"drainage" of fuel cell vehicle?

The fuel cell vehicle is driven by the energy released from a reaction between hydrogen and oxygen. In chemical equation, the reaction is described by:
2H2 + O2 --> 2H2O ...(1)
The right side of this equation is H2O, meaning that the fuel cell vehicle discharges water of quantity same as the consumed hydrogen.

One day I wondered "how much of water does a fuel cell vehicle discharge"?
Here this post is the answer to myself on this aspect.

h2o-from-fc-vehicles

"MIRAI", developped by Toyota Morter, is one of the commercially available fuel cell vehicle.
According to the website by Toyota Morter Corpoation, MIRAI of the grade G "Excecutive Package" can drive for 152 [km kg-1][1]. By taking the inverse, we learn that MIRAI requires 6.6 [g] of hydrogen molecule to drive for 1 [km]. Because the molecular mass of hydrogen and water molecules are 2.0 and 18, respectively, a fuel cell vehicle generates 59 [g] of water after a drive of 1 [km].

By the way, the volume of hydrogen tank is 141 [L], which can store approximately 5.6 [kg] of hydrogen.
Hence, with a tank full of hydrogen, a fuel cell vehicle can drive for roughly 850 [km] in total (5.6 [kg] * 152 [km kg-1])

The discharge of substantial ammount of water is a unique issue of fuel cell vehicle...? No, the same is true for gasoline-powered vehicle.
Next post calculate the drainage of water by gasoline-powered vehicle.

References

  1. トヨタ自動車株式会社, "燃費(燃料消費率)はどれくらいですか?", https://faq.toyota.jp/faq/show/4914?site_domain=default (accessed on 2022/02/01)
  2. トヨタ自動車株式会社, "水素満充填にはどれくらいの燃料代がかかりますか?", https://faq.toyota.jp/faq/show/4930?site_domain=default (accessed on 2022/02/01)

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