The concept of hydrogen car is probably nothing new to many people from US/ European region, but in Asia, only Japan has came out with prototypes of hydrogen cars before. However, this is going to change as Thailand has recently introduced a new prototype hydrogen car.

The car was designed by a group of researchers led by Air Marshal Morakod Chansumruard, a retired military official who is also the president of Clean Fuel Energy Enterprise Co. His company produces electric-powered vehicles that are used in golf courses, villages, public parks, resorts, hotels and factories.

After receiving a funding of 14million baht from the National Research Council of Thailand (NRCT), AM Morakod sped up the work in the four months that follow.

The concept car, which runs on a fuel cell stack of 8-10 kilowatts, ran smoothly during a demonstration last friday. It also has enough power left for the air-conditioning and radio equipments. Its hydrogen tank has a capacity of 900 litres that will allow the car to travel 50 kilometres per fill-up and reach a maximum speed of 90 kilometres per hour.

Similar to a battery-powered vehicle, hydrogen fuel cells also create electricity to run a vehicle in the same way. However, fuel cells also need to have their electricity-generating substance, which is hydrogen, constantly replenished.

With the global oil price reaching as high as US$147 per barrel, this concept fuel car if goes into commercial production, could help reduce Thailand’s dependency on imported oil. A more important benefit is that such cars emit water instead of gases which could then help to reduce global warming.

AM Morakod said the local supply of hydrogen was abundant as it was produced by many petrochemical plants in the Eastern Seaboard provinces as a byproduct but was released unused. It is estimated that each plant released about eight million litres per hour of hydrogen.

Tapping the supply for just 24 hours from these plants would yield enough hydrogen for 120,000 cars. The plants offer the hydrogen free but filling the containers would cost money.

A fuel cell car produced in Thailand would cost a few million baht, but that would be about one-tenth the cost seen in some countries.

Source: Bangkok Post