hydrogen it's literally the most abundant element in the universe it's essential for life on earth
it fuels the sun which converts hundreds of millions of tons of hydrogen into helium every
second when used for fuel here on earth it emits nothing but water sounds like a miracle
fuel for clean energy right so why hasn't hydrogen fuel taken off over the last few decades the way
electric vehicles that are powered by batteries have well roadblocks like high production costs
lack of charging infrastructure not to mention challenges in gathering storing and transporting
hydrogen have led ev leaders like elon musk to dub hydrogen the fool's cell but thanks to
one company plasma kinetics and their breakthrough solid-state hydrogen technology
which literally stores energy on tape could hydrogen fuel finally overcome these obstacles
and become the energy breakthrough we've all been promised all these years
we thought these questions and this technology deserve a deeper dive here on two bit da vinci
special thanks to truebill for sponsoring this video the all-in-one finance app
that helps you budget like a boss and lower your bills so let's talk hydrogen being one of the most
abundant materials in the universe it's always been long held out as a promising alternative to
fossil fuels and there's a good reason for that it's an inherently clean energy source with no
adverse environmental impacts as its byproducts are typically nothing more than heat and water
nasa has even experimented with using hydrogen to fuel various space projects utilizing the water
produced in the process as potable drinking water for astronauts hydrogen is also incredibly energy
dense around three times more than fossil fuels and other natural gases by weight hydrogen fuel
which powers hydrogen fuel cells is also far more efficient than gasoline-powered engines
as it's far better at converting energy which can then be sent to vastly more efficient electric
motors the best part is they produce no greenhouse gases which of course is the ultimate goal with
alternative fuels but as great as hydrogen fuel cells have proven to be there are several
reasons why they haven't made a big splash in the mainstream for one thing while hydrogen itself may
be an abundant material it doesn't ever really hang out by itself at least not here on earth
because it's so light pure hydrogen typically floats off into space so the hydrogen we use
is always bonded with other elements getting pure hydrogen to use as fuel can be done in a
handful of ways there's the clean but expensive method called electrolysis which involves using
electricity to split water into its two components hydrogen and oxygen the cheaper much dirtier way
actually starts with fossil fuel in steam methane reforming methane reacts with steam
under 3-25 bars of pressure in the presence of a catalyst to produce hydrogen carbon monoxide
and a relatively small amount of carbon dioxide this is one of those dirty little secrets that
hydrogen proponents would rather you not think about these aspects drive up the cost of hydrogen
extraction while also reducing its overall environmental benefit then there's transportation
hydrogen is extremely flammable and being such a small element in gas form under normal conditions
needs to be compressed significantly the total mirai for example stores its hydrogen at 10
000 psi this makes it difficult and dangerous to move around which is why most hydrogen production
happens right at the location where it's going to be used on this channel we often talk about
how every technology has pros and cons and hydrogen is no different though it has some
deficits it still has found some niches mostly in the industrial sector as well rocket fuel
but if it wants to gain more proliferation it's going to have to overcome some serious limitations
and that's where plasma kinetics comes in their proprietary technology may provide a one-step
shop solution to capture store and even transport hydrogen best of all the company claims that its
technology is cheaper safer and better than their competitors including lithium-ion what is this
breakthrough hydrogen technology well to help break it down let's cast our memories back to
a time before smartphones before cd players to the era of cassette tapes that's right plasma kinetics
technology essentially stores hydrogen on tape well light activated nanostructured thin film to
be exact so how does it work the material itself is a nano graphite magnesium hydride film about
one tenth of thickness of a human hair the film is covered in billions of tiny negatively charged
points covering its surface hydrogen if you remember back in your high school chemistry class
is positively charged when exposed to greenhouse gases like exhaust from say a smokestack the film
can capture metric tons of pure hydrogen from the steam without using any electricity the reason the
company chose magnesium as a primary ingredient is that it's the element plants use in nature during
photosynthesis to store light energy we've done a whole video on artificial photosynthesis which
you can check out here before we get back to the show let me tell you about our sponsor truebill
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click on the link in the video description big thank you to true bill and all of you
for supporting the show the company's founder paul smith has a background in building computer chips
where according to smith engineers try to layer up materials and get the conductivity the way
they want it in designing the thin film smith and his team applied several principles layering up
negatively charged materials that are naturally attractive to hydrogen to release the hydrogen
the film is exposed to light which changes the polarity of the bonds becoming positively charged
instead of negative once the bonds change the hydrogen is released much like the laser shines
on an old cd to release music you do remember cds right pk's initial design looked much like a
cd player with the nano film in the form of a disc but the company realized that you're gonna get far
more surface area in the form of a film roll one cassette of the hydrogen-filled film would offer
roughly the same amount of fuel as a 5000 psi hydrogen tank but without consuming any extra
energy for compression or extraction the process is almost a hundred percent carbon free a claim
that few other companies can make while the systems wouldn't be rechargeable like an ev
they could easily be swapped out within a matter of minutes literally like a cassette tape
the canisters themselves would be reusable up to a thousand cycles and could be charged with a matter
of minutes by green product sites like municipal water treatment facilities or incineration
facilities and once the canister is officially tapped out each component is a hundred percent
recyclable you might be thinking why haven't we heard of this technology well the truth is
the company created this tech almost 20 years ago and at the time the doe the department of energy
recognized the technology's potential for good however there's a pretty big overlap
between energy production and national security especially when it comes to hydrogen i'm sure
we can all think of one or two ways for hydrogen to cause some serious damage so the company was
actually barred from receiving patents from the us government from 2008 until 2017. now the company
has one restriction they can't export the tech for missile fuel so that's a good thing anyway let's
talk power how would this energy on tape compare to other battery technology these numbers are to
be taken with a grain of salt as the technology is still in development i know that's another thing
we say all the time on this channel in terms of energy density a tesla battery gets about
watt hours per kilogram and 730 watt hours per liter compressed hydrogen gets significantly
more at between 530 and 960 watt hours per kilogram and over 1200 watt hours per liter
plasma kinetics light activated solid state fuel cells fall somewhere in the middle
between 380 and 500 watt hours per kilogram or over 1 000 watt hours per liter to give about
the same range as a tesla battery but the company claims that their technology is about 200 percent
longer lasting than batteries and about 15 to 20 percent cheaper to produce and maintain than other
battery and fuel cell technology the technology is also significantly lighter than other technology
out there today meaning it could present a viable option for commercial vehicles as well as aviation
and because it doesn't use any precious materials it could see wider applications so that lithium
ion can stay reserved for things like phones computers and ev technology of course there are
a handful of drawbacks for one as we mentioned above the tech wouldn't be rechargeable in the
way we typically think of a plug-in ev though the cells would be reusable and easily swappable
they'd have to be removed and taken to a separate facility to gain more hydrogen there's also the
issue that the way these batteries get hydrogen is through the exhaust waste of other technology
meaning it sort of requires greenhouse gases so while it doesn't produce any carbon itself
it still requires exhaust finding a way to gather hydrogen using this technology with absolutely
no emissions would be a real challenge but maybe in the future engineers could
accomplish this for now the technology is still in development as we mentioned above but if this
company can roll out and show that it's truly as simple and effective as they claim we may
start seeing more and more cars fitted with some sweet hydrogen tape decks but what do you think
should we get excited about this new hydrogen fuel cell or is it just more pie in the sky daydreaming
let us know in the comments below alright so that is a look at the solid state hydrogen tape pack
it's a really exciting technology i will say there's a million things they need to prove out
as far as reliability and how many times they've mentioned a thousand cycles that
may or may not be true um degradation just sitting around if they're safe
other considerations that we haven't thought about they are in moving vehicles potentially
but i do think it's pretty exciting stuff and i'm wishing them luck i hope they make some better
breakthroughs in the next couple of years a huge thank you to all of you for watching thank you
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ricky with tuba davinci and if nothing else just remember the future is gonna be awesome