Ammonia Cars

Ammonia, NH3 Vehicle Fuel
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Frank
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Ammonia Cars

Post by Frank »

I was watching The National on CBC on Monday night when a story about Greg Vezina and his ammonia-powered 1981 Chevrolet Caprice appeared. Up until then, I had never heard of ammonia an alternative fuel source.

Although the CBC doesn't (yet) have the story on their web site, they were able to give me his email address and I've invited him to join this forum. Until he does, you might find a Mechanical Engineering article interesting that I came across, which is entitled "The Ammonia Economy".

AMDninjaboy
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Post by AMDninjaboy »

Ya I caught that on TV tonight, it was interesting. They showed that old rusty car in back of a building. Neat technology although they say it is 6 to 30 yrs away...

Frank
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CBC Story is Online!

Post by Frank »

I was able to make contact with Greg Vezina and discovered that he is quite a character. You can find the CBC story about his ammonia-powered car at his web site: http://gregvezina.com/.

sleepybu
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Post by sleepybu »

Frank, whats your thoughts on the viability of this fuel :?:

Frank
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Post by Frank »

I think ammonia has a lot of potential. Just the fact that ammonia contains more hydrogen (on a volume or weight basis) than even liquefied hydrogen is an important advantage.

sleepybu
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Post by sleepybu »

How does NH3 compair to CNG and LPG for storage. It looked like that guy was using an LP tank to hold for that stuff :?

Frank
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Post by Frank »

Ammonia is a liquefied gas with pressures similar to propane. My understanding is that it's handled very much like propane too. The fuel tank does appear to be very similar to a propane tank but I think it was probably customized with ammonia-compatible parts. Care must be used when handling ammonia since it is very alkaline and reacts corrosively with all body tissues.

DMartin
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Re: Ammonia Cars

Post by DMartin »

Ammonia production is a great hydrogen storage system !
1 litre of liquid ammonia contains about 1.2 m3 of hydrogen at room conditions, it's 1.5 times more than the same liquid hydrogen...
The industrial process to make ammonia from hydrogen is about 80% energetically efficient, also it's almost even possible to convert ammonia into hydrogen and nitrogen by using the heat recovered from hydrogen fuel cells...
The hydrogen contained in ammonia can power turbogas systems that are more than about 60 % energetically efficient, so an ammonia ship would be energetically equivalent to a diesel ship that is 30 % efficient...
An ammonia car would have only toxicity problems...

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