loony toons and Hydrogen economies

[Denny Crane!]

This isn't as exciting as the title makes it sound!

So a while back I made a thread on Steorn Over Unity Free Energy con artists that appear to be running a genuinely legitimate business that is 12million in the red but the news from them is that they have 2.5million pounds worth of developers license orders.

It is a scam that is losing money that will seemingly only make money if it really works. Which strikes me as being really interesting. Full news here:

http://www.steorn.com/

http://pesn.com/2010/04/12/9501635_S...id_state_Orbo/

I still think it is fake but if it is then it is the most interesting scam I've ever come across.


Horizon Fuel Cells.

The hydrogen economy has to me always seemed like a waste of time as it takes electricity to convert water into Hydrogen. The new Horizon desktop charging station (with optional solar panels) charges up a mini low pressure fuel cell which can then be plugged into a USB charging device saving us money in charging and it is green.

At the minute I am not that interested because I don't charge a great deal from USB. They are rapidly scaling this up in order to charge a fuel cell big enough for a car, or you could use it in combined heat and power units taking massive amounts of strain from the grid.

It is certainly preferable to power generation methods which involve the transmission of power and the 30-45% waste that is involved in typical power station.

But why not just have a solar panel that converts things into electricity directly for use? What is the deal with hydrogen is it purely as a form of a battery?

http://www.horizonfuelcell.com/



One of the most amazing products that Horizon has created is the desktop Hydrofill refueling station. The Hydrofill uses water and electricity to refill Horizon’s small Hydrostiks. Just screw the Hydrostiks into the center of the Hydrofill and turn on the electricity. Oxygen is vented out of the top and hydrogen is stored in the solid hydrogen cartridge. While it uses high compression to fill the sticks, the hydrogen is actually stored at low pressure which makes it safer. Horizon offers a solar panel kit to use with the Hydrofill if you really want to keep it totally off grid.



The Hydrostiks are currently used in Horizon’s miniature car kits, but a similar larger hydrogen storage cartridge is used in its mobile and stationary generators. The cool thing about the desktop refueling station is that scaled up, they would make the perfect in home refueling stations for future hydrogen fuel cell vehicles.

Right now it takes one hour to refuel the Hydrostiks but it isn’t too big a leap to envision more efficient scaled up Hydrofills being able to refill car sized hydrogen cartridges in one to four hours. Like gas canisters for your grill, charged hydrogen canisters could be available for a quick swap at your local fueling station. Much easier than swapping out batteries.

All in all Horizon certainly seems to be gearing up for a hydrogen future. Now it is up to the scientists to bring it into reality.

[Jaketh]

cool