In June, I had talked about the Greek geeks getting into the act when it comes to hydrogen technology by developing new storage technology along with developing new hydrogen minibuses.
Now, the Greeks have out-geeked themselves by developing hydrogen submarines that will cruise the Mediterranean Sea unnoticed by watchful eyes. Air Products Corporation will be supplying the fueling station for the fuel cell driven HDW 214 submarine that is part of the Hellenic Navy.
The Greek hydrogen submarine will be able to stay underwater for up to 3 weeks before resurfacing for fuel. This compares favorably to diesel-electric submarines that can stay submerged for only a few days before resurfacing.
Nuclear-powered submarines can stay underwater for months, but hydrogen submarines are quieter and harder to detect. Hydrogen submarines also don’t pose a problem in regard to disposal of depleted radioactive waste.
Leave it to the Greeks to dive into the hydrosphere with hydrogen submarines. With water, water everywhere one would wonder why more navies aren’t using hydrogen for fuel?
Hydro Kevin,
I’m an advocate of a clean energy near future as it sound you are. I’m interested in your thoughts on hydrogen-powered vehicles vs. simpler battery-electrics. It seems to me that battery electrics with latest generation batteries plus a quick-charge infrastructure would be more practical than overcoming the hydrogen hurdles.
It seems that a good use of hydrogen would be as the “batteries” to store excess generation of solar and wind plants to help match generation and demand. In other words, wind and solar would feed the grid but also create hydrogen through electrolysis when production outstripped demand. Then when demand outstripped production, fuel cells would be used to feed the grid. This would also be a way to in-effect transport electricity. Your thoughts?
Since the “Who Killed the Electric Car” movie came out, people try to pit electric cars against hydrogen cars as the vehicles of the future. I reject the premise and think there is room for both.
This is a good blog. Keep up all the work. I wonder if the greek h2 submarine program will continue now that their economy is collapsing?
Again an amusing fallacy – how do you think they will generate the hydrogen? Hydrogen is in no way a fuel, it is an ENERGY CARRIER. And a fuel cell is a VARIABLE REAGENT FLOW BATTERY. The fuel will come from fossil fuels using steam reforming to generate large volumes of hydrogen, along with pumped storage of tons of oxygen.