Hydrogen powered engines. Could this be the future for Cogen?

[Henry W]

Been thinking of Hydrogen powered engines. Byproducts would be Water and NOx. But there would be no carbon emissions. I would imagine that the NOx levels can be reduced with a catalyst.

Could cheap efficient Hydrogen Generators be made to produce enough hydrogen to run an internal combustion engine powered CHP unit to run a home?

Is there a possibility that this could work?

[Henry W]

Here are some clips to watch.

https://youtu.be/3IPR50-soNA

https://youtu.be/zMK9p07pXz4

[DKMC]

Have they solved the problem of Hydrogen embrittlement these days?

[Henry W]

Learned something, thanks for posting. I believe Toyota has a hydrogen fueled automobile. How serious could Hydrogen Embrittlement be?
Does it take hours, months or years for metals to get so brittle that components fail? Can and engine be engineered to resist failure?

[DKMC]

Don't know the answers to those questions, but they are good questions to ask.

[mike90045]

Learned something, thanks for posting. I believe Toyota has a hydrogen fueled automobile. How serious could Hydrogen Embrittlement be?
Does it take hours, months or years for metals to get so brittle that components fail? Can and engine be engineered to resist failure?

I think it's months for the high pressure areas.  Then years in the low pressure areas.  That's the big problem.

[Henry W]

That's not good at all. It's something, I never heard about Hydrogen Embrittlement until today. I'm thinking how dangerous high pressure cylinders loaded with Hydrogen could be. None of this has ever been released to the majority of people from companies promoting Hydrogen fueled vehicles and CHP units. I guess it's all amounts to companies and investors selling the people the idea so they can turn around and make a profit off the grants from the research.

[cujet]

Could cheap efficient Hydrogen Generators be made to produce enough hydrogen to run an internal combustion engine powered CHP unit to run a home?

Is there a possibility that this could work?

Hydrogen is energy intensive to produce using conventional means. However, it is possible to use the waste heat of a nuclear reactor to disassociate hydrogen from oxygen. The process starts in earnest at about 3000 degC. and by 4000C, it's really impossible to keep the atoms together.

But to produce hydrogen on your own is a non starter. Not because it's too difficult, but because it uses too much electrical energy. The energy you can get out exactly equals the energy you put into the process. Unfortunately, we can't combust hydrogen at 100% efficiency, so there is always a loss.

Might as well directly use the electrical power from the solar cells or generator.

[BruceM]

Mike Strizki in New Jersey stores his summer's excess PV energy  via electrolysis of water as low pressure hydrogen in a big tank farm in his yard.  He runs a fuel cell system to generate electricity, which runs a geo source heat pump heating system in winter. 

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/hydrogen-house/

Payback of never on the electrolyzer and fuel cell system, I expect, but interesting.  PV sized for winter use means gross excess of power, most of the time, and it would be great to be able to put that into long term storage once the batteries are full.  Too bad the cost is out of sight.

It's a pity there's no miniature home power version of the Hall-Héroult process for converting aluminum oxide to aluminum as long term energy storage.  Aluminum is readily converted to heat and hydrogen via lye and water. The waste aluminum oxide could then be converted back to aluminum via PV power.

[DKMC]

Wowzers sounds like a La-BOMB-a

Mike Strizki in New Jersey stores his summer's excess PV energy  via electrolysis of water as low pressure hydrogen in a big tank farm in his yard.