Japanese Firm Demonstrates Car That Runs On Water

Japanese Firm Demonstrates Car That Runs On Water
Friday June 13, 2008
CityNews.ca Staff

http://www.citynews.ca/images/2008-0...8-watercar.jpg

If you're tired of spending money like water on gas, maybe you'd just rather spend money on water, period.

That's what you'll be doing if a Japanese firm has its way.

A company called Genepax, dedicated to finding ways to turn water into power, has unveiled what it calls the first practical car to run solely on H20. The firm claims putting just a litre of water from any source - tap, rain or river - is enough to keep its automobile going for 60 minutes at a respectable speed of 80 kilometres an hour.

And forget about finding a gas station when you're running on empty. "The car will continue to run as long as you have a bottle of water to top up from time to time," Genepax CEO Kiyoshi Hirasawa told a local Japanese broadcaster after demonstrating the test vehicle in Osaka. "It does not require you to build up an infrastructure to recharge your batteries, which is usually the case for most electric cars."

According to the company, the water gets poured into a tank at the back of the car and uses a generator to break it down and convert it to electrical power. It's a completely different approach from the big automakers, who are looking at fuel cells that run on hydrogen as the next power source. Ironically, they emit water from the exhaust, not use it to run the vehicle.

Genepax can't say yet when you'll be taking one of their cars for a spin but like all these future fuels, their arrival seems to be off in the distance. They've just applied for a patent on the system and can't say when - or if - it will ever actually hit the showrooms.

But they're in talks with Japanese automakers about the idea and hope it will one day water down your need to ever visit a gas station - with its non-stop climbing prices - again.

Photo courtesy: Genepax

http://www.citynews.ca/news/news_23767.aspx

Are you sure theres not a hamster on a treadwheel in it? :lol:

New Fuel Cell System 'Generates Electricity with Only Water, Air'
Jun 13, 2008 19:30
Kouji Kariatsumari, Nikkei Electronics
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Prototyped vehicle


120W fuel cell system


Internal portion of the 120W fuel cell stack


300W generation system mounted in a luggage room (left)
Genepax Co Ltd explained the technologies used in its new fuel cell system "Water Energy System (WES)," which uses water as a fuel and does not emit CO2.

The system can generate power just by supplying water and air to the fuel and air electrodes, respectively, the company said at the press conference, which took place June 12, 2008, at the Osaka Assembly Hall.

The basic power generation mechanism of the new system is similar to that of a normal fuel cell, which uses hydrogen as a fuel. According to Genepax, the main feature of the new system is that it uses the company's membrane electrode assembly (MEA), which contains a material capable of breaking down water into hydrogen and oxygen through a chemical reaction.

Though the company did not reveal the details, it "succeeded in adopting a well-known process to produce hydrogen from water to the MEA," said Hirasawa Kiyoshi, the company's president. This process is allegedly similar to the mechanism that produces hydrogen by a reaction of metal hydride and water. But compared with the existing method, the new process is expected to produce hydrogen from water for longer time, the company said.

With the new process, the cell needs only water and air, eliminating the need for a hydrogen reformer and high-pressure hydrogen tank. Moreover, the MEA requires no special catalysts, and the required amount of rare metals such as platinum is almost the same as that of existing systems, Genepax said.

Unlike the direct methanol fuel cell (DMFC), which uses methanol as a fuel, the new system does not emit CO2. In addition, it is expected to have a longer life because catalyst degradation (poisoning) caused by CO does not occur on the fuel electrode side. As it has only been slightly more than a year since the company completed the prototype, it plans to collect more data on the product life.

At the conference, Genepax unveiled a fuel cell stack with a rated output of 120W and a fuel cell system with a rated output of 300W. In the demonstration, the 120W fuel cell stack was first supplied with water by using a dry-cell battery operated pump. After power was generated, it was operated as a passive system with the pump turned off.

This time, the voltage of the fuel cell stack was 25-30V. Because the stack is composed of 40 cells connected in series, it is expected that the output per cell is 3W or higher, the voltage is about 0.5-0.7V, and the current is about 6-7A. The power density is likely to be not less than 30mW/cm2 because the reaction area of the cell is 10 x 10 cm.

Meanwhile, the 300W fuel cell system is an active system, which supplies water and air with a pump. In the demonstration, Genepax powered the TV and the lighting equipment with a lead-acid battery charged by using the system. In addition, the 300W system was mounted in the luggage room of a compact electric vehicle "Reva" manufactured by Takeoka Mini Car Products Co Ltd, and the vehicle was actually driven by the system.

Genepax initially planned to develop a 500W system, but failed to procure the materials for MEA in time and ended up in making a 300W system.

For the future, the company intends to provide 1kw-class generation systems for use in electric vehicles and houses. Instead of driving electric vehicles with this system alone, the company expects to use it as a generator to charge the secondary battery used in electric vehicles.

Although the production cost is currently about ¥2,000,000 (US$18,522), it can be reduced to ¥500,000 or lower if Genepax succeeds in mass production. The company believes that its fuel cell system can compete with residential solar cell systems if the cost can be reduced to this level.

http://techon.nikkeibp.co.jp/english/NE ... 13/153276/

Great, with parts of our country already rationing water, this is just what we need. They need to find a car that runs on solar energy or something that is not needed to sustain life. Food shortages are occurring because farmers crops are going to make ethanol. Over crowded and drought ridden places can't afford for their water to be going to automobiles.

Whatever happened to desalinization? Besides, I was reading up on the water engine and my sources said you had to put way more energy in than you got out. I'm not meaning to be a naysayer, and I'm sure there will be surprising innovations, but the risk of bad science and fraud is also there. But for the honest seekers: more power to them!

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Originally Posted by cayla99

Great, with parts of our country already rationing water, this is just what we need.

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That was my first thought. But it can run on saltwater, and probably even reclaimed water, so I don't see a threat to our drinking water supplies.

Having said that, I do not believe this to be true. I suspect it is a grand scam.

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Originally Posted by AngelaTC

Quote:

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Originally Posted by cayla99

Great, with parts of our country already rationing water, this is just what we need.

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That was my first thought. But it can run on saltwater, and probably even reclaimed water, so I don't see a threat to our drinking water supplies.

Having said that, I do not believe this to be true. I suspect it is a grand scam.

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Even if it was, it will be cost prohibitive. By the time the international environmentalists get done with their reports on the damage to the oceans by using all this water, and the meteorologists get done with the reports on the catastrophes putting the extra water vapors into the air will cause, it will never come onto the market.