Originally published January 6 2006
Automotive company receives grant to work on hydrogen fuel cell-powered vehicle
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
OSCar Automotive has been awarded a grant from the BOC Foundation to continue its work on a two-seater vehicle, tentatively called the Hyrban concept car, that will run off of a hydrogen fuel cell
The grant will help fund the two year Hyrban project which aims to prove that practical hydrogen fuel cell urban vehicles are readily engineered using existing fuel cell technology.
This allows the vehicle to have the acceleration of a Smart Car, despite the fuel cell only having an output of around 6kW (less power than that required to run 4 electric kettles) and the energy consumption of a moped.
Hugo Spowers, managing director of OSCar commented: "We are very pleased that the BOC Foundation is supporting this work which promises to overcome the main barriers to the commercialisation of fuel cell powered cars.
Said Spowers: "A sophisticated hybrid powertrain will require a fuel cell of less than one quarter of the power required conventionally - and thus one quarter the cost.
The powertrain of a vehicle consists of all the components that convert the fuel's energy into vehicle motion, from the primary energy device - internal combustion engine or fuel cell - through to the wheels.
The former, such as the Toyota Prius, consists of two linear powertrains in parallel, whereby the wheels may be driven either by a conventional powertrain or by an electric motor driving through the same shafts.
The car's fuel cell system operates by electrochemically combining on-board hydrogen with oxygen taken from the air outside.
Although in most respects fuel cells are more like engines than batteries, to the extent that they generate energy from fuel in a tank rather than store energy, like batteries, they use electrodes (solid electrical conductors) with an electrolyte (an electrically conductive medium) and release electricity.
Hydrogen fuel cell cars are often held up as the solution to our transport emissions, but inefficient fuel cell cars will not solve this problem.
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