Electric Cars or Hydrogen Fueled Vehicles?

Electric Cars or Hydrogen Fueled Cars? As the sustainability perspective spreads around the world with the support of all stakeholders, the decarbonization journey is gaining momentum. While the risk of exhaustion of existing fuel resources one day pushes humanity to seek new resources, the sustainability of these resources and their importance in the carbon neutral maps announced by the countries are in the first place.

Electric Cars or Hydrogen Fueled Cars? Sustainable mobility!

Electric vehicles are causing a major change in the entire automotive sector and sub-industry. With this change, some automotive manufacturers and scientists are divided on this issue.

While the sub-industry and technology requirement provided by the automotive industry in internal combustion engine vehicles completely changes the structure, new markets, new procurement processes and a new ecosystem are formed in the automotive sector.

On the other hand, in the race to decarbonize mobility, hydrogen is emerging as an increasingly promising option for several reasons. There is also an increase in the number of companies investing in this area, with hydrogen-powered mobility offering benefits such as zero exhaust emissions, long range, fast and quiet refueling, resilience to climatic changes, ease of scalability, flexibility to find resources and freedom from the constraints of grid electricity.

The focus here is on hydrogen as the fuel of choice for urban and longer-distance transport, as it combines sustainability with the efficiency required for the best possible user experience.

History of Hydrogen

The history of hydrogen fuel is as old as electric vehicles and dates back to the 18th century.

Hydrogen was discovered to be an energy source in 1839 when William Grove discovered systems that produced hydrogen energy, called hydrogen energy “fuel cells”. Fuel cells were considered one of the greatest discoveries that would make human life easier in the second half of the 1800s. However, with the invention of the petroleum-powered internal combustion engine (1876) and the production of vehicles that moved with oil, this excitement seemed to diminish by Petroleum Lobby.

How do hydrogen fuel cell electric cars work?

Fuel cell electric cars run on the most abundant element of hydrogen in the universe. At its core, the hydrogen in a fuel cell reacts electrochemically to produce electricity to power the vehicle. Fuel cell cars are powered by compressed hydrogen gas, which does not burn the gas, but instead feeds an onboard batch of fuel cells that convert the fuel’s chemical energy into electrical energy. This electricity then powers the car’s electric motors. Exhaust emissions are zero and the only waste produced is pure water.

While the structure of the fuel cell resembles a battery, hydrogen gas is stored in tanks reinforced with carbon fiber to fuel the fuel cell stack. Hydrogen consists of a catalyst and electric motor that promotes separation and the battery that gives the electric motor additional power from regenerative braking. Only water vapor comes out of the exhaust.

Fuel cell vehicles

Features that distinguish hydrogen-fueled vehicles from electric and gasoline fuel vehicles
While hydrogen-fueled vehicles refuel in as fast as 3-5 minutes, 80 percent charge (DC) is reached in an average of 30 minutes in electric vehicles

– Hydrogen-fueled vehicles with higher range (parallel to vehicles with internal combustion engines)

-Due to the ease of refueling, it offers a great advantage for public transportation vehicles and different business models.

Hydrogen fuel cell cars are quiet, highly energy-efficient, produce no emissions, and have range and performance on par with their gasoline counterparts.

Fuel cell vehicles travel about twice as far as a car with a conventional internal combustion engine with the equivalent amount of fuel while carrying enough hydrogen fuel

Fuel cell vehicles serve to take sustainable steps while reducing countries’ dependence on oil.

Sustainability with hydrogen and electric vehicles

Hydrogen-powered fuel cells are a 100 percent renewable, environmentally friendly energy system and evergreen offering a solution to the much-discussed problem of recycling lithium-ion batteries used in electric vehicles

Hydrogen vehicles, with their emission of pure water vapor, are also seen as the future of environmentally friendly mobility. At this stage, while electric vehicles are seen as a stepping stone in the automotive sector, as hydrogen production and distribution progresses, we will be able to see more clearly that hydrogen fuel cell vehicles will replace electric vehicles in the future for more green world.