Hi,
As I remember, one of the problems with sodium and other borohydrides is
that boron is a relatively scarce element if considered for use on a
global scale. The main deposits are found in Turkey, Chile and Southern
California (owned in the major part by Rio Tinto, and 3 other smaller
companies). It's currently mainly used for producing washing powder etc
(e.g. Borax). There's a link to some recent production notes at
http://minerals.usgs.gov/minerals/pubs/commodity/boron/120302.pdf .
A vehicle running on a borohydride fuel cell solution would have to have a
separate tank for collecting the "spent" solution after the hydrogen has
been extracted from the borohydride. The spent solution has to be recycled
("rehyrolised") after use, as it's a finite resource and you couldn't just
dispose of it, without mentioning the pollution problems you would
encounter if you tried to.
Carrying 20 gallons of spent borohydride solution around in a vehicle also
presents different economics than letting plain water vapour out of the
exhaust pipe.
I can envisage a situation where going to a filling station would result
in your "spent borohydride solution" tank being emptied and your "charged
solution" tank being refilled. The spent solution would then be
quality-checked and rehydrolised, hopefully with the help of
renewably-generated electricity, and put back into succeeding vehicles.
This should result in a minimal borohydride distribution network - no
tankers on the road like you have today. [On another note, I never
understood why they didn't try and do this with lead-acid battery-powered
electric vehicles, just suck out the spent electrolyte and replace it with
charged electrolyte?]
Vehicles would also be equipped with photovoltaic charging systems (I
guess using the new coating-based PV polymers which are coming on the
market) which could "trickle-hydrolise" the spent solution in sunlight.
All in all, it represents an interesting possibility, especially if
there's a great concern about the safety of using pure hydrogen. The major
limiting factor is, I think, the availability of Boron. Turkey and Chile
could become major countries on the geopolitical landscape if demand for
Boron goes up!
Thanks,
Sam
On Thu, 03 Mar 2005 03:24:31 +0100, Phillip Wolfe <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:
Thanks Ken...and it appears from websearch that Sodium
borohydride itself derived from the Boron elements
from its oxide such as sodium borate. Also, I read
boron is a pretty good fuel alternative to carbon
based. Boron is near carbon on the chemical table.
Looks like boron for fuel cells is one of the ways to
go...
Phillip Wolfe
--- Ken Provost <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
On Mar 2, 2005, at 3:18 PM, Phillip Wolfe wrote:
>
> If I recall from my chemistry there are a just few
> catalysts in this and any reaction for that
matter; so
> is a natural chemical reaction a "patentable"
thing?
>
>
The reaction in question is not "natural", and the
catalyst is probably some exotic organic compound
of titanium, mixed in with the NaBH4 in a specially
developed sintering process (or some such thing).
There are many opportunities in all that process
technology for patents to be granted, without
having to patent any specific chemicals which
may be used as constituents.
-K
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