Solid state will always be more efficient than chemical reactions. A battery will always be more efficient than a fuel cell.

Fuel cells will have their place, but not as a major player in motive energy.

ehm, David ... it's carbon nanospheres not carbon nanotubes..

you may accept fuel cells or not, but if you want them to be widespread and cheap you can't rely on platinum

When Roger hears about this we'll never hear the end of it. This is still only in the lab and doesn't solve all the other problems with H2 (distribution, storage, infrastructure etc..) Give me an simple BEV please, I already have electricity coming out of the wall.

There is no present source of hydrogen cheaper than steam reforming of hot coal. The extra high temperature nuclear reactors that may be built ten years from now might be able to chemically separate hydrogen from water in two or three steps and produce hydrogen cheaper than it can be from coal. Using windmill or solar cell electricity to make hydrogen for fuel cells is a waste of about half the energy just to begin with. ZEBRA batteries are a much cheaper and more efficient way to save solar and wind energy for later use. The high voltage, direct-current transmission of energy from wind or solar converters can allow for very long buried or undersea cables with far lower loss and cost than conversion to hydrogen and back again. It is great that there is a new catalyst that is not platinum. Lead chemistry EFFPOWER bipolar batteries along with more standard ones with Firefly technology and perhaps Atraverda materials may be more cost effective than LiIon even with more frequent replacement. A car can have two battery packs or more. One of them is designed to be dropped at a service station and a similar replacement picked up. It may have only 6 KWH or 30 miles of energy in it; It can have more as it is designed for energy not power. As in the Prius, the power battery is permanent. Stored and sold like propane, DME or other fuels would be available for a tiny highly efficient backup engine generator that weighs less than twenty pounds. High performance, but not continuous high performance, will then get you any distance at high efficiency. ..HG..

Roger: What industry do you work in?

I object to the FCV as a way for big oil to keep its claws in us. "... just wait five years and you can have an FCV ... just keep burning gasoline in the mean time ... then we'll spend the billions to provide the infrastructure ... oh by the way we'll have to charge a little extra to recover the cost of all that infrastructure ... just ignore those PHEVs and EVs over there ... you don't really want those anyway ... we'll just buy out a couple of key patents to make sure those horrid things go away ... if your government provides us with enough money we'll figure out all those pesky little problems (like reasonable on-board storage of H2) ... in the mean time just keep burning our gasoline ... please ignore the price at the pump ... peak oil is a myth ... I'm sure the FCV will be ready in another 5 years ... we'll lease out a few because you couldn't actually afford one of these million dollar babies ... in the mean time just keep bidding for our gasoline"

DaveD et al:

This may sound ridiculous but Genepax Co. Ltd (Japan) and Hydrogen Technologies Applications have produced small fuel cells using water and air as fuel. Another research group has produced a mechanical device(membrane) to separate hydrogen from water on a continuous basis.

A 1 Kw Genepax unit installed in your home could produce 24 Kwh/day or just about enough for the average residence.

A similar on-board unit (1000 watt) running continously could supply about 24 KWh a day for a PHEV or BEV, i.e. enough for about 150 Km/day on e-power, if the on-board ESSU can store enough energy. Such vehicle would never have to be plugged in. It would recharge itself within a few hours depending on the size of the on-board water tank and converter/fuel cell.

If low cost hydrogen can ever be produced from water with a small portable unit and the cost of fuel cells can be reduced 10 folds, the world may enetually have a sustainable replacement for liquid fuel ICE + affordable off grid e-power for residential use.

If so (very doubtful), how long would it take before we run out of water?

HarveyD,
I hope you're right and this turns into the next great thing. I read those articles a few weeks ago and was interested as well. There are still too many things unknown for us to judge if it's "real" or not. From this link:
http://www.fuelcelltoday.com/online/news/articles/2008-06/Genepax-unveils-water-energy-fuel-cell

"Genepax unveiled a fuel cell stack with a rated output of 120W and a fuel cell system with a rated output of 300W. The 300W system is an active system, which supplies water and air with a pump" Ok, so what powers this pump? Is it being powered by the energy of the fuel cell itself once the reaction is started with an outside catalyst such as left over charge in the lead acid battery? Even so, this starts to sound like perpetual motion to me.
They gives no details to know what is providing the power to sustain this reaction. It may not be fair to ask for that info yet if they really are real and are protecting some trade secret. Who knows.

Here are a few facts about Genepax's new fuel cell we do know:
Costs - (again from the article above) "In future Genepax intends to provide 1kw-class generation systems for use in electric vehicles and for residential applications. The production cost is presently about ¥2,000,000 (US$18,522), it estimated that it can be reduced to ¥500,000 ($5000) or lower if the company succeeds in mass production."
An average sedan, cruising down the highway, takes about 10kW. So we're talking about $50,000 worth of cost WHEN THEY GET MASS PRODUCTION COSTS!!!
Ok, now let's factor in the cost of the H2 infrastructure and the fact that it won't exist for a long time, if ever.

Early on in these types of announcements and demonstrations, you see people saying these same things about electrolysis and big TV news stories with some poor guy in his garage showing how he can produce hydrogen from water and the average Joe watching gets excited and is now waiting for their new water/hydrogen powered car. Oops, did we forget to do the calculations that show it takes ten times as much energy to do the electrolysis as you could ever get out of putting the resulting hydrogen in your car??? Sorry, forgot that bit of detail.
It's not fair for me to compare these two things really because I don't have enough facts about Genepax yet. The facts we do have don't look good so I'm also skeptical until I see the total story on something like this that covers all the little "gotchas".

I'm still waiting for the miracle ultracapacitor from EESTOR. I don't believe it, but I sure HOPE it's true LOL We'll have to wait and see on both EESTOR and GENEPAX. Maybe one really will provide us with a miracle.

Getting back to you Dave,
This first wicki site starts a comprehensive discussion on the matter.
My understanding is that most people think of H2 as THE fuel required for a fuel cell by definition.

I guess it is correct to say that any catalyst with the ability to output electons would fit my definition as a fuel cell. IE an exhaust gas oxygen sensor on a motor vehicle. In this instance the output is very small in relation to the input -tanks of gasoline but it still qualifies.

H2 fuelcells are quite good converters of energy when well designed I wont quote any figures as we all have a feel for the current efficiency and the theoretical max must be very high.

While many fuel cells use hydrogen rich energy sources inluding air. It is is common practice to reform the fuel to hydrogen. This is because the fuel cell varient described is a Hydrogen fuel cell. The point I made is that Hydrogen is not the only type of fuel cell nthat is described or understood, just the most common and developed.

Hope this is a clear enough explanation.

http//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_cell

http://www.acumentrics.com/products-fuel-cell-home-energy.

htmhttp://www.begellhouse.com/journals/6d18a859536a7b02,340249711d4c8eb3,5bdb8a622319fcda.html

Dave,
I tend to apply your reasoning to the various options, we should believe none of what we hear and only half of what we see. Is about right.
So many claims exaggerate.
I dont mean to make claims, only observations.

Many people feel the same way about battery claims.

There are many traditional prejudice which need to be abandoned when shown to be overtaken or wrong.
Hence the liquid fuel beliefs are hard to shake.
simply they store so much energy.
Note the fuel cells which use formic acid, a pathway step in rerforming (synthesise) DME.
The saying "keep an open mind , just not so open your brains fall out" sums it up for me.

Dave again,
You mention Eestor's ultracap.
I think you mean capattery or a battery wih capacitor built in.
(what got me going was hat you call it a an ultracap - not so)
I made a comment about this on another site after following a link from GCC.
My comment was far from flattering. The point is that there are battery capacitor hybrid in the marketplace and reportedly living up to expectations.
(CSIRO aust have a lead acid version(maybe to hedge patents), I think it may have been Maxwell were building and promoting this concept years ago for small? windmills, so the concept is not new.

Neither is the practice of making claims to patented technology that will make the shareholders rich ,
"Make (ice) hybrids HEV and plug in Hybrid PHEV obsolete " That GM will be the only BEV - battery anything left standing (another distraction) In the style of (likely) senators being conned by everything from perpetual motion wate & air fuel cells.

Too right there are a lot of gullible people around.

Heres a beauty,
In Aus we had one MParliament suggesting to the house that by "Jacking up the east coast we could flow rivers inland to irrigate the inland" This was not so widely reported as , I guess, even the opposition were too embarrased to be in the same profession as this ???.
This sort of stupidity and deceit? is about in spade. Take the Enhanced greenhouse deniers for example. As dangerous as they come (in my opinion)

So while in this eestor example the concept may well work with whatever battery VERSION they propose, the claims that this is a" patentable" concept is likely false, willfully misleading to potential shareholders, and as a distraction is unethical and points to a company that (if you nbelieve that Bs****ers are nothing more than that) one need ask the question , " what am I dealing with here?"
Then, you get on the web blog and call it.

Arnold et al,
First, I would like to apologize: EESTOR is using barium titanate or BST, not barium nitrate. But they are definitely claiming it's an ultracap and there are plenty of comments by the company's CEO where he answers to questions about their "ultracaps" without correcting anyone. Whether it's really an ultracap that gets delivered will only be shown when/if they ever do deliver. But anyway, I should have checked my memory against a source before posting: http://www.ultracapacitors.org/ultracapacitors.org-blog/eestor-eestor-eestor.html

Secondly, I would like to point out that I'm an equal opportunity ranter as well :-) I'll rant at battery based ideas that seem to be folly as well.
For example, I know their heart is in the right place and some of the work they are doing makes sense. But the whole "Project Better Place" seems so wildly impractical that I don't know why somebody isn't saying "the emperor has no clothes".
Let's take a quick glance at the idea of swapping batteries. This would require a huge supply of batteries of every size shape, capacity, voltage, current, etc, etc, etc. Do we really think we're going to get every car maker and battery maker to agree on one size, format, chemistry, voltage level, etc, etc??? Do we really think every car manufacturer is going to design and produce their cars so there is easy access to open and remove a 100-300kg battery? Are we going to somehow retro-fit the equivilent of every gas/petrol station in the world with the mechanical machinery and means to swap these monsters around if we can even agree on a standard for the batteries/cars?

I'll say that their hearts are in the right place, but if you're going to throw hundreds of millions of dollars at a something, at least do it on something that is practical.

neil,
Do not doubt the ease of H2 infrastructure. H2 can be produced, stored and compressed on the spot using electricity from renewable sources, for direct consumption. GE has developed a low-cost yet highly efficient electrolyzer suitable for widespread deployment.

Natural gas or biomethane can also be reformed on the spot to produce H2. The heat of this operation can be use for high-temp electrolysis using wind or solar electricity with electrical efficient of up to 140%, so very little energy will be wasted. H2 can be produced locally in the community where it will be dispensed, thus avoiding the cost of long-distance fuel transportation like petroleum now. No more energy security issue due to disruption of the oil pipeline.

H2 infrastructure will be very cost-effective and very easy to do, and is currently being implemented in many places.

Henry,
Nope, I'm not missing a zero. It blew me away too the first time we talked with them. To be fair, we're still in testing with it, but it actually seems to meet specs so far.

It does have some operating limitations about temp range which they have not overcome yet, but it still leaves us with plenty of places we can market the car with the first generation and wait for them, or someone else, to solve that problem for the total market availability.

The part that has me most excited is that some people are getting close on viable battery tech. They really are and these aren't wild claims, they are batteries that we are testing with right now.

It's almost too good to be true so I'm waiting to see if they can really meet production volume for us at that price, plus it takes a while to verify the life cycle claims in real world conditions (even the best you can do to simulate them). So we have a few months to go before we can claim it's real technically, and then another 6 months to see if they can meet volume commitments. The other thing that makes me hold my breath is that even if this is real, and they can make volume...will they really sign and honor the final contract at that price or is this a bait and switch? I have no reason to think that right now, but life has a way of kicking you in the rear-end if you believe in something that is too good to be true.

Some for now, I'm very cautious, but very optimistic. :-)