizing it carbon dioxide. So why bother with the reforming step unless you need hydrogen for some special purpose?
I’m getting tired of hearing greenies speak of hydrogen as an energy source. Absent fusion, hydrogen is a medium for transmitting energy.
“Any Hydrocarbon source” will mean any compound that is made of only carbon and hydrogen. This will mean methane, ethane, butane, propane, octane as well as all of the longer chain hydrocarbons such as all sorts of oils, diesel, bio deisel and even grease.
The by-product will be pure carbon. Not carbon dioxide but just carbon. Charcoal, graphite and diamonds are all pure carbon.
It is not very difficult to extract hydrogen from water and, as you said, the only by-product is oxygen but the difference is that it takes much more energy to separate oxygen atoms from hydrogen atoms than it takes to separate carbon atoms from hydrogen atoms.
What these devices have the potential to do is to enable hydrogen cars to fill up on normal petrol, diesel or gas and convert it to hydrogen before being used. This should eliminate harmful emissions from the exhaust of cars as the only emission would be steam. It could, therefore, utilise the existing infrastructure for transporting and delivering petrol.
In a normal engine, the carbon combines with oxygen and releases energy in that reaction. With this, the carbon is unreacted and therefore it is extrecting less energy from the raw material. On the other hand, hydrogen engines can be more efficient than combustion engines which means less wasted energy.
It’s not a silver bullet. It doesn’t reduce our dependence on oil at all but it is a big improvement over where we are now. I’m all for it.
I must state while you are both somewhat correct in the remotest aspect - no, you cant split ‘water’ with a hydrocarbon reactor, as water is not a hydrocarbon.
Secondly - Hydrocarbons are already high-energy. You wouldn’t add energy to split the carbon/hydrogen - although you would lose some of the original chemical stored energy - it takes in high energy *gasoline for example* and spits out carbon and hydrogen. Carbon having little chemical potential, and hydrogen having most of the chemical potential.
I want to take hydrogen, supplied by desert solar plants though electrolysis and mix it with C02 from coal burning power plants in the same location and synthesis a safer, easy to transport, cleaner fuel. Too complicated for American minds?
Water can’t be used as a fuel because it takes more energy to break it into hydrogen than you can get out of burning it. Hydrocarbons are suitable because they are easily broken and used as energy.
Though, I still say Hydrogen made with solar energy ultra compressed into carbon buckyballs and used as fuel via fuel cells.
Also I agree with Dave, this is a temporary solution to pollution, but it only lasts as long as our oil reserves.
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