Burst My (Hydrogen) Bubble!
It's downright inspiring just how many great and meaningfully different ideas are being developed around market production of hydrogen-powered cars. I want one now! How can we work to make this technology relevant to more than environmentalists and early adopters? How do we generate demand for hydrogen vehicles?
Alan Alda, always delightful, recently hosted a Scientific American Frontiers special on PBS that focused on the myriad approaches that the manufacturers we care about (read: GM and Daimler Chrysler) are taking to make hydrogen-powered vehicles a reality. Though the Mercedes solution -- a low-powered A-Class with a 150Km range -- was economical, efficient, and handled well, it really falls well short of "revolutionary." Not so compelling. However, the boys at GM have taken a significant step in another direction. Rather than trying to retrofit a current production model with a hydrogen fuel cell, they've redesigned a car based on the structural contraints (or lack of same) of the fuel cell. Because current approaches to hydrogen fuel cell design consist of long, flat, chassis-shaped wheelbeds, it's entirely possible (so say the say so's at GM) to build a mass-production version of the chassis. On top of that fuel-cell chassis, you can place most any locally-designed car body, and this approach can actually control the wheels using "drive by wire" technology, rather than mechanical controls linking steering control to wheel movement. You MUST read about it here:
http://www.autointell.com/nao_companies/general_motors/gm-autonomy/gm-autonomy-02.htm
Alan (or someone on SAF's editorial staff) clearly has a yen for driving. The upcoming web companion piece for the show dedicated to safer (thinking) cars contians a number of useful links:
http://www.pbs.org/saf/1502/resources/resources-1.htm
When they post this episode on the web, you've got to watch it...if for no other reason than to see the scene where Alan and a GM engineer are crouched behind an internal combustion, hydrogen-powered, hydrid vehicle sniffing the vehicle's moist effluent. Alan says, "This is wonderful! It smells like...clean lanudry or something!" "Yeah, I suppose...," says the engineeer. Alda interjects, "..you know, I bet people are going to really get into sniffing one anothers' tailpipes in the future."
Alan Alda, always delightful, recently hosted a Scientific American Frontiers special on PBS that focused on the myriad approaches that the manufacturers we care about (read: GM and Daimler Chrysler) are taking to make hydrogen-powered vehicles a reality. Though the Mercedes solution -- a low-powered A-Class with a 150Km range -- was economical, efficient, and handled well, it really falls well short of "revolutionary." Not so compelling. However, the boys at GM have taken a significant step in another direction. Rather than trying to retrofit a current production model with a hydrogen fuel cell, they've redesigned a car based on the structural contraints (or lack of same) of the fuel cell. Because current approaches to hydrogen fuel cell design consist of long, flat, chassis-shaped wheelbeds, it's entirely possible (so say the say so's at GM) to build a mass-production version of the chassis. On top of that fuel-cell chassis, you can place most any locally-designed car body, and this approach can actually control the wheels using "drive by wire" technology, rather than mechanical controls linking steering control to wheel movement. You MUST read about it here:
http://www.autointell.com/nao_companies/general_motors/gm-autonomy/gm-autonomy-02.htm
Alan (or someone on SAF's editorial staff) clearly has a yen for driving. The upcoming web companion piece for the show dedicated to safer (thinking) cars contians a number of useful links:
http://www.pbs.org/saf/1502/resources/resources-1.htm
When they post this episode on the web, you've got to watch it...if for no other reason than to see the scene where Alan and a GM engineer are crouched behind an internal combustion, hydrogen-powered, hydrid vehicle sniffing the vehicle's moist effluent. Alan says, "This is wonderful! It smells like...clean lanudry or something!" "Yeah, I suppose...," says the engineeer. Alda interjects, "..you know, I bet people are going to really get into sniffing one anothers' tailpipes in the future."
posted by Matty at 1:39 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home