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103 Comments
- helix400, on 10/12/2007, -4/+32"It's some new anti-terror BS from the CPSC and the ATF."
Anti-terror BS? What the hell?
This is about an explosives license. That's it.
That's right, all this company needs is a license to work with chemicals that could be used as explosives. But, they refuse to get a license, because they are outraged that the government should make them get a license for explosive chemicals if their end product is not explosives.
Seriously, could this company act any dumber? Reading through their complaints, it's obvious the owner of this company has no business skills, has a persecution complex, and is as stubborn as a junior high school girl with PMS. And, as floorman56 found out (posted down below, please go mod him up, I don't want to take his credit :) ), the founder of this company is Bob Lazar. Yes, that Bob Lazar who made those amazing UFO at Area 51 Government Conspiracy theory claims.
Seriously, can this story get any lamer? - rcook, on 10/12/2007, -1/+25Link to a blog, which links to a blog, which finally links to: http://www.switch2hydrogen.com/
- iamnos, on 10/12/2007, -0/+19Read up on the Hindenberg before you blame it all on hydrogen. Its generally believed that in an accident, hydrogen would be SAFER than gasoline, since it will burn instantenously and burn up, where as gasoline pools and flows and burns much longer.
- stan205, on 10/12/2007, -1/+15@fani
Taken directly from there site:
Since you can't make Hydrogen quickly enough to power a car in real time, you must produce it separately, and store it as you store your Gasoline fuel supply in your vehicle now.
There are but 3 ways to do this:
1. Store the Hydrogen as a compressed gas.
2. Store the Hydrogen as a liquid.
3. Store the Hydrogen chemically bonded to a chemical.
We'll cover each option in order.
1. If you choose to store the Hydrogen as a compressed gas, you'll need HUGE tanks, and many of them, since Hydrogen isn't very dense, so a tank really can't hold all that much. In addition, you'll be driving a giant bomb. In a collision, expect to die in a huge fireball/explosion.
2. Choosing liquid does solve the density problem since liquids are far more dense than gasses, so you can reduce the amount of tanks and their sizes required to power the car. The new problem that pops up is the fact the liquid Hydrogen in cryogenic... in short REALLY cold. It requires vacuum-thermos ( dewar ) tanks and vents to exhaust the boiling Hydrogen gas. You'll also have to find a source for liquid Hydrogen which is far more expensive than Gasoline. You've also now increased you danger factor when it comes to a collision. Not only will you have more Hydrogen gas spewing around that's going to explode and burn, but you'll also have a liquid spraying about that's over 400 degrees below zero. Once you add in the added complexity of the system due to the cryogenic liquid, your vehicle will wind up being a giant, low efficiency, rolling bomb that costs more than your house, and costs far more to run than it did on Gasoline.
3. The 3rd option is simply the only way to go. There are materials call Hydrides that absorb Hydrogen like a sponge absorbs water. Typically, the tanks are filled with granulated Hydrides, and Hydrogen is pressurized into the material. Hydrides have many advantages over liquid & gas. One is that the density of the Hydrogen stored in the Hydride can be GREATER than that of liquid Hydrogen. This translates directly into smaller and fewer storage tanks.
Once the Hydride is "charged" with Hydrogen, the Hydrogen becomes chemically bonded to the chemical. Even opening the tank, or cutting it in half will not release the Hydrogen gas. In addition, you could even fire incendiary bullets through the tank and the Hydride would only smolder like a cigarette. It is in fact, a safer storage system than your Gasoline tank is.
Then how do you get the Hydrogen back out? To release the Hydrogen gas from the Hydride, it simply needs to be heated. This is either done electrically, using the waste exhaust heat, or using the waste radiator coolant heat.
Our kits heat the Hydride tanks electrically, and as soon at the Hydride is sufficiently warm, Hydrogen is released from the tanks and the on-board computer detects the presence of Hydrogen pressure. The fuel system remains in "Hydrogen" mode until the tank pressure begins to drop. If the tanks run out of Hydrogen, the engine will seamlessly switch over to Gasoline, which enables the car to run conventionally until the Hydrogen tanks are refilled. - AgentAce, on 10/12/2007, -3/+17People would find other things to go to war over.
- floorman56, on 10/12/2007, -2/+14United Nuclear was started by Bob Lazar ...yea THAT Bob Lazar.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Lazar - thenativeraver, on 10/12/2007, -0/+11http://www.unitednuclear.com/legalaction.htm
Any and all funds collected for this purpose will be provided to the Fireworks Foundation/Chemical Defense Fund and used solely for legal defense expenses in the CPSC action.
Hmm...
The Fireworks Foundation huh? - stan205, on 10/12/2007, -0/+11@iamnos
This is what it says on there website about what you have written (http://www.switch2hydrogen.com/h2.htm):
You can produce your own Hydrogen from electricity using either common "household current" or directly from solar cells so your energy cost is zero. It does however take a substantial amount of time to produce sufficient Hydrogen to fill even a small tank.
As an example, it takes over 2 days of our generator running at full power, 24 hours a day, to fill our smallest "short range" tank.
So they are upfront about the limitations of their system, but more over it's a start towards moving to a sustainable energy creation for vehicles. - buddyfarr, on 10/12/2007, -0/+10or the government didnt mess with them and this is just a story to get VC money. I didnt see anything in the article that shows proof that they were indeed raided. it could of happened or not. we don't know. I hope this is a reality so that I can get one. I have an economy car already but it only gets 30mpg. I would prefer to use this so that I don't have to pay everytime I fill my tank.
- AgentAce, on 10/12/2007, -1/+10If you actually read the United Nuclear page about the technology they're developing, you'll learn that they store the hydroged in containers filled with Metal Hydrides. Hydrides absorb hydrogen like a sponge and release hydrogen at a consistent rate when warmed. This is a far safer method of storage than what the big automakers have been working with: Toyota cryogenically stores hydrogen as a liquid and I'm pretty sure GM stores it as a compressed gas.
- iamnos, on 10/12/2007, -4/+11Do you have any idea the amount of land required to generate enough solar power (converted to hydrogen) to power our vehicles? Its not quite as simple as you might think.
- stan205, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7@ iamnos
Do your math. The power companies don't charge $.40 per watt, they charge by Kilowatt or 1000 watts. So based on your calculations that would be 48 dollars. Also, since we haven't seen any hard numbers and benchmarks from the company your number seems very speculative. - YossarianDent, on 10/12/2007, -2/+9Pretty much all of what I'm about to say has been said before, so mod me down if you like, but I'd just like to summarize and reiterate:
1. This is unbelievably old news. A couple years, if I remember correctly.
2. Learn to write before you submit "news" stories.
3. It's not "political bs"; it's Bob Lazar BS. - Jeffrey903, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6In addition, there are theories that it was not infact the hydrogen that caused the explosion, but a chemical in the paint used to paint the walls of the machine.
- aveyuen, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6@iamnos:
you're right about solar power not being able to drive a car, at least not the way they are currently engineered. In my undergrad days I helped build a solar powered car for a race across north america. It was 1/4 of the weight of a toyota echo (kevlar + aluminum), a bit larger of a footprint than a standard sedan, and sported a 1 kW solar array (1.3 horsepower). The solar cells alone cost us $12,000 USD, which is one of the cheaper solar cars out there. Total cost of car: over $100,000. In conclusion, people: a solar powered car is not the solution, it is merely a demonstration. This is coming from someone who pretty much gave up all semblance of a life to build one of these things.
also.... 25% is not 'a long way off'. There are 24.7% efficient silicon cells already, and efficiencies of GaAs and triple junction III-V ones are well over 30%. and the solar intensity is much larger than 175 W/m^2.... it's around 1000 W/m^2 at full sun, actually. and it's a kilowatt-hour (kWh), *not* a kilowatt PER hour (kW/h). Otherwise, good stuff with your math; i'm glad someone else did it so i don't have to. :-) - NorthRider, on 10/12/2007, -4/+10Id have to agree. There technology is very sound, but what the government is trying to stop is the general public from having hydrogen. Anyone remember the Hindenburg? But it is still very suspicious that the government is raiding them and taking all information instead of working with them to insure safety is maintianed. Gasoline in a tank is just as volitile.
- helix400, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7Yes! We now have our UFO/Area 51/Evil Government Conspiracy/Nutcase scientist/Hydrogen Fuel Car link.
- dWhisper, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6Sadly, the site behind all this, United Nuclear, has been pretty questionable. Take their Scientific Supplies site, http://www.unitednuclear.com/supplies.htm, and look at the "Looking for Uranium" link at the bottom. They've never had anything in stock and available for purchase, except a sticker or a T-Shirt.
- Raznog, on 10/12/2007, -3/+8yeah they would go to war over the sun or something just as stupid as that =D
- compwizz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5@ iamnos
"You can produce your own Hydrogen from electricity using either common "household current" or directly from solar cells so your energy cost is zero."
Read the last part of that sentence. They are talking about the cost of the electricity from the solar panels being zero, not the power from your house. - bkbarrett, on 10/12/2007, -2/+7That must be why gas prices are at record lows right now. All that cheap oil we got in the war.
- Raptor235, on 10/12/2007, -6/+10if they had nothing in the first place the goverment would not be messing with them in the first place...
- Raznog, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6@iamnos
Well i think this is more of a great thing not because of whats going on right this minute as the next step but what will happen down the line after this is perfected imagine what we will be able to do - Raptor235, on 10/12/2007, -3/+7all the major car manufactuers are now working on hydrogen cars and I've seen video tests showing that a hydrogen is safer if for some reason it gets pearsed... it shotts out in one direction until empty... where as gasoline spills all over the place putting the whole car on fire... I think it was on discovery channel...very interesting.
- ViperDaimao, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4I think it's related to this, not so much the hydrogen thing. http://www.boingboing.net/2006/03/04/us_bans_sale_of_chem.html
Although I haven't been able to find ANY mention of this, except links to United Nuclear's page asking for donations. - helix400, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5 Lame
Reasons:
* One of the most poorly written summaries to ever reach the main page.
* Focuses on partisan political conclusions when the source blog does not.
* The blog linked to doesn't explain anything.
* The blog which links to a blog which links to a blog, and that blog has the most information (but not enough).
That said, I wish we had more information about why this particular raid took place. All we have is a quick couple of paragraphs from this company explaining something about oxidizers, and that's it.
- TaeBoX, on 10/12/2007, -3/+7It's some new anti-terror BS from the CPSC and the ATF.
http://www.unitednuclear.com/legalaction.htm - Yoda716, on 10/12/2007, -7/+11Message to Bush: Just because your not smart enough to introduce this doesn't mean you should take it away (ie shut it down) I am however trying to ignore the fact that your in bed with the Saudis and this would make you less of a ridiculously rich man.
- iamnos, on 10/12/2007, -5/+8Okay, here's the numbers for you then:
(Taken from Wikipedia)
The most we can expect to get from solar energy is 175W/m^2 (in most of NA). Lets say we get our solar panels up to 25% efficient (which is a long way off). We can generate a little less than 44W per squar metre. Since that data is averaged over 24 hours, we get about 1KW/h per meter squared.
Now, lets say your car gets 30mpg. Lets say you drive 60 miles per day. That means you have to generate the equivalent energy of 2 gallons of gas. According to http://auto.howstuffworks.com/question424.htm a gallon of gas has about 60KW/h of energy in it. So, just to drive your 60 miles a day, in a relatively fuel efficient vehicle, you would need 120 square meters (think of a strip of solar panels, 3 feet wide, longer than the length of a football field).
Of course that doesn't take into account that you'll lose energy transferring to something like hydrogen. Doesn't take into account longer trips, or where you load up your vehicle with extras effecitively reducing the mileage. Its not feasible to power our vehicles purely off solar power.
Even if you take a vehicle like the Prius (which has regenerative breaking, etc.), You're still going to need 50-60 square metres of solar panels to power it, just for your day to day drving.
- johndi, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4They say the gov wants to shut them down. Hell, I've got a fusion reactor with quad flux capacitors and a positron induction coil in my back yard, but the gov wants to shut me down!!! Saying the gov wants to shut you down is high on the list of things to watch out for in potential scams.
'Some time ago, the CPSC (Consumer Product Safety Commission) recruited the SWAT team and other Government agencies to raid our facility confiscating all papers, plans and computers.' - That's real credible. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4in this day an age.. even if the governement was completely right in the raid...
even if these guys were idiots and had chems without licenses
this would be on the news with their claim that the gov is trying to hinder their research..
anti bush makes great news.. keeps sponcers happy which is who matter anyway..
But even a lame raid would make some googleable news , i think it is a vc scam..
kinda like those stock tips that come in the mail... oh really some penny stock i have never heard of is going through the roof again..
but yeah every few years to gov bans chems... in the late 80's it was fertilizers(they all lost alot of nitrate nd was replaced with ammonium.)
then after 9/11 it was model rocket engines..
now i guess it is oxydizers
you shouldnt need a $1k license but i wouldnt be opposed to a background check like guns. - deut, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Yep, I agree with Raptor235 & Raptor235.
As for "safe oil", If you wanna see what happens to an oil depot when it catches fire, check out the Buncefield oil depot fire that happened last year in the UK. "Europe's largest peacetime blaze."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/flash/0,5860,1665521,00.html - Reddog_x2000, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3@Truth is that the government is trying to shut things like this down because it gets cars running on something other than gasoline of diesel (or ethanol for that matter), over which they get tax. They do not just want people to pay this tax because they are greedy, or because it's easy money for the government, but because of the fact that that tax includes money for the maintance and creation of roads.
Uh no, they'll just tax whatever new fuel source we switch to. - Raptor235, on 10/12/2007, -2/+5not to fully move to solar power, I agree however the sooner this gets started the better and the faster new technology will evolve.
- Tengen, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3I would really prefer it if stories with extremely biased/slanted summaries were not dugg up to the front page. Not because I think digg should be completely impartial, but because it would keep us from having to read irritating stuff like: "oh ya the US goverment is trying to shut down the company... wonder why... I'm so sick of this political bs"
If you care about promoting this kind of story, learn how to persuade without sarcasm (generally only persuasive to people who already agree with you) and without intentional obnoxious abbreviations. - compwizz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2@iamnos
Yes, I am completely aware that it's going to cost you money when you start using your household current. The point I was trying to make is that hydrogen can be created at zero cost, just don't use your household current. The system can run solely on solar power if you wanted. - Raptor235, on 10/12/2007, -4/+6agreeed trying putting a huge bucked of fuel on fire and see what's safer...
- velorz, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3I believe this site is a total hoax. If it wasn't they would have started seeking national media attention by now.
- helix400, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3I found some more information about this raid, link is here: http://www.unitednuclear.com/legalaction.htm.
"This forbids or very severely limits sale of all common oxidizers and many common pyrotechnic fuels to anyone who does not hold a manufacturing license from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (BATF). To require everyone who wants to work with common chemicals to hold a BATF "Explosives Manufacturing License"... even though they are not manufacturing explosives, is completely insane."
So....they're complaining that the government is out to stop them because...they don't have a license to work with certain chemicals and they don't want to get a license?
You've gotta be kidding me. - driftersgold, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2the site is now down due to the digg effect.
- Raptor235, on 10/12/2007, -3/+5I like what's going on seems like there is a ton of people putting effort in delivering the information to the masses and making everyone aware... its very exciting.
- kneeare, on 10/12/2007, -7/+9because nobody is stopping them
- Sagecreation, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2United Nuclear is owned an operated by Bob Lazar - the guy that went on the radio and claimed to spill the beans on his time working at area-51. From what I heard (Coast to Coast), he was shut down because of the process he was using to charge the hydrogen collectors (not completely sure I remember exactly what he called it). was technically against the law and required a permit. Although, this is fodder for conspiracy crowed, if there is any conspiracy I would think it would be more related to his pretty public discussions about the alien technology he says he worked on at dreamland.
- longboarder543, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2@bojoes
As you can probably imagine, commutes vary greatly depending on the part of the county/world you live in. Those of us in Houston, which is the largest city in the U.S. in terms of square mileage, drive a long way to get places. I happen to work in Galveston, which is not uncommon for Houstonians, and I drive around 80 miles round trip each day. Granted, it's freeway driving, so the commute time is not ridiculous (about 45 minutes when traffic is light), but I pack on the miles. I envy cities with efficient public transit systems. - Neumahn, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3http://cgi.ebay.com/Back-to-the-Future-Delorean-Flux-Capacitor_W0QQitemZ7615255796QQcategoryZ60361QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
- iamnos, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2@aveyuen
Oops, yeah KWh, now kw/h. And absolutely, at peak times you will see over 1KWh. However, the article I referred to averaged it out for the amount you get per hour over the course of a year. So, in a given year, you could expect (365 * 24 * 175) about 1500KWh. It was easier to work with averages then to say in the summer for 2 hours during the day you could get 1000KWh, 0 KWh from 10pm until 5am, etc. etc. - gaddis, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2@iamnos
Yes actually I can give you a ballpark estimate on how much sunlight it takes to power a car.
Assume 100hp average power output of the car. 100hp=75kW Energy of the sun=1kW/m^2
Efficiency of Si solar cell=20%
So you have 375 m^2 or 4000 sq. ft. of solar cells needed to continuously power the car.
Now take into account that solar cells currently go for about $8.00/W, so you need an up front investment of $60,000 just for the cells, not even including the cost of battery strorage/hydrogen production and neglecting losses due to real world inefficiencies.
This guy is obviously a crackpot and there are much smarter people working alot harder on solar power/hydrogen storage. Clearly you should not believe this nonsense. It's way too good to be true. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Raptor...you are right. That is why the ENTIRE stoyr is *****. NONE of it happened!
Wow. I really thought that digg users were more internet savvy that regular users. Ones that wouldn't all for ***** like this. Apparently I was wrong.
Just to let you know, Raptor...Bill Gates will never send you $1000. No matter HOW many times you forward an e-mail. - Jack9, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3-- Bush is no better than Hitler ..... riiiight. One had people slaughtered like animals, one is a blathering idiot (we both can agree he isnt smart enough to be successful on his own)
I think your little rant is ridiculous. This last comment shows you need to sit in a corner and think about the differences between these mortal men rather than spewing something you read on another forum because you're full of adolescent rage and an unrequited need for recognition. - compwizz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2@iamnos
Actually I do know the lifetime of the panels. This is from their website.
Solar Panel - 80 Watt - 21.3 volts (open circuit). Approximate panel size: 2' x 4'. UPS shippable. All weather construction - full 25 year warranty from the manufacturer.
Note: 5 solar panels (400 watts total) is the minimum amount of power required to operate the H2 generator.
The panels are under warranty for 25 years, that's quite a long time. -
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