DETROIT, Michigan, April 11, 2003 - General Motors and BMW announced this week that they will jointly develop refuelling devices for liquid hydrogen vehicles. The motor manufacturers said they hope others will join the initiative, which will centre on setting global standards and supply specifications and on finding the best technical and cost-effective solutions.
"We want to accelerate the progress being made on the distribution and onboard storage of liquid hydrogen as the future fuel," said Lawrence Burns, GM's vice president of research and development. "Both compressed and liquid hydrogen hold promise to be used in hydrogen vehicles. The density of hydrogen in a liquid state is especially attractive with respect to fuel distribution and vehicle range."
The goal of the collaboration is to have affordable and compelling hydrogen vehicles for sale by 2010 and the companies need to concentrate on the storage and handling technology to achieve this goal, according to Christoph Huss, BMW's head of science and traffic policy. We have to start working on a standard so that customers will not be confronted with various systems," Huss explained. "Standardising the refuelling coupler is a must."
Liquid hydrogen provides the most convenient way in transporting hydrogen fuel before a hydrogen pipeline infrastructure is in place, he said, and teaming together will allow GM and BMW to help bring about the liquid hydrogen infrastructure faster.
The car makers say they will follow draft specifications for liquid hydrogen coupling units that have been developed by the European Integrated Hydrogen Project, which are the basis for current negotiations by the United Nations' Economic Commission of Europe (ECE) over a standard for hydrogen-powered vehicles. "BMW and GM want this refuelling system - with the coupler as a core component - to become a global standard" Huss said. -
Environmental News Service.
Copyright Environmental News Service (ENS) 2003.
Republished with permission. See www.ens-news.com
This is one of almost 50
chapters and articles in the 336-page large format book, Before the Wells
Run Dry. Copies of the book are available for £9.95 from Green Books. Continue to Panel 2 of section 2: a methanol economy rather than a hydrogen one?
