ColdFusion - World's First Hydrogen-Powered Ship Undertakes Six Year Voyage

Starting point is 00:00:00 You are watching Cold Fusion TV. Hi, welcome to another Cold Fusion video. If you've been following technology advancements in recent years, you've probably noticed a trend towards new energy sources for transportation. Obviously, electric cars are the most prevalent, but production electric planes and hybrid fixed-wing aircraft also exist. But what about ships? Today, what you're going to see is not an electric ship,

Starting point is 00:00:32 but a ship powered by the simplest and lightest element known to man, hydrogen. That's right, a hydrogen-powered ship, and it's called the Energy Observer. Before we get into that, I just quickly want to thank today's sponsor. This video was brought to you by Audible. While you guys in the Northern Hemisphere, enjoy the warmer weather, whether it be being outdoors at the beach or road-tripping, why not make the most of the summer by consuming content at the same time? Audible is a great way to do that, with an unmatched range of books in every topic, including science and technology. For a limited time, Amazon Prime members get three months of

Starting point is 00:01:03 Audible for the price of one, but you might want to get on it quickly because this offer ends July 31st. Use my link www.audible.com slash cold fusion or text Coldfusion to 500,500 to get a free book and a 30-day trial. And again, Amazon Prime members who sign up in July get three months for the price of one. Thanks, so on to the video. Okay, so what's this all about? The Energy Observer Ship is a French project that will use solar panels, wind turbines and a hydrogen fuel cell system to power itself. The voyage of the ship is set to last six years. It will navigate 50 countries and stop in 101 ports.

Starting point is 00:01:40 A team of over 30 people, including architects, designers and engineers, work to prepare the ship for its six-year voyage. The crew aims to reach Tokyo in 2020 in time for the Olympic Games. In charge is Victorian Erizard, an offshore racer and merchant naval officer. And alongside him is Jerome Delafos, a professional driver and producer. of wildlife documentaries. The French team has partnered with Toyota, which have some hydrogen technology of their own,

Starting point is 00:02:07 but we'll get to that shortly. So how does this hydrogen ship work? Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe, and at first glance, that sounds great. Why aren't we just using hydrogen for fuel all the time? Well, there's a problem. All the hydrogen that we can find is tied to other

Starting point is 00:02:25 atoms, for example, oxygen, which makes H2O or water. The thing is, it takes energy to split these atoms apart, get pure hydrogen. The cool thing about energy observer is that it creates hydrogen on board by first demineralizing sea water, so that is, removing the salt and all the ions, and then the oxygen and hydrogen are separated through electrolysis. This means that they literally create hydrogen from the ocean and there's never a need to refuel. So earlier, I stated that it

Starting point is 00:02:52 takes energy to actually separate hydrogen from other atoms, and this is no different. The electrolysis process, or the separation of the hydrogen, is powered by 130 square meters of solar panel, and two wind turbines, which can produce a peak energy of 23 kilowatts. Okay, so once you have hydrogen separated, there's still another problem. Hydrogen is a gas that occupies a large volume under normal pressure conditions. Because of this, the gas needs to be compressed in order to be transported effectively. This compression also requires energy. Once again, this problem is solved by the renewable energy sources on board.

Starting point is 00:03:27 The hydrogen is compressed from 350 to 700 times atmospheric pressure. Then it's stored on onboard tanks ready to be used. The stored hydrogen is then used in a fuel cell where it's mixed with oxygen. The reaction causes electrons to flow, resulting in a current which is used to power the 241 kilowatt electric motors on board. Combined, the fuel cell and other renewable sources on board can produce up to 45 kilowatts, but in support is a lithium iron battery which can produce 106 kilowatt hours and can be charged by the panels, wind or fuel cell. It's essentially a self-sustaining ship and the only pollution it leaves behind is pure water. And I think that's pretty cool.

Starting point is 00:04:07 The Energy Observer is about 30 metres long and 13 metres wide and weighs about 28 metric tons. That might sound heavy but it has a considerable weight advantage over an electric ship that's powered by pure batteries alone. So some notes on hydrogen. Why did they choose hydrogen? Well essentially it was to prove a point. Here's a quote by Delophos. Quote, when we are overproducing energy, like when we have a lot of wind and sun, the idea is not to waste this energy and to just keep it on board.

Starting point is 00:04:36 Hydrogen is the best way to do this because it's very light and the efficiency of hydrogen is three times more than just fuel. End quote. Toyota is already using hydrogen to help power their vehicles on land. This includes cars like the Toyota Marai as well as buses, trucks and forklifts. But Toyota aren't the only ones looking at this technology. Hyundai have prototype cars and Mercedes just revealed a sprinter van prototype, which uses a hydrogen fuel cell.

Starting point is 00:05:00 The main problem with these vehicles is that there's no infrastructure to fill them up easily just yet. So what about safety? After all, you've probably all seen what happened to the Hindenburg. Well, it turns out hydrogen being used in this way is actually pretty safe. Because hydrogen is so light and is pressurized in this situation, when there's a rupture in a hydrogen storage tank, the gas simply just rushes out and reverse back to atmospheric pressure so quickly

Starting point is 00:05:23 that it doesn't really have a chance to ignite. To prove this point, Toyota shot their high-outherionage hydrogen fuel tanks directly with bullets on many occasions and the system never ignited. So why do all of this at all? Toyota spokesperson Mike Harrison explains in regards to the energy observer ship. Quote, this project once again demonstrates the practical uses of hydrogen that can be developed as we transition towards a hydrogen society. End quote. So basically it's a proof of concept to show that hydrogen transport is now becoming viable. The French researchers also stated that the same techniques to separate hydrogen can be used on land.

Starting point is 00:06:00 This whole thing reminds me a bit of the solar impulse project from a couple of years back. This is where a Swiss team of scientists and engineers built a completely solar-powered plane that successfully flew around the world. As a side note, I think it's cool that solar panel efficiency is just getting to the stage to make this kind of thing possible, both for solar impulse and for the energy observer. In conclusion, I think it's encouraging to see such research into alternative transport coming from all sides. It seems quite sudden after being stuck with the status quo for about a century. Anyway, that just about rounds up the video.

Starting point is 00:06:34 Thanks for watching. This has been Degogo. You've been watching Cole Fusion. Feel free to subscribe to this channel if you've just stumbled across it. And I'll catch you again soon for the next video. Cheers, guys. Have a good one.

ColdFusion - World's First Hydrogen-Powered Ship Undertakes Six Year Voyage

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