ICELAND THE FIRST COUNTRY TO TRY ABANDONING GASOLINE

[No Exit]

Iceland the First Country to Try Abandoning Gasoline
Hot Water Heats Homes, Businesses; Hydrogen Fuel Oil Powers Cars, Buses
Publication Date:18-January-2006
09:00 PM US Eastern Timezone
Source:ABC News

REYKJAVIK, Iceland— Iceland has energy to spare, and the small country has found a cutting-edge way to reduce its oil dependency. Volcanoes formed the island nation out of ash and lava, and molten rock heats huge underground lakes to the boiling point.
The hot water — energy sizzling beneath the surface — is piped into cities and stored in giant tanks, providing heat for homes, businesses and even swimming pools.

The volcanoes melted ice, which formed rivers. The water runs through turbines, providing virtually all the country's electricity. Iceland wants to make a full conversion and plans to modify its cars, buses and trucks to run on renewable energy — with no dependence on oil.

Water Turned Into Fuel

Iceland has already started by turning water into fuel — hydrogen fuel. Here's how it works: Electrodes split the water into hydrogen and oxygen molecules. Hydrogen electrons pass through a conductor that creates the current to power an electric engine. Hydrogen fuel now costs two to three times as much as gasoline, but gets up to three times the mileage of gas, making the overall cost about the same.

(snip)

(emphasis added)

http://www.fuelcellsworks.com/Supppage4338.html

I've often read that bit about how "hydrogen fuel is more expensive than fossil fuels", but never before have I read the REST of the story, which is that it also gets THREE TIMES the mileage of gas--making the cost about the same.

Sure there may be some impractical things at first, but wouldn't it just be SO WORTH IT, to deprive the fossil fuel magnates--the greedy oil and natural gas corporate tyrants--of their obscene income?

[FreedomAngel82]

1. I'll be interested in seeing how this works out

We need to get away from oil too.

[GreenPartyVoter]

2. Thanks for posting this :^)

[sandnsea]

3. What about the water though

Will there ever be a point where we're using too much water that won't be able to re-generate itself.

[greenman3610]

8. when the H2 burns, the product is water again eom

[sandnsea]

10. Perfectly equal? n/t

[htuttle]

14. Well, I think so

The 'input' in the "H20 + Energy -> H2 -> H20 + Energy" cycle would be the energy you use to make the hydrogen. Everything but that should come out the other end.

[sandnsea]

20. Another question

I contacted a snowmobile advocacy group up around Yellowstone to ask them why they don't retrofit to hydrogen, because it can be sold in canisters like propane and would be way better than the current situation. She said the hydrogen freezes so people could end up out in the cold with snowmobiles that wouldn't work. Anybody know how Iceland is getting around that?

I am totally for hydrogen, forgot the water emission portion. But would still be concerned about using water for energy without a full formula. It would be nice to know if the freezing thing had been solved too.

[PSUDem]

22. -434 degrees F

According to this link, the melting/freezing poing of hydrogen is well below any temps that you would run into. They were just feeding you a bunch of bull.

http://environmentalchemistry.com/yogi/periodic/H.html

[sandnsea]

24. Thank you

I will get back to them on that. It's been a couple years, but I should have the email address saved.

[htuttle]

25. It wouldn't freeze anywhere on Earth

...but a bigger problem is leaking.

Hydrogen is the smallest atom, so it can eventually escape just about any container you put it in. Sort of the same problem as 'What sort of container could you use to hold a Universal Solvent?'

[sandnsea]

30. I guess

But I do know I've read that it can be stored in little containers like propane canisters so, :shrug:

[htuttle]

31. It can

It just continually leaks, though fairly slowly.

[sandnsea]

32. I see

Would it matter? Is there anything dangerous about it leaking? Isn't it explosive or something?

[htuttle]

33. I don't think so

I'm sure that it leaks through the steel in such diffuse amounts that it's not a problem.

But I would imagine that it's an issue affecting long term storage. You'd have to count on losing some. Pipelines could also be problematic, I'd guess.

[sandnsea]

35. California demonstration project

Probably stuff in here about it, I just remembered reading about this project a while back. Most of it flies right over my head, I'm so scientifically inclined that I can't even remember the names of the planets. And I never could so I don't even get to blame that on aging hormones! :rofl:

http://www.hydrogenhighway.ca.gov/

[htuttle]

36. Here's a page I found on storing hydrogen as relates to vehicles

I don't know anything about this site, but it looked fairly information-dense and propaganda-sparse:
http://www.aip.org/tip/INPHFA/vol-10/iss-1/p20.html

One interesting idea is storing the hydrogen in a solid hydride compound, then re-releasing it in the vehicle (though then you'd have another waste product to deal with).

[baby_mouse]

44. Weren't they making progress on a Buckminster-Fullerene type lining? nt

[baby_mouse]

43. There are other reasons that hydrogen's a problem.

The freezing talk is weird, hydrogen has one of the lowest freezing points there is! The only gas in the entire world of known gasses with a lower freezing point is helium, at least that's what I remember from studying Chemsitry at University. However...

Hydrogen is an *extremely* dangerous substance, it's VERY volatile and combustible, it's a *good deal* more dangerous than something like propane or even liquid oxygen. Tiny amounts of energy can make it explode. The Hindenberg disaster, I think, was a hydrogen explosion, if you've seen the footage, the stuff burns up at many times the speed of other substances.

So they MAY have included a combustion retardant in the hydrogen mix that DOES freeze at a higher temperature than hydrogen (which presumably they would remove with something like a catalyst once the gas is transported to the safe, controlled combustion chambers of the engine itself). Certainly I recall a lot of talk about how to store hydrogen in the early 80s when schoolkids like me in the UK were encouraged to think about these things. Most people thought that a carrier medium for the hydrogen could make it safer.

Most gases will dissolve in liquids.

Will you be researching this stuff? I've not had time to follow the development of hydrogen fuel technology.

[baby_mouse]

41. All water is burned hydrogen.

Water is the waste product of hydrogen combustion.

Some hydrogen may escape, but it's sufficiently combustible and volatile that it'll oxidise back to water pretty quick.

[lvx35]

4. Awesome!

Now that's what I consider leadership! Right on Iceland.

[eridani]

5. But what is the energy balance?

Dollars and yen mean nothing here--what counts is kilocalories. If you put more into the process than you get out, you have an energy sink, not an energy source.

[ljm2002]

9. "If you put more into the process"...

..."you have an energy sink, not an energy source."

Well, sort of. In fact, according to well understood principles of physics, you will *never* get out 100% of what you put in. So the question is not whether you will put more in that you get out, rather, what is the differential and how does it compare with other energy sources.

Also, this can change based on how much infrastructure is in place for one method over another.

[Solon]

11. Not good, but they are willing to do a conversion at a loss, basically...

Look, much of Iceland is fueled by geothermic energy, probably the closest you can get to "free" energy on this planet after building a simple steam turbine. Using that type of energy source, when you already DON'T use even close to 100% of the energy present, it doesn't really matter what the efficiency is. If they have to use 100 kilocalories of energy that comes from a magma chamber or hot spring to make one kilocalorie of hydrogen fuel, does it really cost them or the planet anything? The energy is lost regardless of what they do, whether it is used to turn a turbine or is spewed into the air. Probably best if implemented in this way. This is probably one of the few instances where geography actually works FOR us. Local uses of local forms of renewable energy, building solar panels in deserts would be another example.

[K-W]

23. I don't understand your question.

Obviously the hydro-elecric generation and geothermal heat produce a great deal of energy. Are you referring to the process of producing hydrogen? If so there is of course some energy lost, but this is a miniscule price to pay for the massive benefits of moving off fossil fules.

The problem in America is we use fossil fuels to generate electricity, so using electricity to create hydrogen just changes where the fossil fuel is burned. Since Iceland has renwable sources, they do not have this problem.

[baby_mouse]

45. Entirely so. Wind! Sea! Sun!

They work!

[eridani]

46. Does Iceland get all its electricity from renewable sources?

If so, the energy balance issue would not necessarily be relevant. If, however, they could use their resources to get some other kind of fuel for cars that would yield more kilocaloties, this would be relevant.

The issue is discussed for the case of ethanol from corn here--
http://www.ethanol-gec.org/corn_eth.htm

[CottonBear]

6. How cool is that? Good for Iceland! n/t

[TX-RAT]

7. Maybe we should tap into our underground thermals.

Many areas have high underground temps in excess of 350 degrees. Or we could just tap into Yellowstone.

[DrunkenMaster]

12. sooperkewl!!!!

Let's hear it for Iceland! Great work: now if only the US could do the same, we could transform our economy, self-image and the entire planet.

[muriel_volestrangler]

39. Good for Iceland, but impossible in the US in this way

because Iceland has the geology for enough true geothermal energy to power the whole country, while the USA doesn't (Iceland may be the only country in the world that can power itself entirely from geothermal energy).

For the USA to do this, you need enough renewable energy sources (wind, wave, solar, sustainable biofuels) to power all the electricity needs, all the heating needs, any chemical needs (we'll need to synthesise some chemicals that now use fossil fuels as a feedstock), and then produce hydrogen, or some other transportable energy carrier (eg rechargeable batteries) for transport. It's a lot to do.

[wiley]

13. The by-product is steam!

I have been pushing for this forever. Go Iceland!

The Democrats could create millions of jobs just setting this country up for a future almost devoid of fossil fuels. Bold new Leadership? Not from the CORRUPT REPUBLICANS.

[yodermon]

15. Well then.

clearly, Iceland is a terrorist state that must be destroyed.

[Solon]

16. Good solution for areas that are geographically active and also...

have no "explosive" situations, basically. Other areas that I can think of that similar projects would work are the Hawaiian Islands, as an example. The largest mountain in the world is a continually erupting volcano, Mauna Loa. It is controllable, because the heat and lava basically leak out of the mountain. Occasionally a house is burned, but I haven't heard of anyone recently who has died from the volcano that didn't do something stupid(hey, let's jump the lava stream!).

Think about it, all you need is heat, a lot of it, and using that you have a "free" source for electricity, and it could produce a LOT of it rather quickly. This is, after all, just waste energy from the Earth itself, and that energy can be utilized by us in varied ways. One idea I have is to make heat and expansion resistant tubes that are piped into the volcano and pass over a vent(preferably not an active vent). These tubes could be made of carbon fibre or other material that is resistant to corrosion along with handling large amounts of heat and not be expanding. Pump water straight into the tube, when it passes over the vent, it will quickly become super heated and high pressure steam will shoot out the other end, this steam could then be used to fuel old fashioned steam turbines, making electricity for powering homes, for splitting water to make hydrogen, whatever you want the electricity to do, in addition to powering the pump for the water to go back in, it would be a closed system, after all.

Not to mention that this technique would be surprisingly safe, no human would ever be near the vent if we are smart about it, and the tube(s) in question could be built elsewhere and laid out by robots. The power plant itself could be miles away, though half a mile would be more than enough distance. The worse case scenario, lava going up the vent, need not lead to disaster, especially if the tube is built out of the right materials, then it won't break or melt. Even in the event of breakage, they could close it down, shut off the water, and send some robots to fix it after the lava is cleared.

Though, if people are leery of going over a tube, you don't really have to, a smarter idea would be to run the pipe through naturally heated rock around the volcano. Somewhere are 200 degrees Centigrade or so would be good enough, and probably easier to handle.

[MadHound]

17. And you know what's really sad?

The US is similarly blessed with the natural resources and climate to wean ourselves off of oil. Instead of water and geothermal though, the US has an abundancy of wind. In fact the DOE did a study on the US energy resources back in '91. They found that, given 1991 technology, there was enough harvestable wind energy in three states, North Dakota, South Dakota and Texas, to power the US electric grid, including factoring in growth, through the year 2030. Damn, just think what we could do adding in Oklahoma and Kansas.

We could be oil independent now, however corporate America only thinks about next quarter's profit numbers, thus they'll take us right on over the energy cliff.

[Nutmegger]

18. Excellent, this is a step in the right direction! n-t

Cheers!

[Odin2005]

19. GO ICELAND!

[Vidar]

21. Arguably the oldest democracy as well.

[TheFarseer]

26. The Wright Brother's plane wasn't very practical

but we developed the technology and see where we are today? What if we just gave up the the airplane as impractical?

[htuttle]

29. Well, there'd be a lot more oil left

We should have spent more time on dirigibles and blimps. Far more fuel efficient. I bet they make a comeback for that very reason, too.

[TheFarseer]

38. Ha, not what I was getting at, but interesting point

I wonder if we would have alot more oil if the Hindenburg wouldn't have went down in flames - and with it the dirigible industry. Someday trains will run on something more practical that diesel also. I've said it a millions times - we're not using our energy options efficiently. We're clearly overbooking oil and natural gas.

[SmokingJacket]

27. Iceland is COOL.

They are also the home of some of the best new music, like Sigur Ros... and they wear great sweaters.

[AntiFascist]

28. Wow, this is great!

I've always felt eletrolysis of water to hydrogen was the way to go.

(Invest in Icelandic Kronas - www.everbank.com)

[entanglement]

34. The Nordic nations never cease to amaze me with their progressive ideas

How I wish we had a tenth of their foresight!

[iconoclastNYC]

37. I wonder if battery life will increase fast enough to beat Hydrogen

There are so many tough technological challenges to overcome before we can go to Hydrogen. I wonder if all battery/solar cars will take off before then.

[tsuki]

40. How much is the price of a gallon of gasoline in Iceland?

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

42. Slightly less than the price of a new car. n/t

[Lorien]

47. K & R

I'm sure the usual naysayers will have a field day with this, but I'm certain Iceland is up to the challenge. Where there's a political will, there's often a way...