Operating experience with a liquid-hydrogen fueled buick and refueling system

Abstract

An investigation of liquid-hydrogen storage and refueling systems for vehicular applications was made in a recently completed project. The vehicle used in the project was a 1979 Buick Century sedan with a 3.8.1, displacement turbocharged V6 engine and an automatic transmission. The vehicle had a fuel economy for driving in the high altitude Los Alamos area that was equivalent to 2.4 km/l of liquid hydrogen or 8.9 km/l of gasoline on an equivalent energy basis. About 22% less energy was required using hydrogen rather than gasoline to go a given distance based on the Environmental Protection Agency estimate of 7.2 km/l of gasoline for this vehicle. At the end of the project the engine had been operated for 138 h and the car driven 3633 km during the 17 months that the vehicle was operated on hydrogen. Two types of onboard liquid-hydrogen storage tanks were tested in the vehicle; the first was an aluminium Dewar with a liquid-hydrogen capacity of 1101.; the second was a Dewar with an aluminium outer vessel, two copper vapor-cooled thermal radiation shields, and a stainless steel inner vessel with a liquid-hydrogen capacity of 1551. The Buick had an unrefueled range of about 274 km with the first liquid-hydrogen tank and about 362 km with the second. The Buick was fueled at least 65 times involving a minimum of 8.1 kl of liquid hydrogen using various liquid-hydrogen storage Dewars at Los Alamos and a semiautomatic refueling station. A refueling time of 9 min was achieved, and liquid-hydrogen losses during refueling were measured. The project has demonstrated that liquid-hydrogen storage onboard a vehicle, and its refueling, can be accomplished over an extended period without any major difficulties; nevertheless, appropriate testing is still needed to quantitatively address the question of safety for liquid-hydrogen storage onboard a vehicle.