How a Renewable Hydrogen Fueling Station Works

EDITOR'S CLARIFICATION: Hey folks the hydrogen fuel-celled vehicles including the Honda Clarity and Toyota Mirai are just plain old EV's except they can offer unlimited range as long as you keep the tank filled up with hydrogen.

FCV (fuel-cell vehicles) just like every other EV (electric vehicle), uses electric motors with batteries that MUST BE CHARGED, and can be charged one way or another and hydrogen fuel cells is another way, or a plug-in is another way, or an on-board electric generator powered by a internal combustion engine like the Chevrolet Volt is another way, or a hybrid kinetic recharge system (brakes etc.) is another way, or maybe even some day in the future a flux-capacitor will be another way to charge batteries..

You gotta know that a fuel-cell DOES NOT POWER YOUR VEHICLE it is NOT AN ENGINE, the fuel cell has just one job in the car...to charge the battery, in other words instead of a gasoline-hybrid, or a plug-in hybrid, or a flux-capicator hybrid, the FCV is just a hydrogen-hybrid, albeit better for the ecology and better for the free world, but still just a battery powered EV.

Special to The Auto Channel From Hygen.com

HyGen believes the hydrogen infrastructure is mostly in place. With electricity and water universally available, the missing piece is on-site equipment to extract hydrogen from water using electricity.

Major automobile manufacturers have hydrogen fuel cell vehicles ready for mass production with expected volume sales to begin in 2015. Vehicles need fuel like people need food. It’s a commodity that will always be required and will always be in demand. Supplying that fuel is a profitable business with predictable, very long-term revenues. Long-term revenues attract capital and capital expenditure is all that is required for the hydrogen infrastructure. No need for new pipelines, just the installation of profit-generating equipment. If the business model works in low volume, it will work even better as equipment costs reduce with mass production.

As developer of several Southern California renewable hydrogen fueling stations, including the world’s first in Los Angeles, HyGen has the necessary experience to oversee the planned rollout of hydrogen stations to meet California and the nation’s goals for an alternate solution to fossil fuels.

The above diagram outlines the HyGen process. Renewable energy is purchased from the utility company and is used to split water to obtain pure hydrogen which is held in a buffer tank. Oxygen is the by-product of this process and is currently released to the atmosphere in the majority of on-site hydrogen stations.

The next stage is to compress the hydrogen from x bar to x bar and pump the gas to storage vessels for delivery to the fuel pump. FCEVs are designed to accept 350 or 700 bar with the greater pressure adding to the cost per kg. 700 bar gives greater range at additional cost, leaving the choice to the consumer. HyGen uses a booster pump to achieve the 700 bar. Fueling time is 3 to 5 minutes and the current cost for 700 bar hydrogen is $3.00-$3.50 GGE (Gallon Gasoline Equivalent).

Depending on production capacity requirements, a HyGen system can be installed for as little as $1.5 mil. which can fuel up to 100 vehicles/week. This will be a starter system for the first 20 stations HyGen plans to install in its next venture.�Given low initial volume, this figure represents a surprisingly low capital cost over the lifespan of the equipment.

How a Renewable Hydrogen Fueling Station Works

HyGen believes the hydrogen infrastructure is mostly in place and the market will provide the missing piece.