with both progress rail and wabtec proposing designs and already building units of Hydrogen and battery locomotives would you say that the next transition era is already upon us?
are hydrogen locomotives safe in the case of derailments? would a hydrogen locomotive become a hydrogen bomb if in a derailment?
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A Hydrogen bomb is nuclear. A Hydrogen gas explosion is mor like the Hindenburg! not quite as catastrophic .
Hydrogen is no worse that compressed natural gas, like what the FEC uses.
@paigetrain posted:with both progress rail and wabtec proposing designs and already building units of Hydrogen and battery locomotives would you say that the next transition era is already upon us?
are hydrogen locomotives safe in the case of derailments? would a hydrogen locomotive become a hydrogen bomb if in a derailment?
The tanks on the engines are made to take a beating. Same style tank that was put on the roof of GM RTS buses years ago, built like a tank.
@ThatGuy posted:The tanks on the engines are made to take a beating. Same style tank that was put on the roof of GM RTS buses years ago, built like a tank.
and automobiles ( Toyota makes hydrogen powered cars) popular in CA. The biggest problem, like battery power it they lose efficiency In cold weather
Around 2013 BNSF had a hydrogen cell demo engine. It's only exhaust was water. I got to explore it a bit up at Hill AFB. It was pretty neat
Good morning Cody. H2 storage and safety is certainly a concern. I work around it regularly as it is used daily in power plants for its thermal transfer properties.
So concerns:
H2 has one of the largest combustible ranges when mixed with air or oxygen of any substance on the planet. This makes it prone to light off near sparks.
H2 molecules are incredibly small. That makes it hard to contain, especially in a vessel with a shaft coming through it.
H2 burns with a flame invisible to the naked eye.
H2 is incredibly plentiful, but is difficult to strip off whatever it is already attached to. Production of h2 is done several ways. Some production methods are considered environmentally friendly and others are not.
H2 can be burned in a combustion engine but the still requires some lubrication of the pistons.
Fuel cells are expensive.
Gaseous storage is done at high pressure for industrial applications. 2000 psi or greater is common. Storage vessel require inspections to ensure continued reliability.
Positives:
A hydrogen spill doesn't need cleaned up, just vented to atmosphere. Therefore is a big improvement over possible diesel spills.
The combustion byproducts of H2 are heat and water. Same for use of H2 in a fuel cell. In fact with right mix, H2 used in a combustion engine can produce cleaner air than it sucks in by burning off pollution.
Some storage methods are very stable. In side a pressure vessel you can get hydrogen to bond with iron shavings and then not release until heat is applied. This method greatly reduces the amount of H2 released in the event of a vehicle accident, but it does leave the possibility of more fuel to burn at the accident site.
Electric fuel cell efficiency is very high, 40 to 60 %. This is twice or more efficient than diesel engines, but the increased cost is still a huge problem.
Tl;dr: H2 has lots of great properties but not without problems. The biggest issue is it is much more expensive to produce per btu than diesel fuel and will not become mainstream until that cost comes down.
Note- do a search on Civil War ballooning for a fascinating dive into the use of Hydrogen in balloons.
Safer heating systems have to be used when converting to hydrogen support in a shop. Gasoline fumes tend to go to the ground, that is why many auto shops have heaters near the ceiling. Hydrogen gas floats up.
i found this article on railway age its pretty cool
As someone else posted, Hydrogen has good things about it and technical hurdles. One of the biggest problems is that hydrogen is usually created by electrolysis, and that uses a lot of energy (often generated by fossil fuel sources) or they fracture natural gas. In theory it can be created biologically by genetically modified algae, but that is still a lab thing, not been done to scale (nice part? That algae can be grown in waste, that cleans the waste up and produces h2).
Storage is a problem, usually it is done under pressure, like LNG. It also can be stored as a hydride, where the hydrogen is stored bonded to a metal, and it is release by an electric current (that once it heats up, happens on its own). Another problem with hydrogen, is distribution. You could in theory use existing pipelines (same for delivering it to the house), but as someone else pointed out, hydrogen is a small molecule, you would need to redo pipelines that were designed for nat gas.
It also has less btu content than hydrocarbons like gasoline or nat gas. Not applicable to a fuel cell, but in an engine it is, would need to fuel up more
It does burn clear, but that is pretty easy to fix, you can put otherwise innocuous agent in it that would cause it to burn with color (kind of like the smell they add to natural gas, so if there is a leak you smell it).
Hydrogen has a plus, can be used as a fuel cell or burned in existing cars (if you can figure out how to store the hydrogen&get it to the engine, it is pretty simple to use it in a conventional gasoline engine, most of it is programming the ECU parameters for hydrogen, not gasoline) .
The big one is that it is carbon free, as long as the production doesn't use things that generate CO2. It burns cleanly, if it burns properly it produces heat energy and water.
With hydrogen burning, everyone has seen the pictures of the hindenberg and there is immediate "that is what my car would do!". The Hindenberg burned that badly, not because of the hydrogen, but because the fabric was doped with butylene dope (the crap if you made model planes as a kid you put on the tissue paper), that is incredibly flammable. The hydrogen burned, don't get me wrong, but it didn't explode. Gasoline vapor is a lot more explosive than hydrogen gas. If hydrogen escaped it would burn more like natural gas. Even see a car on fire blow up? I have , and it isn't a small thing..nor for that matter are the lithium battery packs in EVs we currently use. Pressurized hydrogen can blow up pretty spectacularly, but with a well designed tank that likely would not happen much if at all.
My take is that hydrogen hold promise as part of a new era, but it really isn't there yet. My guess will be biodiesel (same thing that airlines are trying with Jet fuel replacement) will be the transition, even the oil companies are ramping up production. It has the advantage of being carbon neutral, as the CO2 released is not from Carbon sources laid down 160 million years ago, it is cycling CO2 taken out of the air as part of the growing cycle.
@bigkid posted:My take is that hydrogen hold promise as part of a new era, but it really isn't there yet. My guess will be biodiesel (same thing that airlines are trying with Jet fuel replacement) will be the transition, even the oil companies are ramping up production. It has the advantage of being carbon neutral, as the CO2 released is not from Carbon sources laid down 160 million years ago, it is cycling CO2 taken out of the air as part of the growing cycle.
Traditional Fame based biodiesel still has a ton if issues including instability in very short timeframes. The more recent hot topic of HVO which is created via a different process seemingly is a much better option. SOme large engine mfrs have already completed validation testing using HVO as a straight up 1 for 1 replacement for diesel fuel and in general it is acceptable. One of the minor details to keep sight of is the fact that HVO does not contain the same energy per volume. This may seem insignificant however, current engine's are designed around distillate fuel and as such the air and fuel systems are designed to provide max power on that max "flow" of distillate fuel. With HVO being less energy dense, there can be a slight derate from max power when HVO is substituted for straight distillate(diesel).
The same situation actually occures when considering substitution of H2 for Natural gas.
The speed with which H2 production capabilties advance will simply be a function of how much emphasis the govt puts on it.....
Your milage may vary.
The technology is changing all the time. In the airline industry the engine makers and airlines are committing to bio based jet fuel for example and the methodology to achieve this is changing all the time. It is the same way that Lithium based batteries are likely to be replaced with better tech, etc. I am not betting on anything at this point, in theory they could produce oil and gas and jet fuel from Algae, but not sure if that will ever be practical (that would have environmental and world benefits well beyond that, I leave the rest to the imagination).
@bigkid posted:As someone else posted, Hydrogen has good things about it and technical hurdles. One of the biggest problems is that hydrogen is usually created by electrolysis, and that uses a lot of energy (often generated by fossil fuel sources) or they fracture natural gas. In theory it can be created biologically by genetically modified algae, but that is still a lab thing, not been done to scale (nice part? That algae can be grown in waste, that cleans the waste up and produces h2).
Hydrogen by electrolysis is the basis for green hydrogen. The electricity comes from solar, wind, hydro or some other green source. Not much green hydrogen is produced currently. There are a few companies working strenuously to bring green hydrogen to the market place.
Pink hydrogen is produced using nuclear fission as the energy source.
Practically all current hydrogen production is based upon the reaction between natural gas and water. Natural gas is heated to 1000 deg C and is contacted with water gas at 1000 deg C. This reaction CH4 + 2 H2O -> CO2 + 3 H2 is similar to the old water gas reaction between coal and water. This is grey hydrogen if the carbon dioxide is released to the atmosphere and blue hydrogen if the carbon dioxide is sequestered. Currently, there is very little blue hydrogen produced. Most of the hydrogen produced currently is grey hydrogen.
Genetically modified algae produced hydrogen is called gold hydrogen which is still in the experimental stage. Gold hydrogen still produces carbon dioxide which needs to be sequestered.
why does oil and fossil fuels have to practically be the only energy source?
It isn't and hasen't been for 50 plus years. Nuclear is the simple solution. Nuclear at one point made up more than 25% of our energy to grid with Hydroelectric making 12% or more if I remember the old pie charts correctly..... But this thread will go quickly if people can't stay on topic.
Saw a news article that Wabtec introduced the battery-electric locomotive for their mining customer in Western Australia.
The news article has a photo of this Production, FLX-drive locomotive. It looks different from their prototype FLX locomotive that they tested on BNSF, 2 years ago.
For comparison, here are some links to the other diesel-electric, ES44ACi locomotive that GE, Wabtec's predecessor, made for Roy Hill.
https://pilbararailways.com.au...yimage.php?pid=14469
https://www.railpictures.net/photo/661669/
Story behind Pink Evolution locomotive
These are just my opinion,
Naveen Rajan
A friend of mine works for a start up that is developing battery-powered, autonomous trains. Motive power is provided by the individual rail cars, rather than locomotives. Cool idea if it works, although it will make for some boring models. https://moveparallel.com/
There are advantages and disadvantages to both hydrogen and battery-electric locomotives (and other vehicles). Hydrogen and Lithium are highly reactive, and Lithium mining causes a lot of pollution; so does producing Hydrogen. The mechanical efficiency of both Hydrogen Fuel Cell and Battery-Electric vehicles is quite high compared to gas or diesel-powered vehicles. Plus, the vehicles themselves are better for the environment. The cost of buying Hydrogen and/or Battery vehicles is high, but that will change as tech improves and demand for these alternative power sources increases. Another advantage of Hydrogen and Battery-Electric vehicles is less noise, which is good in cities. Finally, electric motors are efficient and easier and faster to maintain than gas engines. Hopefully in the future, railroads in the US and other countries will be able to make Hydrogen and Battery-electric locomotives on a large scale and make the world cleaner. Rail transportation is already one of the most efficient forms of long-distance transportation over the land in the world.
@paigetrain posted:with both progress rail and wabtec proposing designs and already building units of Hydrogen and battery locomotives would you say that the next transition era is already upon us?
are hydrogen locomotives safe in the case of derailments? would a hydrogen locomotive become a hydrogen bomb if in a derailment?
The battery locomotive has been on testing for a while and is proving to be a dud. The hydrogen version is a win win.
An alternative fuel that has been gathering interest is ammonia which is using nitrogen as a carrier for hydrogen.
The reaction is:
4 NH3 + 3 O2 --> 2 N2 + 6 H2O
Thus, the reaction products, nitrogen gas and water, of ammonia are free of carbon. Nitrogen is 78% of Earth's atmosphere. Ammonia is advantageous in that it hydrogen bonds similar to water which makes ammonia easily compressible to a liquid at high temperatures and low pressures. However, care must be taken to avoid the formation and emission of NOx.
Ammonia powered ships are now under construction.
https://www.rivieramm.com/news...%20Holsether%20said.
https://www.fraunhofer.de/en/p...ll-for-shipping.html
Toyota has developed an ammonia internal combustion motor.
Those of you that want to turn this thread into a political discussion need to stop. We have deleted the posts that really don't do the thread any good. AND...those of you that must always get personal in your posts, stop it! Everyone has an opinion so there is no need to belittle someone that may not agree with your opinion.
Get back to discussing the main reason for the topic!
This article came up in my newsfeed yesterday and I thought it was worth sharing. For once a mass media article that was fairly well-informed. I like the fact that an old GP9 has a new lease on life thanks to technology.
https://www.13abc.com/2023/11/...ternative-railroads/
I never pretend to be the expert on this subject. However, I remember when I was in high school and people said the personal computer was a fad for doing schoolwork. Now my youngest who is in high school herself has a school issued laptop that has exponentially more computing power, is about 1/20th of the size, and weighs about 40-60 pounds less. While I wasn't alive, I have lots of old railroad magazines where all the alleged experts said diesel electric locomotives would never replace steam. We have seen how that has worked out. It took about 100 years for the diesel electric to be viable. It's been around 90 years since then.
I never want to downplay the ingenuity and gift for pushing innovation into the mainstream. We often forget that the greatest accomplishments of the human race in any arena started with an idea and someone who thought it was worth pursuing. This younger generation is scary smart even if we don't want to see it and I have faith in the future generations. The is especially true when I look at the accomplishments of my own children and their peers.
Rather than guess where the next technology in locomotive traction will take us, I'll sit back and watch it as it unfolds.
really enjoying the responses so far
it seems that CPKC has built its 3rd hydrogen unit and is helping my local railroad CSX build some as well
@GG1 4877 posted:This article came up in my newsfeed yesterday and I thought it was worth sharing. For once a mass media article that was fairly well-informed. I like the fact that an old GP9 has a new lease on life thanks to technology.
https://www.13abc.com/2023/11/...ternative-railroads/
I never pretend to be the expert on this subject. However, I remember when I was in high school and people said the personal computer was a fad for doing schoolwork. Now my youngest who is in high school herself has a school issued laptop that has exponentially more computing power, is about 1/20th of the size, and weighs about 40-60 pounds less. While I wasn't alive, I have lots of old railroad magazines where all the alleged experts said diesel electric locomotives would never replace steam. We have seen how that has worked out. It took about 100 years for the diesel electric to be viable. It's been around 90 years since then.
I never want to downplay the ingenuity and gift for pushing innovation into the mainstream. We often forget that the greatest accomplishments of the human race in any arena started with an idea and someone who thought it was worth pursuing. This younger generation is scary smart even if we don't want to see it and I have faith in the future generations. The is especially true when I look at the accomplishments of my own children and their peers.
Rather than guess where the next technology in locomotive traction will take us, I'll sit back and watch it as it unfolds.
The With all of this technology Is hydrogen natural gas, methane all can basically run through a diesel locomotive. You have to change a few things but they will run. A battery operated locomotive. We had three of them with the Penn Central. Great around the yard until it got cold. Then they sat, with my father’s transit bus company. We had methane buses produced by General Motors in cooperation with the federal government. It was the same diesel engine. That was an all our other buses, different injectors, different timing, tanks on roof I think the future lies somewhere between methane, hydrogen and natural gas
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