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Linde, owners of BOC, have a [url= http://www.the-linde-group.com/en/clean_technology/clean_technology_portfolio/hydrogen_as_fuel/h2_bike/index.html ]hydrogen fuelled bicycle[/url].
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And according to another press release on their site you may be able to refuel it, in Germany. In 2013. Sort of limiting right now. Oh, and by then the fuel cell will have died (service life 5 years). Major advantages over the standard e-bikes would be ?
Did you read the article?
Like hydrogen-powered cars, fuel-cell bikes have the dual advantage of a long range and a short refuelling window of just a few minutes.
I did. The range advertised is about the same as my wife gets from her standard pedelec, and short refuelling is only interesting if the infrastructure exists to do it. Which it seems it won't, even in Germany, until the next decade. Seems slightly back-to-front to me. The other advantage they claim is 'better carbon balance' than conventional pedelecs, which seems bizarre, given that most hydrogen is produced by electrolysis, and the process overall is no more efficient.
OK, not having LI batteries around is probably good, but I really can't see this as a major contribution, unless all transport goes the hydrogen route.
Oooh, imagine being run over on one of those. Yeah, you'll die in a massive fireball, but you might also take out the dopey **** who hit you. BOOOM! 😀
The point is that it is a prototype. It's not exactly a huge fuel tank on there, and would hardly be difficult to double if not triple the size of that. The infrastructure is clearly a chicken/egg thing. You asked what the advantages are - well those are the theoretical advantages which make it worth developing the infrastructure.
The reason it can be greener is that it's a lot easier to store hydrogen and so it can be generated with spare renewable electricity. Batteries get recharged using marginal electricity production, which is likely to be hydrocarbons a lot of the time. IMHO hydrogen power is certainly one of the ways to enable the use of more renewables.
There's a fleet of hydrogen FCEVs Toyota Mirais delivered to Boris Mayor earlier this week. Infrastructure inching it's way forward.
Got to store your excess solar somewhere, electrolysing water seems like an option.
so what are the chances that I can buy/ build something at home that can...
obtain hydrogen through the electrolysis of water using wind energy or by reforming biogas
and sustainably re-charge at home rather than waiting for an infrastructure to materialize?
getting the hydrogen would be easy. Compressing it might be a bit of a poser.
what if I put it in a big balloon and just drag that around?
methane powered would be better 
Meh, I helped build one of them over a decade ago:
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http://collections.glasgowmuseums.com/starobject.html?oid=433824
😀
that looks like it should have a flux capacitor!
[quote=bencooper ]Meh, I helped build one of them over a decade ago:
http://collections.glasgowmuseums.com/starobject.html?oid=433824
I can't imagine why the idea hasn't taken off
Got to store your excess solar somewhere, electrolysing water seems like an option.
Not when you read up on how difficult hydrogen is to store. Shame, cos otherwise it'd be fantastic, and Iceland would be the new Saudi Arabia as it exported huge quantities of hydrogen generated for free.
Flow batteries are a much better option for storage.
I can't imagine why the idea hasn't taken off
It was deliberately meant to look bodged. Artists 😀
Explaining to BOC what we wanted to do with the very explosive hydrogen we were buying from them was fun. And I got to do the first test ride - it did make a start up noise exactly like a flux capacitor, which is a bit unnerving when it comes from right under the saddle and you have no brakes.
I suspsect that all that electronic hardware is not strictly necessary either..? Is that a PC in the main triangle?
It was at the time - it's a Ballard 5kW fuel cell, overkill for this kind of thing but all he could get for reasonable money. That big circuit board is the fuel cell management system, that feeds power to the battery pack (behind the Raleigh sticker) which drives a golf buggy controller and then a 2kW Heinzmann hub motor.
Really, it's a fuel cell motorbike - 2kW is 10x the legal limit for electric bikes.
If only there was some form of carbon neutral way of powering a bicycle...
It's turning H2 into H2O - technically it is carbon neutral 😉
(Yes, I know, there's all the stuff about how you make the H2)
http://goo.gl/photos/eQi6FLzFBCJVcZxV9
Im hoping work dont notice a little of their 300 bar hydrogen disappearing once in a while.