Australian electric battery-swap truck company JANUS is going to SMASH Tesla-Semi!

eclipsenow

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It will work in Australia, no doubt. It won't work anywhere else in the world. It's not comparable to the Tesla semi. The Tesla truck won't be sold in Australia and I can't see Janus selling in the US. Different vehicles for different markets.
You have links to the American size limits? Seems odd that such a large country with so many people would be limited to 40 tons, when our little population sometimes justifies Road Trains!
 
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eclipsenow

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Thanks. That's got some interesting implications! EG:

An Overloaded Truck can Cause Significant Damage to the Road.​

Over time, the extra weight can wear down the asphalt and create potholes. This can be expensive to repair and can even lead to accidents.

Do Aussies just spend more on our road maintenance? Are American bridges really that close to falling down? ;-)

Or is it more that their interstate highway system ended up being vastly larger on even a per capita basis, that it would cost more per citizen to maintain if the trucks were too large?

I mean, a normal Aussie Semi can carry 100 tons or 2.5 times the Tesla, and the Road trains get BIG!
 
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Tuur

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Thanks. That's got some interesting implications! EG:



Do Aussies just spend more on our road maintenance? Are American bridges really that close to falling down? ;-)

Or is it more that their interstate highway system ended up being vastly larger on even a per capita basis, that it would cost more per citizen to maintain if the trucks were too large?

I mean, a normal Aussie Semi can carry 100 tons or 2.5 times the Tesla, and the Road trains get BIG!
I have seen rural bridges on county maintained roads with weight limits of about 2 tons / 1.8 metric tons. Those have been replaced now.

You see our limits and ask if our infrastructure is that fragile. I see what you've cited for Australian semi-trucks and ask if Aussie traffic is that much less. As an example, I know of a series of bridges on a county maintained road that saw a huge amount of traffic when a flood closed another bridge. The bridges held up just fine; the road not so much because it wasn't designed for that amount of traffic.
 
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eclipsenow

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I have seen rural bridges on county maintained roads with weight limits of about 2 tons / 1.8 metric tons. Those have been replaced now.

You see our limits and ask if our infrastructure is that fragile. I see what you've cited for Australian semi-trucks and ask if Aussie traffic is that much less.
Good question! We still have vast truck traffic jams now and then. We are slowly building city bypasses etc. Maybe it's a function of us having a smaller population of only 25 m yet a vast, wide continent? We don't have anything LIKE America's huge interstate highway system that criss-crosses the entire continent. Just a few well used roads cutting up the middle for tourist destinations like Alice Springs / Uluru and up to Darwin. I think - from memory - that some of our road trains drive slowly down really dusty dirt tracks for hundreds of km's? So maybe as well as being larger, they have more suspension - or are just trained to drive a whole bunch slower on their annual trips taking a herd of cattle to market?
 
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You have links to the American size limits? Seems odd that such a large country with so many people would be limited to 40 tons, when our little population sometimes justifies Road Trains!
I've been following EV developments for some years now. American semi trailer laws limit GVW to 82,000 lbs. They have a vastly superior rail network. I've traveled a bit by train there and rail freight is pretty amazing. One thing that Tesla is working on is being able to have a convoy system. One driver would be controlling a number of trucks. I don't know the reasoning behind US vehicle weight limits. It is what it is. There are many youtubers who devote themselves to EV's. Australian Sam Evans, aka Electric Viking, is worth a look.
 
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Trogdor the Burninator

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Hydrogen has a lower BTU than gasoline or diesel. It's odorless, which means that, like natural gas, you can't smell a leak, and why it would need an additive to give it a smell. Burning colorless means that it's possible to move a hand or even walk into a hydrogen flame without knowing it's there, which is why it would also need an additive to give it color.

Since hydrogen is a gas, it doesn't day in one place, and while it's lighter than air, air is a fluid that swirls and whirls and well, behaves like a fluid. It would tend to collect up under any sort of overhang, keeping in mind that air is a fluid. Hydrogen atoms are also exceptionally tiny, and will ooze right through some materials (Helium will, too). In a high enough concentration as it swirls around, given a spark or flame it will combust. I wouldn't recommend naming a hydrogen vehicle company Hindenburg Motors.

Gasoline vapors also act as a fluid. They would tend to collect down in something, though keep in mind air is a fluid. In a high enough concentration, it will combust given a spark or flame. Its molecules are larger than hydrogen atoms. More importantly, it's liquid under normal temperatures.

Here is where we get to the big problem: Stored hydrogen is a gas under pressure. This is what caused the issue with bottled gas with that incident in Canada in the 1970s that I only hazily recall. The bus used either natural gas or propane, and in the accident, it was the tank rupturing that caused the tragedy. If I remember it correctly (big if), the victims were likely killed by the force of the rupture before the gas combusted. There was research in the 1970s of making a hydrogen tank out of a sort of metal sponge to lessen rupture problems in a crash, but don't recall how far that came along. The point is that a ruptured tank of a gas under pressure presents issues beyond the gas contained inside the tank.

When a gasoline tank ruptures, since it's under no or slight pressure, you end up with a hole or rip in the tank and gasoline leaking, but the force of the rupture doesn't present a problem as it does with any gas under pressure. The leaking gasoline presents a problem, and if the vapor has a spark or a flame, it will combust, just like hydrogen.

The gas under pressure problem is more significant than many think. In the 1970s there was serious effort to move to natural gas or propane to power vehicles due to availability, and remember articles on converting vehicles to natural gas. It might have caught on had it not been for the issue of what happens if the tank ruptures.

I think you're conflating a couple of issues here. So-called natural gas needs an odour because it's heavier than air and therefore tends to pool in areas when there's a leak and displace the air. On the other hand Hydrogen leaks almost always disperse to the atmosphere unless they occur in a fairly enclosed environment, meaning it's far less of a safety issue.

In addition, when you burn natural gas you get CO as a by-product which is dangerous, whereas burning hydrogen produces water. Again, far less of a safety issue.

As for colour when burning - hydrogen is hard to see. However that issue isn't confined to hydrogen. Superheated steam used in many industrial plants has no colour or odour either. And in an automotive setting, the flame would be confined. If hydrogen is leaking to the atmosphere, it won't be burning for more than a second or two.

As for the example of a bus explosion(?) with CNG or propane - yes, gas can have safety issues just as petrol does. However, just about the entire Australian taxi fleet has been running LPG since the 1970s until recently (they've now gone hybrid) and many cities have been running large CNG bus fleets for over 20 years (now being replaced by electric buses) and there's been no issue with the safety record compared to petrol or diesel there.
 
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Tuur

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I think you're conflating a couple of issues here. So-called natural gas needs an odour because it's heavier than air and therefore tends to pool in areas when there's a leak and displace the air. On the other hand Hydrogen leaks almost always disperse to the atmosphere unless they occur in a fairly enclosed environment, meaning it's far less of a safety issue.
So-called natural gas? You sink a pipe and collect it. It's certainly not artificial. You add an odorant to natural gas and propane not because it's heavier than air, but because you can't smell it. Air acts as a fluid. It swirls, it drifts, it rises, it falls. And heavier than air gases can rise, too, depending on the temperature of the gas and the movement of the air. It's one thing to argue that hydrogen is the fuel of the future; quite another to pretend it's completely safe.
 
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Trogdor the Burninator

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So-called natural gas? You sink a pipe and collect it. It's certainly not artificial. You add an odorant to natural gas and propane not because it's heavier than air, but because you can't smell it. Air acts as a fluid. It swirls, it drifts, it rises, it falls. And heavier than air gases can rise, too, depending on the temperature of the gas and the movement of the air. It's one thing to argue that hydrogen is the fuel of the future; quite another to pretend it's completely safe.

"So called" because "Natural Gas" is a marketing term, not a chemical designation like "Hydrogen". Air is a naturally occurring gas too.

And nobody is pretending that Hydrogen is completely safe, only that the issues around it tend to get magnified and the issues around gasoline downplayed, mostly because of what we're used to.
 
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eclipsenow

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"So called" because "Natural Gas" is a marketing term, not a chemical designation like "Hydrogen". Air is a naturally occurring gas too.

And nobody is pretending that Hydrogen is completely safe, only that the issues around it tend to get magnified and the issues around gasoline downplayed, mostly because of what we're used to.
Yes! This! No body - especially myself who started this thread - is pretending any energy system is completely safe. The number of people Chernobyl has killed is quite low - the estimated (and this is highly controversial!) death rate might get as high as 4000. Now think of coal.
Globally oil coal and gas kill more than 8 million people a year. That's 5.4 Chernobyl's a DAY!
Deaths from fossil fuel emissions higher than previously thought

As Monbiot says:
“….when coal goes right it kills more people than nuclear power does when it goes wrong. It kills more people every week than nuclear power has in its entire history. And that’s before we take climate change into account.” The Heart of the Matter

Tradesmen get electrocuted and fall of rooftops installing solar, and wind turbines are also dangerous to service. The deaths per terrawatt for wind and solar are on a par with nuclear.

There's just no free lunch.

But if we can get hydrogen doing green steel, maybe some agricultural work and concrete and industrial process, and airlines - then I will be happy!
I'll say it again. If it hasn't exploded, hydrogen burns up. You might get down and crawl under the burning obstacle and survive where gasoline or diesel or even some other gases would kill you. So there are pro's and cons to every scenario. The main thing is not to fry this beautiful planet we've been given, and not to fund regimes that don't like us very much by purchasing their oil and gas. Won't THAT make an interesting shift next generation?
 
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Aussie Pete

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I think you're conflating a couple of issues here. So-called natural gas needs an odour because it's heavier than air and therefore tends to pool in areas when there's a leak and displace the air. On the other hand Hydrogen leaks almost always disperse to the atmosphere unless they occur in a fairly enclosed environment, meaning it's far less of a safety issue.

In addition, when you burn natural gas you get CO as a by-product which is dangerous, whereas burning hydrogen produces water. Again, far less of a safety issue.

As for colour when burning - hydrogen is hard to see. However that issue isn't confined to hydrogen. Superheated steam used in many industrial plants has no colour or odour either. And in an automotive setting, the flame would be confined. If hydrogen is leaking to the atmosphere, it won't be burning for more than a second or two.

As for the example of a bus explosion(?) with CNG or propane - yes, gas can have safety issues just as petrol does. However, just about the entire Australian taxi fleet has been running LPG since the 1970s until recently (they've now gone hybrid) and many cities have been running large CNG bus fleets for over 20 years (now being replaced by electric buses) and there's been no issue with the safety record compared to petrol or diesel there.
Hydrogen powered vehicles/aircraft will require special designs. It is the lightest gas and can migrate through the crystal structure of steel pipe. The gas storage will require venting to atmosphere. It is far easier to ignite than any other gas except acetylene. There have been a number of vehicles blown apart by acetylene leaking from cylinders. The inductive spark from interior lighting is more than enough to set it off.

Sure, it can be done. The question is, should it be done? If it was cheap and easy, we'd all be driving hydrogen powered vehicles. The vast majority of investment is in EV's. There is a reason for that.
 
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Aussie Pete

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Thanks. That's got some interesting implications! EG:



Do Aussies just spend more on our road maintenance? Are American bridges really that close to falling down? ;-)

Or is it more that their interstate highway system ended up being vastly larger on even a per capita basis, that it would cost more per citizen to maintain if the trucks were too large?

I mean, a normal Aussie Semi can carry 100 tons or 2.5 times the Tesla, and the Road trains get BIG!
And our roads are a disaster in many places.
 
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eclipsenow

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And our roads are a disaster in many places.
I'm more a fan of rail and New Urbanism - but that's a whole other thing. Don't get me started! ;) Interestingly - surprisingly - a lot of the youth in my world are bigger fans of New Urbanism and Netherlands styled town plans than I am! I'm talking about EV's, and they're reminding me "Why would you design a nicer, more attractive, longer lasting cancer cell?" That's how they see car-based suburbia!
 
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I'm more a fan of rail and New Urbanism - but that's a whole other thing. Don't get me started! ;) Interestingly - surprisingly - a lot of the youth in my world are bigger fans of New Urbanism and Netherlands styled town plans than I am! I'm talking about EV's, and they're reminding me "Why would you design a nicer, more attractive, longer lasting cancer cell?" That's how they see car-based suburbia!
My son has no car but he's single. My daughter has 4 kids and the car is essential for her. Me, I enjoy the freedom of hopping in the car day or night and going where I please. Getting a weekly shop home by train does not appeal to me at all. Leaving a $40,000 car in the driveway and paying for alternative transport is wasteful to me. I don't even like having the car in for a service!

They are trying to change my city to a pedestrian only place. I have no problem with that except a major highway is being converted to an avenue suitable for snails. Now I have suicidal pedestrians and cyclists to contend with. My solution is simple. Shop elsewhere.
 
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"So called" because "Natural Gas" is a marketing term, not a chemical designation like "Hydrogen". Air is a naturally occurring gas too.

And nobody is pretending that Hydrogen is completely safe, only that the issues around it tend to get magnified and the issues around gasoline downplayed, mostly because of what we're used to.
Industry and society generally know how to live with petroleum. Not so much with hydrogen. I worked in the petrochemical industry, on the supply side, for best part of 30 years. I'd not be happy living anywhere near a hydrogen plant.
 
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eclipsenow

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Getting a weekly shop home by train does not appeal to me at all. Leaving a $40,000 car in the driveway and paying for alternative transport is wasteful to me. I don't even like having the car in for a service!

You're not thinking big enough - you don't DRIVE to the shops when you live in a New Urban environment. You walk a granny trolley down to your "Third Place" - to your public lounge room. You hang there for half an hour catching up with a few friends. Here's my copy and paste on the topic. It's not just a town plan - it's a lifestyle. And if it's done right people will have more time, fitness, friends, walks, and FREEDOM! Literally, more freedom! Kids in the Netherlands are free to ride their bikes to their own soccer games. There are laws in North America and Canada popping up to prevent parents 'abandoning' their children up to the age of 16! So childhoods are more naturally like "Kids on bikes" movies like ET or Goonies or whatever - but not in America any more. In the Netherlands. Who has more freedom?

Also, suburbia costs so much more council money to pay for 10 times the roads, footpaths, gutters, wiring, communications, power poles, street signs, nature strips, crossings, bridges, etc etc etc. 10 times! New Urbanism can be built on 10% the land and gives the poor the freedom to live without a car. Who has more freedom - the person that can choose to live without an expensive car and have great services and a social life - or the person trapped in a city designed to make cars happy, but not people happy?

The worst thing about suburbia is not just the economic cost of cars and traffic jams and heat islands and pollution. Nor is it the enormous city taxes to maintain all these unnecessary extra roads and plumbing and power-lines - paving over 10 times more land than needed. It’s the fact that there’s no “there” there. We’ve forgotten what we’re missing out on - an attractive town square within a 5 minute walk of our front doors. The town square used to be the place to just go and hang out. The architecture tells us something about who we are - and it is surrounded by shops and services and the local school. It has a train or tram line, and is therefore a place where overlapping social functions creates spontaneous interactions. It’s where the local 10,000 people or so arrive on on the tram and buy some groceries on the way home. They’ll pass parents collecting kids from school, people walking the dog in the local green, and others having a coffee or grabbing a bite to eat in the diner. Everyone is there, making it safer for women and children. Everyone is there, in multiple overlapping functions that create multiple overlapping opportunities for spontaneous interaction. For friendships to develop. To reduce loneliness.

But in suburbia you have to drive to the local super-mall that services 300,000 people from all over the place. As a result, we’ve lost a sense of place. and become an awful lot lonelier as well. The car designed city divides us. Let’s design cities around people instead.
 
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Sure, it can be done. The question is, should it be done? If it was cheap and easy, we'd all be driving hydrogen powered vehicles. The vast majority of investment is in EV's. There is a reason for that.

A large part of the reason EV's are taking off faster than hydrogen is that the electricity infrastructure already exists. To get a more realistic comparison you'd need to go back to the days when electricity was just starting to make an impact in cities which mostly relied on gas and wood for energy. Had someone developed an EV then, it wouldn't have sold very well.

The thousands and thousands of miles of electrical wiring and poles, and the huge power stations didn't pop up overnight. Nor will a hydrogen infrastructure. But give it the same time it has taken for the electrical network to become firmly established, and you'll see the difference.
 
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Aussie Pete

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A large part of the reason EV's are taking off faster than hydrogen is that the electricity infrastructure already exists. To get a more realistic comparison you'd need to go back to the days when electricity was just starting to make an impact in cities which mostly relied on gas and wood for energy. Had someone developed an EV then, it wouldn't have sold very well.

The thousands and thousands of miles of electrical wiring and poles, and the huge power stations didn't pop up overnight. Nor will a hydrogen infrastructure. But give it the same time it has taken for the electrical network to become firmly established, and you'll see the difference.
Perhaps. I can see no point in hydrogen for the average vehicle. It may well be feasible for haulage vehicles. Oddly enough, in the very early days of cars, around 40% were electric. Porsche had a car with in wheel motors. Battery tech was so poor that electric could not compete with ICE.
 
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