New Facility To Power Liverpool’s Buses With Hydrogen
The title of this post is the same as that of this article on Air Quality News.
These are the first three paragraphs.
Arcola Energy will build a facility to develop hydrogen and fuel cell technology for buses near Liverpool.
The company has secured 15,000 sq. ft of newly-built premises in Knowsley which will house the company’s manufacturing, installation and maintenance facilities.
The manufacturing area of the new site will be used to produce and install hydrogen fuel systems into a fleet of double-decker buses for the Liverpool City Region, after the city region was awarded £6.4m for the project by the Office for Low Emission Vehicles.
The article says this about the design of the buses.
The buses have been developed through a partnership between Arcola and Alexander Dennis, the world’s largest double-decker bus manufacturer.
Arcola Energy‘s Head Office is just round the corner from where I live, by the Arcola Theatre in Dalston.
The Anonymous Widower 
more on this at https://www.liverpoolcityregion-ca.gov.uk/liverpool-city-region-launches-6-4m-hydrogen-bus-project/
If you don’t know of it, here’s a separate Hynet project to include hydrogen for trains https://hynet.co.uk/transport/
AFAIK, both these projects use ‘brown’ hydrogen from methane rather than ‘green’ from hydrolysis.
Comment by Peter Robins | April 21, 2019 |
I wouldn’t be surprised if the Liverpool project eventuslly used green hydrigen from INEOS at Runcorn. Jim Ratcliffe seems to keep quiet about the capabilities there! Perhaps he’s working on a serious green hydrogen project to store wind energy from the massivw wind farms in Liverpool Bay!
Comment by AnonW | April 21, 2019 |
Hynet’s home page does mention moving towards 100% renewable energy (click on ‘Future Hydrogen Sources’).
I note that Liverpool’s buses will be adapted ADL Enviro400s. Hydrogen buses have been running in Aberdeen and London for some time now, but I think those are all single-deckers.
Following some links, I find the EU’s Joint Undertaking will be publishing their “Study on the use of fuel cells and hydrogen in the railway environment” next month https://www.fch.europa.eu/event/fuel-cells-and-hydrogen-railway-environment. I’ll make a note to read that when it comes out.
Comment by Peter Robins | April 21, 2019
After reading the stories about Nikola Motors and big hydrogen-powered trucks, I feel that size may be an advantage. It could be that a hydrogen tank may take up wuite a bit of space, but isn’t that heavy. I’d be interested to know the power weight ratio of a hydrogen and a diesel aystem of the same power and range!
Comment by AnonW | April 21, 2019
hard to compare the 2 directly, I think, because of battery/regenerative braking and all that. Vivarail’s units are much the same whatever the power source, so they might have some numbers, but I don’t know that they’ve released that kind of info. Once RR deliver their MTU hybrid engines, they should be more comparable with the hydrogen-powered equivalent.
Comment by Peter Robins | April 21, 2019
I saw a presentation by Wright’s engineer on the New Routemaster, which is a serial hybrid like a hydrogen-powered vehicle. I remember him saying that you can be very clever how you arrange the components. On the new Routemaster, the battery is under the front stairs and the traction motor is low down between the read wheels. This must stabilise the vehicle. After all Boris and Top Gear didn’t manage to tip one over.
The presentation was as the Institute of Mechanical Engineering and he drew a few gasps, when he said, the top deck might be the best place for the engine.
The engine and generator is actually placed under the back stairs about half way up. You can hear it at times.
As several Routemasters a minute pass Arcola’s offices, I wonder if their bus has a similar layout for the battery and traction motor, with the less fuel-cell low as well. A fuel cell probably needs less complicated plumbing than a diesel engine, although it does need cooling.
I shall do some digging!
Comment by AnonW | April 21, 2019 |
and I’m sure the technology will only get better: more compact, more efficient, cheaper … I actually see hydrogen as more useful for longer-distance bus routes and coaches; I would have thought battery would be sufficient for most urban routes, even in larger cities like London
Comment by Peter Robins | April 21, 2019 |
I think one of the problems with battery buses is that unlike battery trains, which run precisely on tracks, which can provide motive power and charge the batteries at the same time, buses probably need to be plugged in to be charged.
There are more and more battery buses appearing all over London, so they must have a method to make them work.
Comment by AnonW | April 21, 2019 |
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