Aluminum-Air fuel cell from Phinergy-Alcoa

[Christophe]

Bonjour à tous

I return to Phinergy-Alcoa's Al-air fuel cell (PAC) to answer two of the three questions I asked in my last email.

One or more representatives of AVÉQ were present at the press conference in Montreal this morning and the answers to their questions appear in a very interesting post published on the AVÉQ website here.

http://www.aveq.ca/actualiteacutes/pres ... ergi-alcoa

I imagine it was from Simon-Pierre Rioux, the president, who was supposed to be on Île Notre-Dame today. It's hard to say because the tickets are unsigned. I would have liked to give full credit to the author of this post, but the formula of "we" is still used without anyone being able to say formally who it is.

In short, in this post we learn that there is an antifreeze in the water and that in principle there is therefore no problem in winter.

Furthermore, we also learn that the aluminum plates are 1 cm thick. However, according to the images in the following Youtube video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FwxX2A041w0#t=47




we see that the aluminum plates are about 15 cm x 15 cm, which gives a volume of 225 cc / plate. The 50 plates therefore represent 11,25 liters of aluminum. Knowing that the density of aluminum is 2,7 kg / liter, there is approximately 30 kg of aluminum in the Phinergy Al-air heat pump.

Now, the market price for aluminum was $ 1800 per metric ton in April 2014 ($ 1,8 per kg). See

http://www.indexmundi.com/commodities/? ... y=aluminum

The cost on the markets of a full tank of aluminum (30 kg) is therefore $ 54. To this price should be added the cost of recovery and redistribution in service stations, plus a reasonable profit. We can therefore expect a full tank of aluminum which would probably cost from $ 80 to $ 100 to travel 1600 km, plus 5 full of water (one every 300 km), the quantity and purity of which is not not specified. In short, it is difficult to imagine that we can get by below $ 100 for water and aluminum.

For comparison, a Chevrolet Volt consumes 6,3 liters of gasoline per 100 km in fuel mode (when the battery has reached its maintenance level). To travel 1600 km on its thermal range extender, this rechargeable hybrid will therefore consume 100 liters of gasoline, which costs $ 140 to $ 1,40 / liter.

As a result, the Phinergy-Alcoa Al-air heat pump is expected to cost about 30% less "fuel" than the Volt's gasoline engine. But, it must be said that the price of gasoline will continue to rise.

Given that we would only fill up with aluminum 3 to 4 times a year if the Al-air PAC is used as a range extender for an electric car, the fact that there are few petrol stations for aluminum, at the beginning, is less problematic than if you had to fill up with aluminum every week. An 80 km Li-ion battery would be very suitable for traveling 80% of the km with electricity from the network, via charging stations.

What I like about this solution is that we can drive without oil and use our abundant and clean electricity to fill up with a Li-ion battery for daily kilometers and still use our electricity to transform the hydroxide aluminum aluminum and regenerate the aluminum used by the Al-air heat pump.

This technology seems particularly well suited for Quebec. However, in countries where electricity is produced with coal, this is much less advantageous.

It remains to elucidate the question of the efficiency of the aluminum cycle, which should be more than 50% for this technology to be really interesting, from the environmental point of view and sustainable development.


Sincerely

Pierre Langlois, Ph.D., physicist

[Christophe]

Bonjour à tous

You can consider this email as a postscript to the previous one.

I delved a little deeper into the price of aluminum and the data shows that it has been fairly volatile in recent years.

I mentioned a price of $ 1800 per metric ton in April 2014, but the price was $ 2600 / ton in 2011 and $ 3000 / ton in 2008. See the price graph for the last 10 years here

http://www.indexmundi.com/commodities/? ... months=120



All in all, we could expect a full tank of aluminum (30 kg) of Phinergy Al-air CAP at a gross price which could reach $ 90 to $ 3000 per tonne instead of the $ 54 corresponding to the April price 2014 ($ 1800 / tonne). All this to say that the net cost of aluminum and water (including recovery and distribution costs plus a profit) could exceed that of gasoline if the price of aluminum went up ...


Sincerely

Pierre Langlois, Ph.D., physicist

[jean.caissepas]

...
All in all, one would expect for a full aluminum (30 kg) of the Phinergy Al-air CAP
...

A range of 1600 km for 30kg could make it the ideal range extender for occasional long journeys (holidays, skiing, etc.), especially if the cap could be removable (to avoid carrying it every day)
.
It seems much better to me than adding a heat engine to an EV.

[Gaston]

[A range of 1600 km for 30kg could make it the ideal range extender for occasional long journeys (holidays, skiing, etc.), especially if the heat pump could be removable (to avoid carrying it every day)

Warning: it is 30 kg of aluminum (the "fuel"), you must add the weight of the accessories (structure, pumps, cooling, ...), the water required, ...
In my opinion, we should quickly reach 100kg.

It remains very interesting, but less easy to make removable.

It remains to be seen the sale price ... and the cost of the kWh supplied.

PS
By the way, the autonomy is not 1600 km since it is necessary to stop to replace the electrolyte (water-based, but not only ...) every 300 km ...

[chatelot16]

to make hydrogen with aluminum it only consumes water: pure water is not enough, you need caustic soda, to destroy the alumina that protects aluminum, but caustic soda is not consumed just add water and drain the aluminum hydroxide without removing the soda


so an aluminum car would often fill up with water and consume little aluminum ... and would reject aluminum hydroxide with each full of water

considering the complexity of aluminum production I don't find it very interesting

[moinsdewatt]

[i] Hello everyone

I return to Phinergy-Alcoa's Al-air fuel cell (PAC) to answer two of the three questions I asked in my last email.

One or more representatives of AVÉQ were present at the press conference in Montreal this morning and the answers to their questions appear in a very interesting post published on the AVÉQ website here.

http://www.aveq.ca/actualiteacutes/pres ... ergi-alcoa
...........]

I read

............ The liquid present in the battery, which creates a chemical reaction energizing the AAAA, is what mainly determines the weight of the battery .......... ...
.......... Since the aluminum plates erode as they supply energy, to practically disappear after their lifetime, they must be replaced .... ..

It can therefore be understood that these aluminum plates are used as a solid fuel type instead of using a liquid fuel such as gasoline. A fuel made from an aluminum plate is safe, does not emit greenhouse gases (GHG), and is made from fully recyclable materials.

well what do we do with all these chemicals being said to be recyclable?



and then the manufacture of Aluminum is extremely electrically intensive.

[dirk pitt]

and then the manufacture of Aluminum is extremely electrically intensive.

around 15000 kwh per ton of aluminum with a big ladle.
or about 450kwh to produce the 30kg which will make so-called 1600kms.
that's roughly 28kwh per 100kms.
a nissan leaf directly bottled at the nuclear outlet consumes about 23kwh / 100kms.
So using these 23kwh to make aluminum, you have to add about 20% more
that means that we pay for a 20% loss in yield for increased autonomy. I'm not talking about the approximately 10T of CO2 per T of aluminum generated by the reaction of the carbon anodes.

a range extender based on a beast gasoline engine a little efficient must do about as well in kwh / kms I think and with less CO2 / kms. we would have to calculate. (a little lazy)

[chatelot16]

the manufacture of aluminum does not consume only energy: it is done by electrolysis melted in a salt based on cryolite (fluorine) it consumes dangerous chemical products and not recycled

zinc is much more interesting because the zinc consumed by a battery can be recycled by aqueous and cold electrolysis! much simpler than aluminum

one could imagine sharing an electric battery in 2: only the minimum in the car which consumes zinc ... and fixes the bazaar which manufactures zinc with another energy

[dirk pitt]

the manufacture of aluminum does not consume only energy: it is done by electrolysis melted in a salt based on cryolite (fluorine) it consumes dangerous chemical products and not recycled

not exact !:
cryolite is not consumed in the reaction; the consumption of cryolite is zero in the manufacture of aluminum.
The only conso re is that of carbon transformed into CO2. (in addition to alumina.)

[Christophe]

Some details from Pierre Langlois:

Bonjour à tous

You are hard on me, because the questions are increasing on this aluminum-air "battery" of Phinergy. You have to believe that the subject interests you.

This time, dear correspondents, it is the quantity of water necessary for 300 km which is the subject of your questioning, since Phinergy mentions that you must fill up with water every 300 km.

Well let's go. The total chemical reaction in an Al-air fuel cell is ultimately (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminium% ... ir_battery )

4Al + 3O2 + 6H2O → 4Al (OH) 3 + 2.71 V.

This means that we need 6 parts of water for 4 parts of aluminum. However, when we speak of "part" in a chemical reaction it is a quantity which includes a given number of atoms. In the terminology of chemists, this standardized "part" is the "mole" (in a mole of a given atom or molecule there are 6,02214040 × 10exp23 atoms or molecules). Because atoms and molecules have different weights, moles of different atoms or molecules have different weights. One mole of aluminum has a mass of 27 g, and one mole of water (H2O) has a mass of 18 g. 4 moles of aluminum therefore correspond to 108 g (4 x 27 g = 108 g), while 6 moles of water have a mass of 108 g also (6 x 18 = 108 g).

This means that for the chemical reaction to consume all of the aluminum, we need the same weight of water as that of aluminum.

However, I finally knew that the weight of the 50 aluminum plates in the Phinergy fuel cell (PAC) is 25 kg. And when we have to change the plates after 1 km, we will have used about 600% of the aluminum, or 80 kg. We therefore need, in principle, 20 kg of water, therefore 20 liters of water for 20 km. Therefore, for 1600 km it means 300 liters of water minimum.

But, of course it will take more to ensure that the water always flows freely. To be conservative we can approximate the amount of water to 10 liters every 300 km.

The aluminum hydroxide will be found in the water which must be constantly pumped from its tank to the heat pump in a closed circuit. In principle, this product precipitates (does not dissolve) and forms a gel which can be separated from water, which must probably be done in the Al-air Phinergy PAC, thus facilitating its recovery.

So, if you want to do 600 km, it should be conceivable to bring with you a can of 10 liters of water to fill up after 300 km.

Sincerely

Pierre Langlois, Ph.D., physicist