Fountaine Pajot to build hydrogen powered yachts

[Rohan]

https://www.superyachttimes.com/yach...gen-catamarans

Fountaine Pajot has launched the first project of its strategic development plan, entitled Odyssea 2024, aimed at finding energy solutions for its sailing catamarans. They have chosen to incorporate EODev’s hydrogen generator, REXH2[emoji2400]. It is their aim to combine the power supply of their 59-foot sailing catamaran,*Samana*59’, with the hydrogen power generator, which has been developed around Toyota’s Fuel Cell. This technology will be integrated in La Rochelle, ideally located near the Fountaine Pajot shipyard. The first hydrogen powered*Samana 59'*with fuel cell technology, will be launched at the beginning of 2022.

[harlem24]

Interessting idea, but I think I would go for methanol and not H2.
Having high-pressure tanks on a boat is not something I would like to have...
And there is the part with resupplying H2. It's likely not like the H2 Cat that is travelling the world atm producing it's own H2...

[Ifitsworthdoing]

FWIW, there is already a commercially available H2 fuel cell - BOC's Hymera with a design output of 175W (admittedly a bit meagre); its supply comes from Linde's new Genie cylinder which works with a higher fill pressure than conventional gas cylinders (300bar versus 200bar). One Genie cylinder is good for up to 7kW. Might be the beginning of onboard hydrogen based power generation for eco conscious boaters ...

[44'cruisingcat]

Eco friendly? Kinda. Most hydrogen you can buy comes from fossil fuels. Some is also produced by electrolysis, often using electricity generated by burning fossil fuels. Compressing hydrogen to 2-300 bar is very energy intensive.

While burning hydrogen is "clean", producing water vapour exhaust, water vapour is actually the most effective greehouse gas of all....

[Factor]

Hydrogen power you say. Excellent, cause at the weights they are they certainly ain't wind powered

[Barra]

The most eco friendly boat is one that is already built.

The second most eco friendly boat is a new build that sails well and doesn't need the auxiliary except for some maneuvering.

This project seems eco friendly in name only but hey it's all about virtue signalling anyway right.

[bstreep]

There are 2 critical problems with hydrogen, and they both revolve around storage: You can't compress it to a liquid, making it hard to compress, and it leaks out of EVERYTHING. It's so small, it will leak out of a steel tank. And most "regular" hoses and fittings.

[dfelsent]

Originally Posted by 44'cruisingcat

Eco friendly? Kinda. Most hydrogen you can buy comes from fossil fuels. Some is also produced by electrolysis, often using electricity generated by burning fossil fuels. Compressing hydrogen to 2-300 bar is very energy intensive.

While burning hydrogen is "clean", producing water vapour exhaust, water vapour is actually the most effective greehouse gas of all....

Water vapor in the atmosphere is a contributor to warming, but it is self limiting as it precipitates out at a certain concentration. We call this “rain.”

Yes the source of the hydrogen does matter.
If it is produced by electrolysis the core feed stock is called “water.”

The “rain” is a form of “water.”

[bstreep]

Originally Posted by dfelsent

Water vapor in the atmosphere is a contributor to warming, but it is self limiting as it precipitates out at a certain concentration.

Not quite. That's a simplistic answer. Only locally is it self limiting. The "self limiting" part is based upon a whole lot of other factors. Including temperature.


You appeared to be a bit dismissive. This is why I try and stay out of these kind of conversations. They quickly become polarizing.

[Pitchondesign]

My marina doesn't carry hydrogen. Any idea how to get some to the boat?

[harlem24]

Not yet. If ever.

[danstanford]

I have always thought hydrogen was the ultimate battery when combined with a fuel cell. It can store power from wind, solar, or being plugged in with water as a fuel stock and then use the fuel cell to recover the power when you need it.
Clearly I don't understand the other elements like high pressure storage to minimize the size of the storage medium and how that would be handled but conceptually it seems to check a lot of boxes to me. Certainly the concept of re-charging conventional batteries considering the environtmental implications of making and then recycling them has always seemed a bit backward. Having a windmill madly making power at times we don't need it and basically having no way to store that power is also a backwards idea in some respects.

[Orin]

Originally Posted by Ifitsworthdoing

FWIW, there is already a commercially available H2 fuel cell - BOC's Hymera with a design output of 175W (admittedly a bit meagre); its supply comes from Linde's new Genie cylinder which works with a higher fill pressure than conventional gas cylinders (300bar versus 200bar). One Genie cylinder is good for up to 7kW. Might be the beginning of onboard hydrogen based power generation for eco conscious boaters ...

7kw. It certainly is when you are talking about non-heating and non-propulsion loans. You could run your boats electrics all day even with an electric range. The problem is that’s still less than a gallon of diesel. People normally want enough to run their engine full bore two days straight on board.

How large are those bottles?

[44'cruisingcat]

Originally Posted by danstanford

I have always thought hydrogen was the ultimate battery when combined with a fuel cell. It can store power from wind, solar, or being plugged in with water as a fuel stock and then use the fuel cell to recover the power when you need it.
Clearly I don't understand the other elements like high pressure storage to minimize the size of the storage medium and how that would be handled but conceptually it seems to check a lot of boxes to me. Certainly the concept of re-charging conventional batteries considering the environtmental implications of making and then recycling them has always seemed a bit backward. Having a windmill madly making power at times we don't need it and basically having no way to store that power is also a backwards idea in some respects.

Storing hydrogen is the problem. In practical terms it's not condensible (you need cryogenic temperatures as well as high pressure), so needs to be stored as high pressure gas.

Compressing it to those pressures uses a lot of energy.

Obviously the storage tanks need to be heavily constructed. Hydrogen tends to embrittle some metals too.

Hydrogen molecules are the smallest, so it's very difficult to prevent leaks 100%, especially when dealing with such high pressure.

Hydrogen is extremely flammable. It will burn in the widest range of concentrations of any substance. So any leaks could be catastrophic.

To be honest, using hydrogen or hybrid electric systems in boats to be "greener" is in my opinion virtue signalling.

Manufacturers, if they really wanted to be greener could look more closely at their manufacturing methods and materials. And they could look at building boats that can sail more efficiently and motor less.

[BillKny]

And another problem the folks promoting these pie in the sky projects ignore...

Burning Diesel generates 45.5 Mega Joules per kilogram. Diesel weighs 0.85 kg/litre. So the energy density is about 39 MJ/litre

Burning hydrogen generates about 130 Mega Joules per kilogram. Stored at 300 bar (4300 psi!) hydrogen has a density of just 0.02 kg/litre. So the energy density is 2.6 MJ/litre.

In other words, to store the same amount of energy onboard, you will need fuel tanks that are 15 times bigger than you would with diesel....

Think about that for a second.... picture your diesel fuel tank, now imagine 15 of those tanks. Where are you going to put them???? And it is far worse than that! Because of the enormously high pressures involved, the hydrogen tanks will take up far more room, and will be far more dangerous.

This is just plain stupid. But there are lots of stupid people out there who will be suckered along because it is "green" and they don't know how to evaluate the issues involved.