How Issues Work: Gas Cells

Inquisitive about gasoline cells and electrical automobiles? On this attention-grabbing episode of How Issues Work, we’ll take you thru the fascinating mechanics of gasoline cells and the way they’re used to propel electrical automobiles.

Estimated studying time: 3 minutes, 39 seconds.

In the event you can’t watch the video, you may learn the video transcription under:
Edited for readability and readability

Pieter: (00:16)

Welcome to Let’s Discuss Automotive. And on this week’s episode on How Issues Work, I’m going to be taking you thru a expertise that you just’ve in all probability already heard of known as gasoline cells. And I’m going to indicate you ways we use gasoline cells to propel electrical automobiles. Now in earlier episodes, we’ve spoken quite a bit about electrical automobiles, and actually, you may need even seen the section the place we check drove the Tesla Mannequin X. Now gasoline cells differ considerably in the best way that they function in comparison with conventional batteries. Now, if we take a look at a lead-acid battery, it’s fairly a horrible factor as a result of we’ve obtained an anode and a cathode, and we’ve obtained an acid sometimes performing as our electrolytes. So it’s fairly a messy affair and never very environmentally pleasant. And regular electrical automobiles use lithium-ion batteries. And as soon as once more, these lithium-ion batteries are literally fairly devastating if we take a look on the whole footprint that happens by way of mining them after which disposing of them on the finish of the day–not excellent for the atmosphere. 

Pieter: (01:20)

So a number of the producers early on when it got here to the design of electrical automobiles, in actual fact, invested fairly closely in gasoline cell expertise. Now gasoline cells have been used for a very long time within the house station, for instance, as a really clear and environment friendly method of offering electrical energy. And I’m going to take you thru very briefly, how gasoline cells work and why I feel that a number of the producers actually ought to keep it up eager about utilizing hydrogen-powered gasoline cells as an power supply for electrical automobiles. And I feel as soon as I’ve proven you, you’ll agree with me that this, possibly, is the best way to go. 

So principally, what we now have is way the identical as a lead-acid battery; we now have an anode and a cathode, however the distinction right here is that the anode over right here is crammed up with hydrogen, and on the opposite facet, the cathode has oxygen. And we even have a catalyst, and this catalyst is normally made out of platinum. And what this catalyst does is it splits up our hydrogen into protons and electrons. Now what the oxygen does on this facet, is the oxygen attracts the hydrogen protons and electrons to this facet. However this membrane, which is known as a proton alternate membrane, is so effective that it could truly filter out the protons and permit the protons to undergo. However the electrons are too huge to undergo this membrane, and so what occurs to the electrons is that we pressure them to journey an extra path to get to the opposite facet.

Pieter: (03:05)

And so what we now have over right here is all of our electrons shifting by means of this longer path, or this channel, till they come out on this facet. Now the genius behind that is that we all know, as with all different battery, when we now have a movement of electrons, we now have present movement and if we’ve obtained present movement, we’re producing electrical energy. And all that occurs when the electrons get to this facet of the stack, is that the hydrogen protons and electrons then type hydrogen once more, and the hydrogen then interacts with the oxygen and produces innocent water. So the one byproduct of this battery, in actual fact, is warmth and a little bit little bit of water. And so long as we’ve obtained a continuing provide of hydrogen, so we now have a hydrogen tank in our automobile, for instance, then we’re going to have a continuing present movement that’s created by means of this membrane.

Pieter: (04:04)
And if we now have an entire lot of those stacks put collectively, we then have sufficient present that’s generated to, in actual fact, provide sufficient energy for our electrical motors. 

So from my perspective, I feel that the gasoline cells are the best way to go. The one problem, after all, is that they’re very, very costly and that has, I feel to a big extent, put the brakes on their improvement. Which is a little bit little bit of a pity as a result of I feel that it’s a incredible, clear various to even lithium-ion batteries. 

So I hope you discovered that helpful and have a greater understanding on how gasoline cells work and till our subsequent episode on How Issues Work, I stay up for seeing you then. Cheers everybody.

To observe the complete episode, go to: https://www.fb.com/watch/LetsTalkAutomotive/

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