Hydrogen Power Without the Fuel Cell?
by
Karen Miller, Program Director, National Hydrogen Association
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| At HYFORUM, DaimlerChrysler's H2-powered bus took
participants to an evening reception, while BMW 'Clean Energy' car, right, was available for
ride and drives.
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Bob Mauro and I had the pleasure to participate in the HYFORUM
2000 meeting in Munich, Germany, in September. One of the great highlights of this
meeting was the opportunity to see BMW’s first fleet of 15 hydrogen-powered cars,
launched in May of this year. Not only did we get a chance to see the fleet, we
were honored to take a ride in one of the luxury 750 HL automobiles. Let me say
that this car was absolutely awesome on any fuel. With a GPS system and cellular
telephone accessible to the driver and a television available for back seat passengers,
this vehicle exuded class! What made this vehicle particularly interesting was its ability
to change from gasoline power to liquid hydrogen with the flip of a switch. The
car holds 80 liters of gasoline and 140 liters of liquid hydrogen for use in the
5.4-liter V12 internal combustion engine. But don’t panic; the car does use a
fuel cell ... for auxiliary power. But what about performance? The cars have a
range of 550-600 km (over 200 miles), and cruise at over 200 km/hr (120 mph).
They can accelerate from 0-60 mph in nine seconds and are quiet, even when tearing
up the Autobahn at more than 100 mph.
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| HYFORUM participants toured the hydrogen refueling
station at Munich Airport. In Europe with its high gasoline prices, liquid H2 is a bargain.
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Fuel economy was so good we did not need to refuel.
If we had, however, it was a short ride to the single public hydrogen refueling station
in Germany, located at Munich Airport. Liquid hydrogen is a bargain to most Europeans,
who are paying about US$4 per gallon for gasoline. At about US$2 per gallon of gasoline
equivalent, liquid hydrogen is economically beneficial today. It takes the robotic refueling
station approximately four minutes to fill up with hydrogen, which is kept at 280 degrees
below zero.
©2001. All Rights Reserved. A Publication
of the National Hydrogen Association.
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