Alternative Energy Vehicles

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Honda claims it is the first company to have a hydrogen car certified for regular commercial use by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Hydrogen cars are not going to be widely driven anytime soon as Honda estimates it will lease only 200 FCX Clarity vehicles over the next three years.

Hydrogen as a Fuel - should we even go there!

There is considerable debate as to whether hydrogen is truly energy efficient when the entire food chain is taken into consideration. Present mass production methods require a large input of electricity to separate hydrogen from water or methane. Hydrogen must then be compressed, transported and stored, before it is used in a vehicle. At best, this is just a replacement for a battery - and the Honda Clarity still requires a battery for the storage of the electricity it produces (though not as large a pure electric vehicle).

My personal opinion is that we should skip hydrogen powered passenger vehicles all together. Maybe hydrogen will have a place in the future, within commodity transportation (trucking). Time will tell.

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Water Powered Vehicles - see editor's comments at end of article

Genepax unveiled a car in Osaka on June 12, 2008, saying that a liter (2.1 pints) of any kind of water — rain, river or sea — was all you needed to get the engine going for about an hour at a speed of 80 km (50 miles). “The car will continue to run as long as you have a bottle of water to top up from time to time,” Genepax CEO Kiyoshi Hirasawa told local broadcaster TV Tokyo. “It does not require you to build up an infrastructure to recharge your batteries, which is usually the case for most electric cars,” he added. 

Once the water is poured into the tank at the back of the car, the a generator breaks it down and uses it to create electrical power, TV Tokyo said. Whether the car makes it into showrooms remains to be seen. Genepax said it had just applied for a patent and is hoping to collaborate with Japanese auto manufacturers in the future. Most big automakers, meanwhile, are working on fuel-cell cars that run on hydrogen and emit — not consume — water. (Writing by Chika Osaka, editing by Miral Fahmy and Chang-Ran Kim)

Editor’s Comment:

Sounds a bit on the “to good to be true” side. Seems to me that you require energy input, in order to separate hydrogen and oxygen from water. Will watch this one to see what develops, but there's been no proof to date!

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Propane Powered Vehicles

During the run-up in oil prices of the 1970's, propane powered fleet vehicles became popular. Then the price per barrel of oil dropped and so did the use of propane.

Yes, propane is a fossil fuel. Thus it's not renewable and it does contribute to greenhouse gases and air pollution (smog). On the positive side however, it burns much cleaner than gasoline or diesel and is more efficient. According to Richard Ivey School of Business professor Gerry Higgins, propane burns 30 percent cleaner than gasoline and produces 26 percent fewer greenhouse gases.

On the down side, propane conversion kits are quite expensive ($5,000) and the fuel is not appropriate for heavy trucks. Thus, propane is best suited for small, light-duty fleets, such as taxis, police vehicles, and utility fleets (gas, water, phone, cable).

Given the pros and cons of propane, it can only be considered as an interim step. Worth the conversion for high usage, light-duty fleets due to the increase in mileage and drop in pollution. However, it's still a fossil fuel and thus still part of the problem, not the solution.