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Fuel cell bus in California destroyed after explosion during refuelling. [View all]
Engulfed in flames | Fuel cell bus in California destroyed after explosion during refuelling.Subtitle
‘Too early to speculate’ on cause of fire, says bus company CEO
It requires a free registration to the hydrogen website to read the entire thing. I signed up to read it; I'm easily amused.
Excerpts:
A $1.1m hydrogen fuel cell bus in the city of Bakersfield in California was destroyed after an explosion was seen and heard during refuelling in the early hours of yesterday morning (Tuesday).
A section of the Golden State Highway was closed as firefighters fought the flames, but no injuries were reported and damage was limited to the single bus and the dispenser of the refuelling unit.
Golden Empire Transit (GET), the company operating the fuel cell buses, announced in a statement on 18 July that the hydrogen fuel tanks were seen and heard to have exploded, but it later retracted that statement, telling Hydrogen Insight on 28 July that “Explosion- like sounds were seen and heard and it was speculated that it was the tanks”, adding: “We will not have any concrete answers until the investigation is complete...”
A section of the Golden State Highway was closed as firefighters fought the flames, but no injuries were reported and damage was limited to the single bus and the dispenser of the refuelling unit.
Golden Empire Transit (GET), the company operating the fuel cell buses, announced in a statement on 18 July that the hydrogen fuel tanks were seen and heard to have exploded, but it later retracted that statement, telling Hydrogen Insight on 28 July that “Explosion- like sounds were seen and heard and it was speculated that it was the tanks”, adding: “We will not have any concrete answers until the investigation is complete...”
A technical point not covered in the article is that fuel cells generally have Nalfion solid phase electrolytes. Nalfion is a fluoropolymer, in the class of compounds known as persistent fluorinated organic substances, a rather large environmental problem that is growing pretty fast, but not quite as fast as extreme global heating, which hydrogen fantasies have done nothing to address. To be clear, many firefighting agents, fluorinated foaming agents, known as AFFF (aqueous film forming foam) were historically in this class of troublesome compounds, but it didn't seem to save the bus. Places where AFFF were used either to fight fires or for training fire fighters are permanently contaminated.
Despite fossil fuel "bait and switch" ads here and elsewhere pretending otherwise, there really aren't that many hydrogen buses in the world, but even in a small subset they're already blowing up. This is unsurprising given the low viscosity, low flammable limits and incompatibility with many metals - leading to metal failure and leaks - that hydrogen exhibits.
Hydrogen is not, despite much carrying on to the contrary which is regrettably well advertised but false, emission free. It is overwhelmingly made by the steam reforming of dangerous fossil fuels, accompanied by exergy destruction.
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