This is a new thread/forum about electric boats.
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I have a question and I don’t offer it to be a smart ass. I’m not immune to being a smart ass but I suspect this EV move may fairly soon be nothing more than a fad.
I think it’s assumed that spending one’s money on a boat (or experimental boat) that is electric powered w a motor driven by lithium batteries will be a smart and objective move.
I hear some but less than lots of talk about hydrogen power. Does that include motors? How does hydrogen provide power?
Will hydrogen power take over as a power source in the near future?
Is there anyone here that is on top of the hydrogen power development?
While I like the concept of my Trinka 10' dinghy with its Epropulsion outboard and 20 to 25 mile range, I think that is likely about as close as I will get to an electric boat because of my cruising style. Now if I was more likely to cruise from dock to dock (with shore power), I wonder what the feasibility of a cruising boat that you would recharge every night (like an electric forklift) would be. Nothing wrong with capturing some solar power, but I think the market's going to need a 6 or 7 knot cruise with a 40 or 50 mile range to interest cruisers.
Ted
As much as internal combustion power is a fad, yes.I have a question and I don’t offer it to be a smart ass. I’m not immune to being a smart ass but I suspect this EV move may fairly soon be nothing more than a fad.
I think it’s assumed that spending one’s money on a boat (or experimental boat) that is electric powered w a motor driven by lithium batteries will be a smart and objective move.
I hear some but less than lots of talk about hydrogen power. Does that include motors? How does hydrogen provide power?
Will hydrogen power take over as a power source in the near future?
Is there anyone here that is on top of the hydrogen power development?
As much as internal combustion power is a fad, yes.
Steam was the motive power of choice until internal combustion took over.
IC had many detractors until there were robust power plants and fuel
supplies. It was a new concept that had many negatives the steam didn't.
Couldn't use coal, etc. The new fuels were toxic, expensive and technically
harder to create.
That 'fad' had most of the kinks worked out now as steam had before it.
Electric motive power is already practical for many situations and will only
become more so. Hydrogen still has a long way to go as a widespread fuel
for electric fuel cells but at least it is the most abundant element.
Is Carvanna a fad? Re the industry a lot of money is lost at the dealership. I’ve purchased very few new cars but it was nice to be able to return to base even just to ask a question. Perhaps dealerships have been a luxury we just can’t afford anymore?
Regarding Carvana and dealerships, I never thought they were a luxury, more like a necessary evil. They add cost to the purchase. With today's technology, not sure why they are needed. Most everything else is purchased without going through a salesperson. As far as I know, Tesla has no dealerships. I wouldn't miss them if they disappear, along with real estate agents.
I sold and bought my most recent car through Carvana and thought it was a great experience. They gave me a better than expected trade-in and I ended up with a better used car than any I could find locally though dealerships or private. They showed up at my house, unloaded my car, and loaded up my old one. They handle all the paperwork. Good warranty and protection if you don't like it. Clean Carfax and all maintenance records. No pressure or salesperson to deal with. What's not to love?
What I mean by H being the most abundant element is that it makes up"but at least it (hydrogen) is the most abundant element"
It is the most abundant element but only because it is combined with oxygen to make water and water is the most common molecule on our planet. There is essentially no free elemental hydrogen in nature to be mined. It all has to be created by man. How?
Hydrogen is used extensively in petrochemical production, but it is made by partially burning natural gas to separate the carbon from the hydrogen atoms. Half of the energy is destroyed in making elemental hydrogen. And guess where the carbon that is separated goes- into the atmosphere as CO2. So much for green.
The only way to make green hydrogen is to use electric power from a green source such as wind, solar, hydroelectric and use an electrolytic process to separate the hydrogen from the oxygen in water. Then it has to be compressed to store and transport and that takes energy.
Compressed hydrogen will see very little use because it is expensive and requires high pressure tanks to store which are bulky. I don't think you will ever see it in cars or boats. At best it might be used as a short-term way to store energy from a solar farm and convert it back to electricity to use at night. And the only way to do that reasonably efficiently is with fuel cells. Burning it in an IC engine/turbine to run a generator is only 30-40% efficient.
So hydrogen is not a source of energy, it is a way to store energy.
David
Couldn't imagine buying a vehicle (new or used) without test driving comparable models by different manufacturers to figure out exactly what I wanted. But then I tend to own vehicles longer than most people. I've had 3 vehicles since 1980.
Ted
This has been my goal, and I think it can be achieved with sufficient battery. Power density advancements are coming soon. In the meantime, for trawler-sized boats (~40'), it's about 1 kWh/nm at 5 kts. So two Tesla Model 3 battery packs (salvage) at 80 kWh of usable power would get you sixteen hours of 5 kt cruising (80 nm). This, of course, doesn't account for house power or solar inputs.A 8-9 knot cruise speed plus >100 mile range would start getting my attention.
That's the insolation at Earth's orbit (e.g. what gets to something in space at the distance from the sun that the Earth is). The average insolation on the Earth's surface at MSL is about 700 W/sq m. Solar panel efficiencies are currently (see what I did there? ) at about 22%, so 154 W/sq m. Daily production, from what I hear, is about 4x the wattage in Wh, so ~600 Wh/sq m.The laws of physics are very strict. The intensity of sunlight striking the Earth is about 1.4 kW/sq meter.
The dream of a pure solar powered boat (or car, or plane) is alluring, but very difficult to achieve in a practical sense. There just isn't enough sunlight falling on the surface area of a vehicle to enable a practical design that could be exclusively powered that way. Compromises are needed (like the Solar Sal Devlin designs).
Compressed hydrogen will see very little use because it is expensive and requires high pressure tanks to store which are bulky. I don't think you will ever see it in cars or boats.
I think when pontiffs talk recently about hydrogen as a fuel, they are referring to recent developments to create a controlled fusion reaction, aka the the same principle as a hydrogen bomb. Solving the problem of controlled fusion would solve a lot of problems.
"but at least it (hydrogen) is the most abundant element"
So hydrogen is not a source of energy, it is a way to store energy.
David
Thanks for informative post Nick and I agree with most of what you say. Some would argue that forest fires are not the result of climate change. That aside, the problem I have is that in the US, we angst over this issue a lot, but don't acknowledge it's a global problem. The US is very clean in producing fuel and electricity, but much of the world is not. Furthermore, our attack on fossil fuels does not take a global view. For instance, rather than producing fuel in a clean manner in the US, we'd prefer to buy from other coutries that are not nearly as clean. Rather than move oil through a pipeline very cleanly and efficiently, we'd rather move it by boat, truck, or rail. Much of the fuel produced in the world, is spent by transporting that fuel. I'm not arguing against addressing climate change, I just wish we could do it in a non-political and global manner.
I think when pontiffs talk recently about hydrogen as a fuel, they are referring to recent developments to create a controlled fusion reaction, aka the the same principle as a hydrogen bomb. Solving the problem of controlled fusion would solve a lot of problems.