liquid solid and vapor are the (critical) properties of water. supercritical implies another property?

From my limited reading and knowledge of what it takes to ship hydrogen, it sounds like it would be a challenge to ship in tankers. Sounds like leaking is a very real problem. Apparently hydrogen has an embrittling effect on steel and aluminum over time. At present, these are the main materials we use to make shipping containers.
Does anyone else have knowledge about the pros and cons of shipping tankers of hydrogen araound the world? The first thought that came to my mind was the term "hydrogen bomb."
Daniel

Does Graf von Zeppelin's creation the "Hindenburg" 1937 adventure in Lakehurst, NJ ring a bell?

How about that radio announcer: "Oh the humanity!"

Hans,

You have it wrong. the Hindenberg blew because it was filled with Helium rather than the Hydrogen which is a stable gas. Sorry to get the facts in the way of your dis to the matriarchy known as Iceland.

if they are successful, they deserve gigantic kudos.

It will mean the hydrogen powered vehicles being developed in Vancouver may find an affordable and abundant fuel source. It is the cost of produceing hydrogen that has been the weak link in this chain to future polution free cars.

Kelly: in short, a supercritical fluid is a phase similar to gas AND liquid that happens at a given (high) temperature and pressure. When it's supercritical, there's no distinct phase change between gas and liquid.

Duke: you've got it backwards. Also, if hydrogen was inert it would be useless for storing energy.

As for the pros and cons of hydrogen - it's simple to get provided you have an energy source, and it burns cleanly, but it has a low energy density, so you'd have to refuel often. As I understand it ethanol is a better option (but not quite there yet). However if you've got an energy source like geothermal I suppose hydrogen might be the best option.

"A supercritical fluid is any substance at a temperature and pressure above its thermodynamic critical point. It has the unique ability to diffuse through solids like a gas, and dissolve materials like a liquid. Additionally, it can readily change in density upon minor changes in temperature or pressure. Carbon dioxide and water are the most commonly used supercritical fluids."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supercritical_fluid

"The phase boundary between liquid and gas does not continue indefinitely. Instead, it terminates at a point on the phase diagram called the critical point. This reflects the fact that, at extremely high temperatures and pressures, the liquid and gaseous phases become indistinguishable. In water, the critical point occurs at around 647 K (374 °C or 705 °F) and 22.064 MPa (3200 PSIA or 218atm).

"In equilibrium systems the critical point is reached only by tuning a control parameter precisely. However, in some non-equilibrium systems the critical point is an attractor of the dynamics in a manner that is robust with respect to system parameters, a phenomenon referred to as self-organized criticality."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_point_%28chemistry%29

The reason this is interesting is that hydrothermal core taps, which is what they're working on in Iceland, are, after hydrocarbons, one of the three most promising alternative energy sources at this time, the others being pebble-bed reactors and coal.

What I find interesting about Kate's referenced article is that as I understand it one of the biggest remaining problems with the hydrothermal core taps is preventing the bottom of the hole from collapsing under the tremendous pressures involved. Last I heard, some people were looking in to some sort of ceramic nanotechnology or something, sort of like a very hard sponge.

And the article says, "Later this year, they will put a pressure lining into their borehole." That's what I'd like to know more about at this point.

(Sorry to go on about this, I've been working on thermodynamic phase calculation software for the last year so it happens to be on my mind.)

(Oh and, Duke, helium is a noble element, it doesn't react with much. Hydrogen, on the other hand, especially when mixed with two parts molar oxygen, is spectularly inflammible. Hans was correct, although this has little to do with the hydrogen transportation techniques that are being considered for use these days.)

As to the Hindenburgdid exploding rather it burnt very rapidily. The fuel for this fire was the incredibly flammable dope or paint on the big Zep's skin.
Or at least that's the current theory .
I personally do'nt see the "hydrogen economy" happening unless several world govt.s are willing to bankrupt themselves. And even then I do'nt think any either sane or with an engineering background will want anything to do with it!

definitely a geek probably does math 'n stuff

Duke:

Rubbish, Helium is one of the Noble Gases and is stable. Hydrogen is the one that is unstable.

Won't let you near the chemistry set.

The six noble gases are found in group 18 of the periodic table. These elements were considered to be inert gases until the 1960's, because their oxidation number of 0 prevents the noble gases from forming compounds readily. All noble gases have the maximum number of electrons possible in their outer shell (2 for Helium, 8 for all others), making them stable.

Helium
Neon
Argon
Krypton
Xenon
Radon

Duke you must nicht mit de gefinger poken in das blinken lights!! Else you vill scrape ze contents of reaction off ze ceiling YA?!

Gordon:

As I understand it, the Nazi regime could no longer buy helium from the west so they substituted hydrogen as another "lighter than air" gas.

Obviously, Hydrogen when mixed with a flame makes for a highly reactive fuel source with the doped skin of the Hindenburg as the catalyst.

The "Hindenburg" serves as a reminder of containment in the presence of open flame and a precursor symbol of what happened to the country it hailed from, namely pre-war Germany.

Geothermal- Promising Power, or dead-end dillema?

The end of oil is a bunch of garbage.
No, really. And it works. It would also be the end of the garbage crisis that looms over most major cities. Anything at all can be turned into oil.
A very interesting read http://www.perc.org/perc.php?id=290

So, the output of hot gas and hot water from this thing should bring the wattage up from 5MW to 50MW.

Couldn't Canada do the same thing by poking holes into Reg Alcock's and Ralph Goodale's egos?

The Reykjavík Grapevine, Issue 3 2006

The Body Publick.

All About Eve.

More:

(Warning: May offend.)

http://www.grapevine.is/content.aspx?cType=papercontent

The end of oil is a bunch of garbage.
No, really. And it works. It would also be the end of the garbage crisis that looms over most major cities. Anything at all can be turned into oil.
A very interesting read http://www.perc.org/perc.php?id=290

After you read that read this, same publication
$80 a barrel and climbing.

http://www.perc.org/perc.php?subsection=10&id=573

When you burn Hydrogen you get water. I wonder, has anyone considered the environmental effects of a billion cars spewing water vapour in the atmosphere?

I wonder if it would increase precepitation around the world and flood the oceans? At the very least we might all have to get used to having Vancouver weather, everywhere.

All right! Who left the door to the geek containment facility open?

Supercritical, isn't this "plasma", when something acts as both gas and liquid?
www.plasma.org (cool photos, and not "over the top" complicated)

Suoercritical water has some interesting solvent capabilities. lots of folk jumped into geothermal here in California - when the field pressure proved to be finite, lots of generators sold for a dime on the dollar.

Ryan,

When you burn any fossil fuel, one of the products is always water vapour. Ever see water dribble from an exhaust pipe? So burning hydrogen would be no different.

Ryan,

To make things worse, water vapor is a far better greenhouse gas then CO2. You see it has a permanent dipole (whereas CO2 does not) and absorbs IR radiation far better. I think we need the world to come together and create some kind of accord to limit its release into the atmosphere.

http://www.lsbu.ac.uk/water/vibrat.html

"All right! Who left the door to the geek containment facility open?"
-awesome

70% of commercially produced hydrogen is used in food stuffs. Hydrogenation or Trans-Fats, all this crap about running cars on it is merely curbside appeal.

Oh, quit worrying about the extra water vapour. You don't need to be a geek, just use simple logic here. They get the hydrogen by splitting water. Then you burn it and get back the water that you started with. A nice closed loop, nothing lost or gained.

Plasma is ionized gas, not supercritical fluid. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_(physics)

Supercritical fluids:

http://www.chem.leeds.ac.uk/People/CMR/whatarescf.html

This is for CO2, but the same principles apply to H2O

Superheated steam at 200 atmospheres?

Watch those fingers, guys.

the problem with Hydrogen H2 is that it is only a bit bigger than a proton, it will seep through the laminates of steel - yes steel is crystals and embrittle the metal leading to failure , its why hydrogen pipelines arent built. the walls have to be too thick.

Hindenburg was hydrogen and it does burn, helium is the rare element and is recovered in some gas wells in various places such as Sask. where it is a byproduct of decaying uranium.

and lastly 50 MW isnt much.

The lack of chemistry knowledge here is frightening me.

I don't think anybody is seriously considering shipping hydrogen in either gas or liquid phase. As other people have pointed out, it's a major pain to keep contained and diffuses through most metals and other materials - not fast enough to be truly annoying but embrittling some of them. Then diffussion becomes the least of your problems.

You'd have to stabilize it as a metal hydride or convert it to something more stable: like make a simple hydrocarbon of it. Ugh.

That's why Canada and Norway and Russia have isolated powerplants turning out Aluminium and Fertilizer - good energy storage that can be sold on.

In fact, if anybody wants to be the richest person of all time, patent a material that will safely store electrical power at high density... The demand is literally unimaginable.

What's wrong with converting H2 to methane using atmospheric CO2 (Sabatier process)? Carbon comes out of the air, then goes back in. If methane makes you squeamish (excellent greenhouse gas, atmospheric lifespan of ~12 years) use Fisher-Tropsch to convert it to longer chain hydrocarbons and keep the petrochemical infrastructure. Granted some energy is lost, But there's no overall change in atmospheric CO2 levels.

Cal2, I hope you're happy about wrecking the prospect of having a "Kuwait of the North" with the addition of some reasoned science and a Hindenburg reference.

This talk about cheap hydrogen and byproducts of Uranium has me thinking...wouldn't it make sense for the re-emergence of cold fusion to come from Iceland? Might get the Greenpeace official stamp of approval.

RE: "Oh, quit worrying about the extra water vapour. You don't need to be a geek, just use simple logic here. They get the hydrogen by splitting water. Then you burn it and get back the water that you started with. A nice closed loop, nothing lost or gained"
This is not a closed loop as it moves water in liquid form from underground aquifers to gaseous form in the atmosphere. Water vapor is more than a greenhouse gas as it forms clouds in the atmosphere. Clouds reflect sunlight back into space and can balance the increase in solar radiation trapped by water vapor and other greenhouse gases. However, it is not known if there is a tipping point where too much cloud formation can cause global temperatures to fall rapidly precipitating a minor ice-age.

Further to all this, why dont they just skip the hydrogen and export electricity? IMHO electric cars are more efficient and sensible. The infrastructure to deliver power is already here with no major distribution networks to set up. No Brainer really

Hans Rupprecht said: "As I understand it, the Nazi regime could no longer buy helium from the west so they substituted hydrogen as another "lighter than air" gas."

There was an interesting show on Discovery some time ago about the Hindenburg. According to this show the reason that Germany went to Hydrogen was because the entire Helium supply in the world was at that time produced and controlled by the USA, who had been selling it to them previously, but due to strategic concerns about the increasing economic and military strength of Germany as opposed to that of their ally Great Britian, they decided to cease selling them Helium. However, the Hydrogen was not the main factor in the explosion. Rather, the fire seems to have started in one of the fuel tanks (which were carried inside the framework of the craft), and it quickly spread to the highly flammable doped fabric of the gasbags. The burning of hydrogen was added fuel, but was insignificant in the overall picture. Hydrogen was pegged as the culprit early on, because on the surface it seemed a likely explanation. However, the evidence just doesn't support it.

I guess some people missed the sarcasm in my last post. There is plenty of liquid water on the planet already. In fact we have oceans of it on the planet. So you don't have to worry about the water vapour in the atmosphere because if there is too much it rains.

I wonder if it would economical to use geothermal energy to produce the steam needed to extract the oil in the alberta oil sands. It takes electrical power to run the heat pumps but does anyone know if you get more heat energy from the ground relative to the cost of producing the electricity?

...drilling directly into the heart of a hot volcano eh?

Hope they can run fast...

Hlyrad: Iceland isn't in the best location for exporting electricity.

Talk about Power
I have seen a ripping fart clear a room in seconds. But the people aren't blown out, they don't fly out, they just break into this funny urgent trot. It's a totally different kind of power but very impressive in its own way.
If this power were bottled the uses would be multiple. Its ability to shorten staff meetings, directors meetings, political events are enormous.

I was just posing a question, thanks for the responses.

One comment though;

"Oh, quit worrying about the extra water vapour. You don't need to be a geek, just use simple logic here. They get the hydrogen by splitting water. Then you burn it and get back the water that you started with. A nice closed loop, nothing lost or gained."

I don't believe anyone is looking at extracting hydrogen from water, as far as I know its not economically viable (there's only 1 atom of hydrogen per molecule of water, and hydrolisis would cost too much) So I don't believe it is a simple closed loop as you say. Correct me if I'm wrong.

"extracting hydrogen from water" is one of the points of the BBC article. The economically viable part comes from cheap geothermal energy, hence the bigger borehole.

"Electrolysis of water is an electrolytic process which decomposes water into oxygen and hydrogen gas with the aid of an electric current. One important use of electrolysis is to produce hydrogen. The reaction that occurs is:

2H2O(aq) → 2H2(g) + O2(g)

"The amount of electrical energy that must be added equals the change in Gibbs free energy of the reaction plus the losses in the system. The losses can (theoretically) be arbitrarily close to zero, so the maximum thermodynamic efficiency equals the enthalpy change divided by the free energy change of the reaction.

"About four percent of hydrogen gas produced worldwide is created by electrolysis, and normally used onsite. Hydrogen is used for the creation of ammonia for fertilizer via the Haber process, and converting heavy petroleum sources to lighter fractions via hydrocracking. There is some speculation about future development of hydrogen as an energy carrier."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrolysis
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrolysis_of_water

When I was an EE undergrad long ago we used a Hoffman's Apparatus to electrolocize water and ran the H2 and O2 outputs through a soap bath to make a bubble-blowing maching. Bubbles with the optimim amounts of the gases for explosive recombination.

So, you guessed it, we put a spark gap mechanism in the bubble's path, ran 150' of bell-wire, and spent the afternoon working on optimizing the quality of the resulting explosions. Jolly good fun.

...and here i thought

2H2O(aq) → 2H2(g) + O2(g) was relational to
z = sqrt(a2+b2)[a/sqrt(a2+b2) + bi/sqrt(a2+b2)]
whereas ( (d/dt) + r ) ( (d/dt) + s ) (y(t)) to be the same as y"(t) + y(t) in which 3 + 2i is a complex number, with real part 3 and imaginary part 2.

Then you take the (2 + 3i)(4 + 7i) = 2*4 + 2*7i + 4*3i + 3*7*i2 = 8 + 14i + 12i + 21*(-1)
x (8 - 21) + (14 + 12)i x -13 + 26i.

Third, carry out the division, now that the bottom is real. (11+23i)/26 = 11/26 +23i/26.

Finally using the Tomacian therum, (a+ib)/(c+id)=(ac+bd+i(bc-ad))/(c2+d2) where (3+4i)(5+i)=15+3i+20i-4=11+23i.

Dang! I dropped an exponent...ah gotta start over again.

You thought wrong ;-)

The point I'm trying to make by highlighting the kinds of knowledge actual required to think productively on problems of the scale of the 10 terrawatt peak power consumption in North America (for example), is to try to remind that while everyone has an opinion, on high-tech problems like this most don't have a clue.

All the easy problems were solved long ago. Maybe that's why some of the people who actually know the most about this sort of stuff are so averse to hubris.

Vitruvius,

"All the easy problems were solved long ago. Maybe that's why some of the people who actually know the most about this sort of stuff are so averse to hubris."

All the easy problems at one time were "impossible". Maybe the minds in a 100 years will also look at this as easy ... they will have the advantage of everything learned before.

Necessity is the mother of invention - hence ipods and cell phones.

RE Hlyrad: "Iceland isn't in the best location for exporting electricity."
Posted by Vox Mentis at March 28, 2006 04:09 PM

Becoming a mass exporter of Hydrogen would be much more difficult.
Besides, the coast of Greenland is only 287km away and there are several smaller Island within a reasonable distance.
You could generate electricity on Iceland and pipe it through underwater cables like the one being constructed between Norway and the Netherlands. Then they could put all those unionized hydro workers in Ont and Quebec on the Unemployment lines ;)

Absolutely, Ural, sorry I wasn't more clear. Once hard problems do sometimes become "easy" on the heels of new discoveries. It's just I think that now-a-days easy discoveries tend to be hard.

iPods and cell phones don't enter into it. We're talking on the order of 100,000,000,000,000 peak instantaneous watts, globally. Say you make a 1,000,000 watt source, you would still have to make 100,000,000 of them. If you made one every day, that would take 11,415 years. So we have to do better than that.

Keep these numbers in mind...

Hoover Dam = 1,500,000,000 watts
Grand Coulee Dam = 6,500,000,000 watts
Small coal or nuclear plant = 300,000,000 watts
Large coal or nuclear plant = 1,000,000,000 watts

That's the order of magnitude of the scale of the problem what we face. I'm completely optimistic, but people who think they can throw around a few million windmills and solve the problem are, I think, unfortunately, likely to be wrong.

Vitruvius,

The physical realities haven't changed since the big bang. The progress we have made since then is based on previous knowledge and the imagination of the human race. Harder ... maybe ... don't think so ... it's just seeing what's already there.

Don't buy ipods or cell phones ... what about the new xbox?

And I thought only that amount of hot gas came from the bowels of the Lie-beral Party of Canada, if they could convert their B.S. into electricity they would no longer be in debt.

Well I don't believe in the big bang, Ural, I think it's an artifact of the model, but I share with you (as I understand it) an optimism for the Human spirit. Some people have always been running about flailing their arms claiming the sky if falling, but it's gotten us this far ;-)

Consider the words of Matt Ridley, who wrote in the Guardian on 2003-04-08:

"For the past century the world has got steadily better for most people. You do not believe that? I am not surprised. You are fed such a strong diet of news about how bad things are that it must be hard to believe they were once worse. But choose any statistic you like and it will show that the lot of even the poorest is better today than it was in 1903. [...] All this has been achieved primarily by that most hated of tricks, the technical fix. By invention, not legislation."

Anyone else come up with any harebrained schemes to replace 70million barrels of oil a day that is our reality??
Hard to believe for some but oil is the cheapest mobile energy source around.

Sounds like the Harper and gang are putting the the biggest administrative handcuff next to the tax system on hold -the Kyoto dodo.

Cal2: "on hold -the Kyoto dodo"

Good one! You could turn that into a chant. Harper's no fool, those who preach Kyoto taxes will never rule...