BMW brings five Hydrogen 7s to Singapore
The BMW Hydrogen 7 "green" message is going to Asia. While many of the cars are still tooling around Hollywood with various celebrities at the wheel (who's the latest? check back in a few hours), five have been sent to Singapore for a two-and-a-half-week promotion. Two government representatives, the Minister for the Environment and Water Resources, Dr. Yaacob Ibrahim, and the chief of Singapore's national environment agency, Mr. Lee Yuen Hee, came to the BMW CleanEnergy pavilion a week ago to kick off the event. Like the celebrity vehicles here in the U.S. and Europe, the dual-fueled 7 Series will be used to ferry VIPs around Singapore. One, though, will remain on display "in a futuristic, glass-and-steel pavilion located on state land in the heart of Singapore," to make sure everyone gets a chance to be awed at just how unavailable the hydrogen economy is. The vehicles will be in Singapore until the 23rd. There's more after the jump.
Press Release:
BMW CLEANENERGY IN SINGAPORE. MINISTER OF ENVIRONMENTVISITS BMW CLEANENERGY PAVILION.
03/13/2008
Singapore - Underlining the importance of Singapore's search for clean energy sources to power its national economy, the country's Minister for the Environment and Water Resources, Dr Yaacob Ibrahim, and the chief of its national environment agency, Mr Lee Yuen Hee, visited the BMW CleanEnergy pavilion on March 7, kicking off the two-and-a-half-week public event.
Five BMW Hydrogen 7 Series are in Singapore to underline the BMW Group's technological leadership in offering the world a clean fuel solution for sustainable motoring, and in the process, offer an in-depth look into the fascinating, everyday reality and applicability of hydrogen power as the answer to sustainable motoring.
Four of these vehicles will provide chauffeured rides for key Singapore VIPs and media, while the fifth will be on show to the public in a futuristic, glass-and-steel pavilion located on state land in the heart of Singapore. Earlier, in endorsing the CleanEnergy event, the country's National Environment Agency had described BMW's hydrogen drive technology as "innovative" and a possible contribution to environmentally sustainable transportation in Singapore, which hosts its annual Green Transport Week in early June. The latter focuses public attention on clean transportation technologies that are powered by alternative energy sources.
Throughout the CleanEnergy event's run from March 7 to 23, specialists from the BMW Group will be on hand to explain CleanEnergy technology to visitors to the pavilion. CleanEnergy experts will also deliver guest lectures on BMW's hydrogen drive technology at Singapore's two premier universities, which, together with schools and polytechnics, have also arranged for visits by their engineering students to the pavilion.
Singapore is the only Southeast Asian country to host the BMW CleanEnergy technology event featuring the cars and related exhibits before they move on to Beijing in time for the Olympic Games later this year.
"The BMW CleanEnergy event adds another milestone to Singapore's commitment to research and development, test-bedding and pilot projects in the field of clean, environmentally sustainable and renewable energy," said the Managing Director of BMW Asia, Mr Roland Krueger. "With a growing focus on the search for sustainable and environmentally clean energy fuels in Singapore, and its prominent position as a research and development hub, we believe this is an excellent opportunity to share with the government and other decision-makers here about the latest developments in hydrogen combustion technology - one which the BMW Group has been pioneering. We are proud to be able to bring the BMW CleanEnergy Hydrogen 7 Series cars here and thank the National Environment Agency, the Singapore Environment Council and our other government partners for helping to make this event in Singapore possible," Mr. Krueger added.
"With the BMW Hydrogen 7, the BMW Group is opening up a new era for the development of automobiles with alternative drive technologies. After extensive research lasting more than 20 years, the BMW Group is able to underline emphatically its leadership in cutting edge technology. This alternative, clean energy technology, brand-new in a series production car, provides a comparable level of performance as one equipped with a gasoline engine. A hydrogen-fuelled car with a combustion engine is able to offer power, performance, driving dynamics, motoring refinement and, as a result, sheer driving pleasure of the supreme standard expected of a BMW."
Partnerships towards sustainable mobility
In addition to the guest lectures at Singapore's Nanyang Technological University and the National University of Singapore as well as student visits to the BMW CleanEnergy Pavilion, BMW Group experts will also be speaking at another key event which will take place during the next two weeks. The CleanEnergy Roundtable, organized by the Singapore Environment Council (SEC) aims to focus debate on the necessity for sustainable and environmentally friendly transportation. "Through participation as a guest speaker at this event, our CleanEnergy expert will again underline the BMW Group's technology leadership in development and fielding of cutting edge solutions for sustainable transportation," said Mr Krueger.
Reaching out to the next generations
BMW Asia will also be reaching out to students in Singapore's primary and secondary schools as well as junior colleges through the BMW CleanEnergy Challenge for Schools. This initiative aims to create awareness about clean energy sources and technologies and how these can contribute meaningfully and directly to the country's pursuit of sustainable development. The competition, jointly organized with Singapore's Mediacorp TV12, will test the students' creativity and resourcefulness. Younger primary school students will be challenged to produce an 'Earth News Report' in video format as their Challenge entry, while youths in the older age group are tasked to design and build a model of an 'Eco-friendly House'.
[Source: BMW]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
John baldwin 12:54PM (3/15/2008)
These vehicles are a nightmare for CO2, should be illegal.
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Rojo 1:54PM (3/15/2008)
John, the cars aren't anything of the sort. The typical manufacture of their fuel is the issue, and there are clean (if inefficient) methods of producing H. By the same reasoning, EVs are still terrible producers of CO2 because their electricity *might* have come from a coal burning power plant. I'd also love to see an "EV's create Radioactive Waste!" article.
Still, hydrogen as a (widespread) fuel will never see the light of day, and rightfully so.
I honestly can't believe BMW is continuing to sink so much money into a vehicle that wouldn't be feasible for decades, even assuming everyone agreed on it. If they would put that kind of effort into R&D on a hybrid or EV, they would have had a real vehicle by now. Hmm, BMW 1 Series EV, or would that be an EV-1? (groan)
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GreyFlcn 2:11PM (3/15/2008)
==EVs are still terrible producers of CO2 because their electricity *might* have come from a coal burning power plant.==
Bullshit. Point me to any study which says that.
http://greyfalcon.net/plugins7
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armmat 3:29PM (3/15/2008)
Why is everyone so much against Hydrogen? SO WHAT IF it's decades away. Doesn't anyone have a vision that see's beyond a year down the road and only thinks about money?
We could be so far ahead in all areas of technology if money (greed) wasn't such a huge factor. We're at a tipping point for ourselves. And the last thing we need to do is sit here and be bean counters...that's ridiculous.
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Mik_Cal 4:48PM (3/15/2008)
armmat,
YOu need 2.5 times the number of electric power plants to generate hydrogen for a hydrogen economy that has the same end-user energy use as an electric transport economy. It is a sign of the lack of seriousness of these automakers in sustainability that they have pumped lots of money into the LESS Efficient option before working on things like batteries that are FAR MORE EFFICIENT.
Rojo,
Your comment has no basis in fact. you would require 2.5x the number of whatever your electric generators are (coal, gas, nuclear, renewable) to produce the same amount of energy via hydrogen that would have if just used the electricity directly in a car battery. OR if you are referring to reforming hydrogen from petroleum products...you are far better off using the natural gas directly in a car (more energy available for use) or you are just dealing with a limited byproduct of petroleum refining that is just as dependent upon oil supply as ...oil!
Right now you are slightly better off with some of the dirtier parts of the grid with electric cars because they are 3x as efficient as an internal combustion engine car but coal is a little less than 2x as polluting as petroleum.
Eventually we will clean up the grid even more.
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Rojo 9:32PM (3/15/2008)
Holy jeez guys! READ what I said before responding! :P
I said "*By that same reasoning*, EVs are still terrible producers of CO2," meaning John's reasoning, which I just argued AGAINST, as he said hydrogen cars produce a CO2 nightmare and should be illegal.
My (apparently too vague) point was that they don't produce a CO2 nightmare. Their fuel manfacturing process creates the CO2 and it produces far less than millions of gasoline vehicles. And of course EV's are much much much better--click my name to see my previous posts ;)
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Chris M 2:27AM (3/16/2008)
Armmat: After analyzing the facts and figures, we realized that H2 is a poor choice for automotive fuels. Sorry, but sometimes we have to be "bean counters", as a solution that is unaffordable is really no solution at all.
While a charger and LiIon batteries are about 85% efficient, the combination of electrolysis and H2 compression (for storage) and PEM fuel cells is only 25% efficient. The H2 fuel cell route can take more than 3x as much electricity as battery electrics. Of course, fuel cell cars cost 5 to 10 times more than a battery electric, too. Why waste so much electricity and money?
The BMW "Hydrogen 7" is far worse, as it takes a lot more energy to chill H2 sufficiently to liquify, and the Hydrogen 7 uses an inefficient internal combustion engine, not fuel cells. Overall efficiency of that car running on electrolysis derived liquid hydrogen is an abysmal 6%. Yes, 94% of the energy wasted! Moreover, the special 30 gallon liquid H2 vacuum insulated tank only holds enough for 120 miles of driving, and if unused, the entire 30 gallons will evaporate and dissapate in just two weeks. Of course, there is also a 16 gallon petrol tank which offers an additional 240 mile range. With those two tanks, there is very little trunk space! The Hydrogen 7 performs so poorly and gets such lousy fuel economy that I suspect someone at BMW is deliberately trying to saboutage the hydrogen hype.
I wonder if any of those VIPs will ever figure out how bad the BMW Hydrogen 7 really is? Probably not, they don't have to pay for liquid H2, or pay the purchase/lease cost, and are probably unaware of the lousy fuel economy that land yacht gets. Perhaps when they find there is no space for their luggage...
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armmat 3:37AM (3/16/2008)
MIK-CAL & CHRIS M...
I'm sorry but I disagree...the technology is already out there....why it hasn't been developed is beyond me...if these guys can do it, I'm sure the automakers can do it. It's too bad these guys are selling their technology to the military...which will effect make it a black project for weaponry before anything else.
http://hytechapps.com/company/press
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pscs 3:10PM (3/16/2008)
i dunno how much emmisions are produced when sending the cars around the world.
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