This is pretty cool. They built the taxi to do battery operated flights, with the longest flight so far was 150 miles at a top speed of around 200 mph.
For reference, 500 miles is the distance between San Diego and San Francisco. That’s a 90 minute flight that would take closer to 2 1/2 hours with this air taxi. So I suspect that this demonstration is less about any sort of aspiration to replace batteries and fossil fuels with hydrogen, and more a demonstration of an operationally clean burning fuel.
The criticisms that hydrogen is environmentally expensive are valid, but what’s interesting is that the operational use of the vehicle, whether it’s battery or fuel cell, is effectively emissions-free. When the operational fuel is clean, emissions improvements can be centralized. That’s a really big deal.
> is there a chance that +90 minutes for security and baggage could be avoided to make the door to door time more comparable?
Blade in New York flies through high-security corridors. Check-in is like a minute. (Counterpoint: I regularly show up to my small-town airport fifteen minutes before boarding is scheduled to start, although that precludes being able to check a bag.)
That said: you can’t easily take out a building with a helicopter. That may not be true with a tankful of 700-bar hydrogen.
You still need to make sure that no one except the pilot can take over the controls and that nobody is secretly loading up the VTOL with bombs in their luggage with the intention to crash it into the side of a glass skyscraper.
Then there is the safety of the passengers. If you and the pilot are the only ones in the aircraft, there is not much risk to yourself, but if the pilot dies, then the aircraft must land autonomously. If there is a group of passengers, then a terrorist could take the passengers hostage. So you still need to check for weapons and explosives.
The only case where you could get rid of security is with a fully autonomous aircraft that carries no luggage and only a single person.
This is already the case with a bunch of small plane airlines. They are also reasonably priced (compared to chartering). I personally love JetSuiteX (JSX) and the experience is truly incredible, with just 5 minutes to board the plane from entering the hangar. No TSA, no BS. There are a few more with similar service, but as far as I know, JSX was the one that found the loophole in the regulations that allowed them to run their operations this way legally. Proliferation of small aircraft cheap to operate will make this model ubiquitous.
Liquid Hydrogen is not a lot of fun. Anything with an 700:1 expansion ratio is a stored energy hazard in and of itself, but because it's cryogenic it also means the cumulative daily loses in tanks where cooling is not actively maintained will be a constant annoyance.
They seem intentionally coy about how the 523 miles where flown, seemingly just above Marina, CA. They have requested that flight tracking not be publicly shown on flight aware.
You might be able to find them on ADS-B Exchange, either live or in the historical data sets. They are somewhat famous for only using citizen-sourced ADS-B data and refusing all requests to delist or hide data (allegedly anyway).
It looks like their tail number is N542B but I'm not sure how to translate that to the ICAO hex codes that they use to archive their data nor exactly what date and location the flight took place. Some more sleuthing would be required.
Some test flights around 6/23 - 6/27. Looks like a pretty boring way to get 523 miles. They should fly the loops over the Indianapolis Speedway instead.
I wonder if the the high-pressure, non-cryogenic hydrogen tanks used in some cars and buses would work. That technology seems to have solved the major issues, although I suppose aircraft crashes could introduce some additional problems.
The Hydrogen in our supply chain also comes from petroleum so it’s more dangerous, more expensive and less green than any other alternative. Its would literally be more green to burn coal.
Cost to produce H2 from water, 50-55 kWh/kg
Cost to liquefy H2 is 10-13 kWh/kg
1 Kg of H2 stores about 33 kWh of energy.
More than 50% of the energy is wasted before transport, storage, boil off etc are concerned.
H2 doesn't make sense for a lot of things it's promoted for (see Michael Leibreich's Hydrogen Ladder for detail on this) but this is one area where it makes some kind of sense.
If you had all of that H2, what is the additional cost to just fix some CO2 into hydrocarbons?
It feels like that would be a much simpler way to get to net zero than having to reinvent all of the infrastructure.
So much simpler that I wonder why anyone would keep trying on hydrogen. Which makes me darkly suspect that the goal is to take our attention off the solution that's already being deployed, i.e. wind and solar.
Regardless of net efficiency, that still entails collecting CO2 at a central facility (where it could have been dealt with in other ways, such as injection underground) and sprinkling it through the air as you fly over delicate ecosystems. I'm sure bankers see both as net zero, but condors might have more issues with your simpler workaround.
It takes a lot of energy to pull CO2 from the air since it is only 400ppm. It also takes energy to make hydrocarbons. This means they will be really expensive. They might be used for classic cars but can’t replace fossil fuels.
Hydrogen or ammonia have advantages that can be made from water and nitrogen. Ammonia may be good for ships and planes since can be liquid at cold temps. But can’t substitute in cars.
But according to HN armchair engineers, electricity will be free, nay, negatively priced in T+epsilon as exponential decrease in solar panel prices actually turns them negative. Or maybe even imaginary.
Wholesome energy prices do in fact turn negative. But then you store it in batteries and use it when they flip positive again.
No complicated, expensive, delicate, dangerous, cryogenic fuel systems required.
as horrible as Hydrogen is, isnt that still ~two orders of magnitude better than li-ion? Pressure vessel will probably bring that down to one order of magnitude.
In cars where weight doesnt matter that much Toyota, leader when it comes to pushing BS hydrogen, is only able to get Hydrogen Yaris to do 10-14 Fuji laps https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGL5g91KwLA thats 45-60km of range on Hydrogen.
The difference in volumetric energy density is not that big though, and hydrogen is not as flexible as jet fuel or even batteries when it comes to how you can store it in the vehicle.
To be fair, high gravimetric density is a fairly large advantage for an air plane. But the bad volumetric energy density does present some serious challenges.
There are times it makes sense - when you have a remote location you need power in that is more than batteries can provide for example. Say you need 300kW in a farm miles from the nearest supply for 3 months.
Commercially viable hydrogen production starts with methane, goes through a combination of "steam reforming" followed by "shift reaction." So far as I know, liquefaction involves essentially mainstream cryogenic refrigeration.
Hydrogen is just a “battery” for energy storage. The ultimate goal is to produce “green” hydrogen by cracking water using solar energy - either via photovoltaics or developing a way through bioengineering photosynthesis.
Green hydrogen (from renewables) is not the cheapest option to my knowledge. In fact it is not yet cost-competitive.
The electrolysis process is not still efficient today (but improving) and does not yet have scale, and the cost is several times SMR-produced hydrogen.
Most economical hydrogen is produced through SMR or as a byproduct.
The production and use of hydrogen in transportation requires 4x more energy from the electric grid than EVs - and there are people claiming the grid can't handle EVs (they're wrong - but that's another point). What the grid can't handle is hydrogen. Between Microsoft and Google battling over AI, the claim that the grid can handle EVs is being cast into doubt.
None of this is even getting into the consumer issues with hydrogen - of which there are plenty.
Hydrogen may find a use in long distance haulers and heavy-duty construction equipment (think replacing big diesel engines), but it's never going to get a strong foothold on personal transportation.
Note that they never say what the payload was. Was there just a pilot? Was it just remote-controlled? (I'm guessing just the pilot, but that's less than useful except as a personal transport, not a "taxi".)
Generation, transmission, storage and local consumption of energy, are separate problems.
Hydrogen probably makes sense in the long term, it can be transported in pipes, can quickly refill a local users tank and is not going to create a monstrous waste recycling problem.
We’re not even using hydrogen, the most dense fuel, in rockets. Why would you use anywhere else? Cars, trucks, EVTOLS and even planes are getting batteries which are superior in most aspects.
Readit News
For reference, 500 miles is the distance between San Diego and San Francisco. That’s a 90 minute flight that would take closer to 2 1/2 hours with this air taxi. So I suspect that this demonstration is less about any sort of aspiration to replace batteries and fossil fuels with hydrogen, and more a demonstration of an operationally clean burning fuel.
The criticisms that hydrogen is environmentally expensive are valid, but what’s interesting is that the operational use of the vehicle, whether it’s battery or fuel cell, is effectively emissions-free. When the operational fuel is clean, emissions improvements can be centralized. That’s a really big deal.
https://www.jobyaviation.com/news/joby-progresses-next-phase...
Blade in New York flies through high-security corridors. Check-in is like a minute. (Counterpoint: I regularly show up to my small-town airport fifteen minutes before boarding is scheduled to start, although that precludes being able to check a bag.)
That said: you can’t easily take out a building with a helicopter. That may not be true with a tankful of 700-bar hydrogen.
Then there is the safety of the passengers. If you and the pilot are the only ones in the aircraft, there is not much risk to yourself, but if the pilot dies, then the aircraft must land autonomously. If there is a group of passengers, then a terrorist could take the passengers hostage. So you still need to check for weapons and explosives.
The only case where you could get rid of security is with a fully autonomous aircraft that carries no luggage and only a single person.
Edit: typos
They seem intentionally coy about how the 523 miles where flown, seemingly just above Marina, CA. They have requested that flight tracking not be publicly shown on flight aware.
It looks like their tail number is N542B but I'm not sure how to translate that to the ICAO hex codes that they use to archive their data nor exactly what date and location the flight took place. Some more sleuthing would be required.
https://www.adsbexchange.com/products/historical-data/
Some test flights around 6/23 - 6/27. Looks like a pretty boring way to get 523 miles. They should fly the loops over the Indianapolis Speedway instead.
https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=a6df7c&lat=36.689&lon=-...
https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=a6df7c&lat=36.689&lon=-...
Toyota has some detail about their system, which is similar to systems used by Honda and Hyundai, at: https://www.toyota-europe.com/news/2015/hydrogen-is-that-saf...
H2 does not make any sense whatever.
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/hydrogen-ladder-version-50-mi...
It feels like that would be a much simpler way to get to net zero than having to reinvent all of the infrastructure.
So much simpler that I wonder why anyone would keep trying on hydrogen. Which makes me darkly suspect that the goal is to take our attention off the solution that's already being deployed, i.e. wind and solar.
Hydrogen or ammonia have advantages that can be made from water and nitrogen. Ammonia may be good for ships and planes since can be liquid at cold temps. But can’t substitute in cars.
THEN it definitely makes sense.
as horrible as Hydrogen is, isnt that still ~two orders of magnitude better than li-ion? Pressure vessel will probably bring that down to one order of magnitude.
In cars where weight doesnt matter that much Toyota, leader when it comes to pushing BS hydrogen, is only able to get Hydrogen Yaris to do 10-14 Fuji laps https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGL5g91KwLA thats 45-60km of range on Hydrogen.
That being said, hydrogen is usually the worst option, but I don't think that's true for every scenario.
Deleted Comment
To be fair, high gravimetric density is a fairly large advantage for an air plane. But the bad volumetric energy density does present some serious challenges.
And if you think about it for a minute: Do CO2 emissions that occur miles away from where I'm standing right now really even exist?
The electrolysis process is not still efficient today (but improving) and does not yet have scale, and the cost is several times SMR-produced hydrogen.
Most economical hydrogen is produced through SMR or as a byproduct.
Current project status: https://arena.gov.au/projects/yuri-renewable-hydrogen-to-amm...
Related (Australian) hydrogen energy projects: https://arena.gov.au/projects/?technology=hydrogen
(and a few other largish projects with no government funding)
So when you think about it: Did it even really happen at all?
None of this is even getting into the consumer issues with hydrogen - of which there are plenty.
Hydrogen may find a use in long distance haulers and heavy-duty construction equipment (think replacing big diesel engines), but it's never going to get a strong foothold on personal transportation.
how long do the pipes last before crumbing? and how long do the pumps last? Toyota cant even make a hydrogen car fuel pump last more than 7 hours.
Buuut will we ever make it truly make sense for vehicles en masse?