the car of the future: electric, but not as you might think

1 VAB Technologiedag, 19/09/2014

Sebastian Verhelst, Faculteit Ingenieurswetenschappen en Architectuur, UGent

The car of the future Electric, but not as you might think!

Prof. Sebastian Verhelst

Green Drive Project Conference.

Tomorrow’s Vehicles: Challenges for Industry and University

Green Drive Project Conference, Antwerp, 23/09/2016

Sebastian Verhelst, Faculty of Engineering and Architecture, Ghent University

1973

2003

Gb oil consumption

oil discovery

Year 3

Orders of magnitude 2010 15 terawatt (15.1012W)

1 billion vehicles

• Which energy source? • Transport:

o Which energy carrier? o Which powerplant?

Criteria: • Sustainable • Scalable

7 TW

14 TW

7 TW

44 TW

72 TW

85.000 TW

?

H2

Internal combustion engine • Cheap to produce: oEasy to produce oFrom abundantly available,

recyclable materials oRelatively little energy

needed for production • Fuel flexible • High power density • Still potential for efficiency

improvement

Energy density is crucial!

10

liquid

gas



Energy density: illustration

11

60 kg gasoline

+ 40 kg alcohol

+ 100 kg hydrogen

+ 800 kg batteries

1300 kg



Liquids: distribution and storage easier

12

€ 250

€ 10.000

€ 25.000



Long term options for energy carrier and powertrain

for transportation?

Minimum set of criteria:

‣ Sustainability: closed cycle for energy carrier and

powertrain materials

‣ Scalability: resources for energy carrier and powertrain

‣ Compact: need sufficient energy & power density

13 Green Drive Project Conference, Antwerp, 23/09/2016


Conclusions for sustainable transportation

Energy carrier:

• Need for renewable (solar), liquid fuels

‣ Efficient, so practical and cheap distribution and storage

Powertrain:

• Internal combustion engine

‣ Sustainable technology

‣ Best bang (h) for your buck!



Candidate fuels

• Simple molecules are preferred

‣ Production is more efficient

‣ Conversion (end-use) can be controlled more easily (h, emissions)

• Abundantly available building blocks: C, H, O, N, …

• Thus, most simple fuels:

‣ Hydrogen, H2 (at patm, liquid at 20K)

‣ Methane, CH4 (at patm, liquid at 91K)

‣ Ammonia, NH3 (at Tatm, liquid at 8.6 bar)

‣ Methanol, CH3OH (liquid)

‣ Dimethylether (DME), CH3OCH3 (liquid at 5.3 bar)

‣ …

LIQUIDS



Case: methanol

• Can be produced in different ways

‣ Biomass, fossil fuels

‣ Synthesize using renewable energy: H2 + CO/CO2 CH3OH

• Liquid

‣ Cheap tanks, cheap distribution

‣ Miscible with gasoline and ethanol

‣ Evolution of infrastructure possible

• High engine efficiencies possible

• Also building block for synthetic hydrocarbons (MTO)

Has been a focus for UGent since 2009



How can we introduce methanol as a fuel?

• Most successful biofuel presently: bio-ethanol

• Which is being used:

‣ Mixed into gasoline, in low concentrations (E5, E10)

‣ In high concentrations (E85) in “flex-fuel vehicles” (FFVs)

• EtOH lion share of the ~4% share of biofuels in transport,

~40M FFVs worldwide

• MeOH miscible with gasoline and EtOH

• Hypothesis gasoline-EtOH-MeOH

blends with identical properties to E85

(GEM blends) can be used by FFVs



18

CH3OH

n(-CH2-) Transport

Liquid

Storage

Power Electricity

H2

H2O

CH4

CO2

Gas

Storage

Heat

Waste

Heat

…And this can be brought into play quickly using

GEM blends in existing E85/gasoline flex-fuel vehicles

“Renewable Power Methane”,

now supported by Audi as E-gas;

however, vehicle fuel tanks still expensive

because CH4 is not a liquid…

Massive storage of renewable

energy makes investment in it

viable

An integrated system

Conclusions & additional remarks

• Internal combustion engines (ICEs) far from being “fully

developed” with regards to efficiency (i.e. fuel consumption,

CO2) and emissions

‣ Lab: 57% efficiency with near-zero emissions

• + advantage: “flex-fuel”, cheap

ICE is sustainable technology!

“Keep the engine, change the fuel”

towards synthetic fuels, sustainable&scalable, “e-fuels” –

“solar fuels” – “liquid electricity” + support with fuels from

waste and biomass where this can be done sustainable



Thanks for listening!

http://users.ugent.be/~sverhels

[email protected]



the car of the future: electric, but not as you might think

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