On 3/13/2014 8:28 PM, Ben Apollonio wrote:
I doubt "yank and crush" will happen again. Tesla is too much of a
threat for anyone not to want to keep their EV program active, even
if it's only a contingency plan. My bigger fear would be Toyota
sucking market share and investment away from EV's when they start
shipments of their Fool Cell car. Even then, though, the significant
disadvantages of hydrogen infrastructure (and fuel cells in general)
should keep competition to a minimum.
It may cause a little distraction but I feel at this point the EV market
is still such a small percentage of the total automobile market, but is
gaining good momentum, that the distraction will be absorbed by other areas.
I was a judge at the Connecticut State Science Fair today and one young
lady had a very intriguing display on using the Piezo Electrochemical
Effect to generate hydrogen. I'd never heard of this and, honestly,
didn't understand a lot of it, but she was able to create some sort of
carbon matrix by carbonizing egg membrane, put it in a solution and
subjected it to high frequency vibration and it generated hydrogen.
For those who understand such things here's her abstract:
The current energy crisis has sparked many scientists’ interest
in alternative energy sources, specifically the supplementation of a
hydrogen economy that is reliant on fuel-cell technology. Recently, a
new water-splitting mechanism called the “Piezo-electrochemical” (PZEC)
effect was found to be capable of generating hydrogen by submerging
piezoelectric fibers in water and applying an oscillating force. This
way, hydrogen can be created from water-splitting using otherwise
wasteful vibrational movements found in the environment.
Unfortunately, current methods of generating hydrogen through
the PZEC effect, using BaTiO3 dendrites as the piezo material, are
highly inefficient. It is predicted that hydrogen production would be
significantly increased by selecting chemically stable piezo materials
with large aspect ratios and surface areas, allowing for greater
electrical charge. This research provides an optimized, low-cost route
for zero-emission hydrogen production through the PZEC effect by
applying ultrasonic vibrations to ZnO interwoven microfibers and BiFeO3
nanodendrites. ZnO microfibers were synthesized atop an organic eggshell
membrane biotemplate. These microfibers and BiFeO3 nanodendrites were
characterized with SEM/EDS analysis, and separately placed in di-water.
An ultrasonic cleaner was used to apply mechanical force to the
piezo materials, and H2-production was measured using GC-TCD. Vibration
of ZnO biomorphic interwoven microfibers (0.003g/ml di-water) led to a
H2-production rate of 5.46×10-1 ppm/s, which is 102 greater than
literature using BaTiO3 dendrites. The H2-concentration (% percentage of
sample) was found to be, on average, 0.139%. Sonication of
BiFeO3-nanodendrites produced a H2-production rate of 3.34×10-1 ppm/s,
which is attributed to charge cancellations resulting from the dendrite
morphology.
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I know it's off topic for EVs, but I did drive to the fair in an EV <g>
--Rick
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