Emission Zero
Our monthly dose of guilt free, clean and green car technologies
Fuel of the future
What if cars emitted water instead of the contaminating carbon dioxide? Saeed Akhtar and Sarmad Kadiri come across a green car technology that does
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et’s start with a simple one. When was the first hydrogen powered internal combustion engine made? Okay, that was not exactly easy, so can you just give an educated guess? Here’s the answer: the first ever hydrogen powered internal combustion engine was made in the year 1807 by the Swiss inventor François Isaac de Rivaz. What exactly is this technology that, despite being so old, still remains esoteric and has not yet been reined in properly? Let’s attempt an
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CAR India February 2010
analysis of hydrogen as an automotive fuel from a layman’s point of view. Hydrogen, the first element of the periodic table, is the most abundant element in the universe but it is relatively rare in its natural form on earth. It is currently produced mostly from fossil fuels, however, newer alternatives (like integrated wind-to-hydrogen plants) are actively being researched. Its high flammability and violent reactions to oxidizing elements make it an ideal energy
source, albeit one that must be harnessed with kid gloves on. The advantage of using hydrogen as an energy source is that it would not contribute to carbon dioxide emissions if it is produced without using fossil fuel inputs. For the sake of brevity, let’s first classify hydrogen vehicles into two categories depending on how they utilize the gas. First up, are the vehicles that directly burn hydrogen inside internal combustion engines (HICE) to produce motive power.