Germany Floats New Plans to Keep Hydrogen-Powered Cars in the World's Transportation Mix

[OKIsItJustMe]

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=german-hydrogen-powered-cars

February 18, 2010

Germany Floats New Plans to Keep Hydrogen-Powered Cars in the World's Transportation Mix

The German government has big goals for vehicles running on hydrogen fuel cells. But can their model translate to the U.S. market?

By Larry Greenemeier

It's amusing to reduce the development of next-generation electric- or http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=pollution-free-hydrogen-vehicle-hits-driveway">hydrogen-powered cars to a binary paper-versus-plastic decision, but the companies making these cars and the infrastructure to support them are hoping there will be room for both. Hydrogen cars, in particular, have had a bumpy road thus far—the Obama administration has been at odds with Congress over whether to fund hydrogen fuel-cell research. Meanwhile, the first commercial models are not expected to hit the road until 2015, a few years after their http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=plug-in-hybrid-recharge">hybrid and all-electric counterparts.

To help steer hydrogen back into the spotlight, carmaker http://www.daimler.com/technology-and-innovation">Daimler, AG, teamed with the German government Wednesday at a press conference hosted in Washington, D.C., by the http://www.hydrogenassociation.org/about/index.asp">National Hydrogen Association to present their case for the continued development of hydrogen fuel cell cars and the infrastructure to support them.

Public perception of late seems to be that battery-powered vehicles will be the key players in displacing gasoline-dependent internal combustion engines, "but we believe that hydrogen will also play a role, and that the two technologies are complementary," Klaus Bonhoff, managing director of Germany's National Organization Hydrogen and http://www.scientificamerican.com/topic.cfm?id=fuel-cells">Fuel Cells Technology http://www.now-gmbh.de/index.php?id=4&L=1">(NOW), said during the event, which Daimler sponsored. The German federal government created NOW, which is largely funded by private sector businesses, to manage hydrogen and other fuel-cell technologies developed by the German National Innovation Program (NIP). "In the public discussion people tend to say that industry is not interested in hydrogen, but it's the opposite. Activities are actually increasing," Bonhoff said.

NOW sees hydrogen cars as a key element in the German government's plans to reduce the nation's carbon dioxide emissions 80 percent by 2050. One significant step along the way will be for Germans to be driving vehicles that produce no more than 60 grams of carbon dioxide per kilometer by 2030, Bonhoff said, adding that hydrogen-powered cars have the potential to emit as little as 40 grams of CO2 per kilometer. He noted that even highly optimized internal combustion engines are not likely to emit less than 110 grams of CO2 per kilometer.

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[NNadir]

1. Why not? They have a long history of coal gasification, and a definitive bent for playing

shell games with dangerous natural gas and coal.

They have been making hydrogen out of coal for almost a century, and know how to do it quite well, although they eventually forced Fritz Haber, who built their dangerous fossil fuel hydrogen industry, from the country on the grounds he was a Jew.

This hydrogen car scheme, pernicious and toxic though it is, is better, marginally, than their plan to grind up all of Sumatra and stick in gas tanks on the Autobahn.

It's amazing that the country where Ludwig Boltzmann once worked has public policy that is so oblivious to the laws of thermodynamics, but Germany has always, for all it's great science, had a penchant for delusion.