Yep the us sits on it's butt again

Watermark said:
He is getting his hydrogen from a hydrocarbon, natural gas, which contains carbon. What he's basically doing is splitting off the carbon part and taking the hydrogen. The fuel cell itself doesn't do anything with carbon. Once Hydrogen becomes widespread, other options will become viable, and we won't need to extract it from natural gas.
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Quick question Water.... "Once hydrogen becomes widespread?"

Please explain what you mean by this.
 
RStringfield said:
He's right on that. Producing hydrogen creates co2, not the fuel cell.
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Ok, now I am lost.... explain. How is it that the fuel cell doesn't emit CO2?

Because obviously the two of you need to inform the author of the article as well.... because like me they are obviously confused.

"The oxygen that the fuel cell uses comes from the air. The hydrogen is extracted from natural gas by a device called a reformer in the same box as the fuel cell. But a byproduct of that process is poisonous carbon monoxide. So another machine in the gray box adds oxygen to the carbon monoxide to create carbon dioxide, which - though it contributes to global warming - is not poisonous."
 
Superfreak said:
Ok, now I am lost.... explain. How is it that the fuel cell doesn't emit CO2?

Because obviously the two of you need to inform the author of the article as well.... because like me they are obviously confused.

"The oxygen that the fuel cell uses comes from the air. The hydrogen is extracted from natural gas by a device called a reformer in the same box as the fuel cell. But a byproduct of that process is poisonous carbon monoxide. So another machine in the gray box adds oxygen to the carbon monoxide to create carbon dioxide, which - though it contributes to global warming - is not poisonous."
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Getting the Hydrogen creates CO2, they put that hydrogen into a fuel cell that produces water, not CO2.

Later they'll be able to extract Hydrogen from other means once they find ways to make it cheap enough for commercialization. But for now, the creation of Hydrogen to put in the cells creates CO2.
 
Superfreak said:
The hydrogen is extracted from natural gas by a device called a reformer in the same box as the fuel cell.
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SF, you are definitely confused. The fuel he puts into the machine is not hydrogen, it is natural gas. There is a device "in the same box as the fuel cell" that splits the natural gas into it's carbon and hydrogen components. The carbon is released as carbon dioxide, the hydrogen is sent through the fuel cell on the other side of the box, which produces power and releases H2O.
 
Watermark said:
SF, you are definitely confused. The fuel he puts into the machine is not hydrogen, it is natural gas. There is a device "in the same box as the fuel cell" that splits the natural gas into it's carbon and hydrogen components. The carbon is released as carbon dioxide, the hydrogen is sent through the fuel cell on the other side of the box, which produces power and releases H2O.
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Which means that the cell is creating CO2...

I see what he is saying.
 
Damocles said:
Which means that the cell is creating CO2...

I see what he is saying.
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The cell itself is not creating CO2. To say that "the cell is creating CO2" would be an error...

If you can get the hydrogen without using something that contains carbon, then there is no CO2 output. Hydrogen is just a storage medium, like a battery, under that case.
 
Superfreak said:
Ok, now I am lost.... explain. How is it that the fuel cell doesn't emit CO2?

Because obviously the two of you need to inform the author of the article as well.... because like me they are obviously confused.

"The oxygen that the fuel cell uses comes from the air. The hydrogen is extracted from natural gas by a device called a reformer in the same box as the fuel cell. But a byproduct of that process is poisonous carbon monoxide. So another machine in the gray box adds oxygen to the carbon monoxide to create carbon dioxide, which - though it contributes to global warming - is not poisonous."
Click to expand...

Okay, it's a bit of a technicality here but.... The fuel cell is in the box with the device that produces the hydrogen, i.e., the reformer. The fuel cell is not the box and the reformer is not part of the fuel cell.

If you meant the complete apparatus... I did not read the article in detail, so, I did not pick up on that previously.
 
Superfreak said:
ok, so the hydrocarbon fuel cells produce CO2 and the hydrogen fuel cells produce water?
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Hydrocarbon fuel cells do produce CO2. But he's not using hydrocarbon fuel cells...

Now that I'm thinking about it, no, this wouldn't ever be useful for powering a home, unless you got the hydrogen from an exploitable fuel source, like natural gas.

Splitting water into Hydrogen and Oxygen and then recombining it isn't going to net energy.
 
Watermark said:
The cell itself is not creating CO2. To say that "the cell is creating CO2" would be an error...

If you can get the hydrogen without using something that contains carbon, then there is no CO2 output. Hydrogen is just a storage medium, like a battery, under that case.
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Hydrocarbon fuel cells are one item, it creates CO2, it is the first step to get there, but it certainly produces CO2...
 
I'm going to bookmark this thread as "Science can be really funny". I like the insults best but the subject content is very interesting.
 
Damocles said:
Hydrocarbon fuel cells are one item, it creates CO2, it is the first step to get there, but it certainly produces CO2...
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OK, you are talking about a completely different kind of fuel cell, Damo. :)

Don't confuse people, hydrocarbon fuel cells have nothing to do with this subject. :clink:
 
Damocles said:
Getting the Hydrogen creates CO2, they put that hydrogen into a fuel cell that produces water, not CO2.

Later they'll be able to extract Hydrogen from other means once they find ways to make it cheap enough for commercialization. But for now, the creation of Hydrogen to put in the cells creates CO2.
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ok, so the carbon monoxide is a byproduct of removing the hydrogen from the nat gas. The Hydrogen goes to the fuel cell to combine with the Oxygen which produces the power. The carbon monoxide goes to the other machine that converts it into the CO2?

Ok.... I think I understand what water was saying now and where I was getting confused. While the system produces CO2, it is not techinically the fuel cell itself doing so?
 
Superfreak said:
ok, so the carbon monoxide is a byproduct of removing the hydrogen from the nat gas. The Hydrogen goes to the fuel cell to combine with the Oxygen which produces the power. The carbon monoxide goes to the other machine that converts it into the CO2?

Ok.... I think I understand what water was saying now and where I was getting confused. While the system produces CO2, it is not techinically the fuel cell itself doing so?
Click to expand...

Correct.

But now I've come to the obvious realization that it's stupid to use this to power a home unless you use something like natural gas, which will create CO2. There's no other hydrogen source that at least I can think of that would NET or BREAK EVEN on energy.

So yeah, you're right.
 
Superfreak said:
ok, so the carbon monoxide is a byproduct of removing the hydrogen from the nat gas. The Hydrogen goes to the fuel cell to combine with the Oxygen which produces the power. The carbon monoxide goes to the other machine that converts it into the CO2?

Ok.... I think I understand what water was saying now and where I was getting confused. While the system produces CO2, it is not techinically the fuel cell itself doing so?
Click to expand...
Yes.
 
RStringfield said:
Okay, it's a bit of a technicality here but.... The fuel cell is in the box with the device that produces the hydrogen, i.e., the reformer. The fuel cell is not the box and the reformer is not part of the fuel cell.

If you meant the complete apparatus... I did not read the article in detail, so, I did not pick up on that previously.
Click to expand...

yeah, I misread that. I was talking about the entire thing as the fuel cell which confused everyone else. That was my bad.
 
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