January 14, 2004
A hydrogen powered plane
This is pretty neat. They have built a hydrogen-powered fuel-cell electric airplane. This should be an interesting project. They have not yet flown, as can be seen from the quote below.
The E-Plane team hopes to start taxi testing in January. As it stands the Prop Adapter and Wiring are the only things left to complete. Our team is on holiday though we were at the Centennial of Flight Celebration at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina the week of the 17th of December. We are hoping to demonstrate the E-Plane at Sun 'n Fun (Lakeland, Florida) along with a replica Wright B Flyer in 2004!
I think that this is a really cool project, but I have to ask the same question as I ask every environmentalist who waxes poetic about a hydrogen-based economy: Where does the hydrogen come from? Either you are cracking hydrocarbons (read: Oil) or you are electrolizing it using electricity that comes from ... where? Most likely nuclear power. That usually isn't the answer they have, but without a cheap way to separate hydrogen from water, it is unlikely to ever get out of the lab.
Posted by elkaim at January 14, 2004 07:38 PMActually the Hydrogen for the plane and all other vehicles in a hydrogen economy will come from electricity generation via electrolysis. The fact that most comes from fossil fuels now pays no attention to the fact that oil is on the way out (Hubbard effect) and sustainable energy is almost infinite and within 50 years we will have that. That's the solution.
Posted by: Mark Cox at March 22, 2004 03:00 PM