Briefing on Liquid Hydrogen
So we’d like to start uh the round table on liquid hydrogen first I’d like to present to you uh the speaker for today speakers for today on the center Toyota company president Mr Takahashi and uh to your rights racing company a hydrogen project uh manager general manager is and uh to your left
Consideration company and development Mr ogawa so these three will be addressing you today foreign There is going to be an opportunity for you to see uh hydrogen charging uh you can do photo shooting so please I mean I join the tour of the pit hydrogen charging okay Namaste so thank you for the introduction so I am GR in charge of vehicle development my name is
So uh they’re a car that is making a debit today uh liquid hydrogen gr cor Corolla extensions I’d like to talk about the benefit of liquid hydrogen and then get into Q and A hi so for two years uh we have been uh using a gas hydrogen to drive the
Vehicle uh by converting converting that into liquid uh we have made the system very small so now and as the charging could happen with much smaller equipment so now we can charge the fuel inside pitch so because I mean when you’re charging gas I mean uh the racing cargo that
Needs to drive into the parking area uh to get a charging from a huge gas hydrogen charging station now I mean we own the equal Grand with other vehicles as we are now able to charge hydrogen in the pit space so that’s the very big benefit and uh the driving range has
Been uh enhanced we have longer driving range and we have taking steps uh to I mean make the driving range of hydrogen longer and longer another benefit in the first race we wanted to yes I mean uh have uh liquid uh hydrogen but uh we had to miss the race but
Beginning Place uh the two months later so we were able to First further enhance the performance from uh the vehicle that we are trying uh launch in Suzuka so uh that now our car is 50 kg uh lighter than what it used to be when it was ready for Suzuka and one
Of the reasons so we have implemented a solid safety measures to avoid uh fire into our new vehicle so I would like to stop here thank you very much oh so uh yeah let’s go into Q so we have uh two groups so the first 30 minutes will
Be for automotive and uh the second 30 minutes I would be uh economic media but I thought that was a plan but we have everyone here so uh let’s let us not um make that differentiation I mean uh so we’re going to spend six uh the the rest
Of 60 Minutes on any uh type of question and you can ask question in English so I have a question so the safety measure so what are the conditions could we be a bit more specific on what safety measure you have to again so the hydrogen engines so hydrogen I reach the temperature
Where it can’t Inspire so about 550 degrees Celsius measure on that level of temperature so we took we got a grasp on where hydrogen would reach the temperature and we have uh I mean uh set the pipeline as far away uh from uh those high temperature and also uh this
Pipeline pipe piping has coupling and so we took measures so that we do not have any slackness uh in these couplings so we have done a mechanical measure in place on top of that I mean there could be a very small chance of hydrogen leaking so we have detect detector a sensor
Hydrogen sensor which is going to uh I mean when it detects when detecting the leakage they will shut off a hydrogen Supply so how quickly we can get a grasp on the leak using the sensor so that’s the point the speed of detection and the coupling so the cover of the coupling so
There’s a hose attached to the coupling if there’s any leak uh my amount of hydrogen we could detect so we these are the three lines of Defense we have implemented uh for enhancing the safety so the piping I think uh my memory is corrected so you’re using uh uh I mean
Commodity a great pipe piping so did you for instance develop a new parts a coupling Parts a connector a very small molecule and so that’s why it’s easy to leak from any pipe pipe pipings so the coupling or the connector of the pipe so uh we have a coupling which is good for
Moving apart or some of the coupling that we should be using for stationary locations and so we picked the correct material for the coupling so it’s not an exclusive uh development uh for hydrogen purses we have made a careful selection from conventional already existing technology do we have any uh other question okay
Foreign yeah uh vehicle and yes for liquid is low pressure not high pressure So eventually we can make the vehicle lighter than gas so that’s why we will be I mean focused on uh bringing in technology to reduce the weight of the vehicle and one of the big factor
Which is driving the weight increase is the liquid hydrogen pump and the motor to drive that pump so we want to make these two components lighter and we are looking into many different approach on approaches and how we can do that so because -253 degrees Celsius so that’s the
Temperature of the hydrogen so maybe we can yeah we should be using superconductivity technology extremely under extremely low temperature and so that’s why we selected a universities uh which has been long I’ve been developing a super conduction so that we can join force with them to develop a carbon neutral technology so but
Superconduct conduction so in mag lab you would be using helium you could use superconductive conductivity on the hydrogen with hydrogen or are you making development so that is going to happen we can do that at the temperature for hydrogen and also nitrogen so we can do it with a bit
Higher the temperature the technology is being developed so that we need to be used with nitrogen I was a bit higher temperatures so uh of course the liquid surface would erase and go down so when there’s a motor inside so sometimes the motor could be I mean are now above uh the
Liquid level or the temperature conditions going to change so what are the what’s the temperature conditions and what sort of superconduct conductor material we should be using is the island uh what’s the timeline so a superconductor motor so can you start missing that technology from the race
Well in terms of the timeline of course uh this season I think it would be too tough a goal to try to tackle but when it comes to our original thinking when we started to work on this liquid hydrogen we have had many difficulties but there is always like in anything else this
Breakthrough point so you know likewise if we see that breakthrough point then I could accelerate that’s after but it’s going to be a tough job well thank you for the question now next question I have two questions first uh with regard to this hydrogen tank
Um you know this is kind of a natural boiling uh phenomenon and last time I asked about it and you said that to cope with it is one of the issues as a key Point uh how much technological or engineering progress have you made that’s one question and the other is
With regard to uh what I have learned the other day which is with regard to emissions specifically about Knox and there is a comment to the regard of you working on that from the technology development point of view please tell us what your intentions are
There are a couple of ideas we have now maybe two to three ideas but when it comes to the progress uh per se uh we haven’t been able to spend full time uh devoted to the the quest of those issues so we started to you know run the car
And then we will work on them now you know and so the boil of issue Um so this is actually not a new technology but by using a catalyst we will basically turn the gas to water and then it will be you know basically Spilled Out as water and then you know whether it’s liquid or gas when it comes to hydrogen there are
Two things that we need to take a look at one of course so what I’m about to describe is advantage of hydrogen but also a disadvantage which is the fact that you know it could come to a burning point it could Implement that’s a benefit of hydrogen because
From liquid to gas it’s you know easier transformation and you know fire can be started which means it’s being inflammation and when that happens we can lower knocks greatly so that’s a kind of the goal set that we would like to uh Quest and then the other uh is
That this type of gas um it’s good from a emission point of view but uh you know for the capability of the car you know when it’s and when it comes to the three catalysts the original thinking about the gasoline being applied to a hydrogen is this
Other area uh I think at the end of last year we had a round table session where we talked about it a little bit ideally it’s an optimistical thinking is that before the end of this season perhaps we can alter the hardware a bit and start to make progress on this second Point
Okay so are you actually running cars with that technology no it’s not in the current hydrogen Corolla but at one point in time we would like to basically install this so when you do this uh that could be kind of a big step forward mass production is that correct yes
Um you know that would be a kind of opening doors to different models of cars so we would like to be very agile in such a quest and search but as after you know we’ll look at different seasons and then themes will be decided upon depending upon where we see the priority
Thank you very much for this opportunity and you talked about you know launching in the market that I have a question regarding that uh to to go from gas to liquid and it was a release that says that the cruising distance is doubled so per
Um you know per a full tank you know what is the kilometer distance and then the fact that now it’s liquid does it mean that it’s lower fuel you know in the future if everybody you know if this becomes a item in the market everybody will be you know interested in learning the
Economics of it and then lastly the power uh is there a difference between the gas type or the new liquid type Is what we designed for but as I said before there are some engineering issues and legal issues that we need to clear so as of this time maybe 15 laps per a fill up that’s what we are thinking and in terms of the cost of hydrogen well basically what we did is to
Transform the the the way of the physical way of hydrogen of course sometimes gas hydrogen is stored as liquid hydrogen likewise to use Liquid hydrogen in the form of gas hydrogen you know there will be costly involved in each of these steps so it’s not such a clear-cut
Separation as to uh gases higher or you know liquid is higher kind of thing it will depend upon how many times a conversion and whatnot it’s a bit more complex and then in terms of Talk versus gasoline you know Technologically you know by Logic it should be about the same but there’s this emissions issue as we have talked about and then in terms of hydrogen there’s kind of abnormal or unintended uh burning to control you know liquid hydrogen is turned to gas hydrogen uh one is injected into the
Engine so that’s after it’s the sink okay regarding the cost you know of course in terms of transporting the hydrogen liquid is more favorable so you know from the production side to the venues race course liquid would be cheaper is that right well in terms of the specific numbers it
Will depending upon the volume as well so there’s kind of a scale issue economics of scale so I probably should refrain from talking about specific numbers please understand they’ll be appreciated so depending upon the amount used you know the cost in total will certainly change um The the temperature at which such occurs is different between gas and liquid and you know we need to take a look at such effects as well and we’ll observe that during this race and this is uh I have two questions you talked about Knox and and you said you talked about
The lean and that’s of it so usually gas gasoline wise oh hello I thought the logic was uh reverse so if you could please elaborate on that in relation to the temperature and also as takasan talked about as a low temperature is lowered of course the burning characteristics has changed if
You could please elaborate on that point as well but if you can substantially uh make it a lean uh because of the lowering temperature we have a much less now knocks emission and we that’s the range we want to use and what’s the benefit of uh combustion at lower temperature one
Of the issues around abnormal combustion is so uh the inside the chamber if the temperature goes up to up that’s the situation we want to avoid so when do we so so we are going to talk about this um a bit later effect is a liquid uh hydrogen so we can
Inject much lower temperature and that’s the one of the virtue so it’s like oh yes yes the lower the temperature the better so if you use intercooler you have to now use I use water cool down but in case of uh it’s like super conduction so it’s
Already cold so I mean let’s use that super cold temperature I mean so that’s a concept thank you please oh do you have a microphone um So what’s the level of development is in terms of especially in terms of cost who when we compare liquid hydrogen and uh and also the mass production s in terms of mass production the liquid hydrogen and the fuel tank of a vehicle how are you going to keep
The temperature very low inside a mass production environment inside a fuel tank of uh normal vehicle thank you for the question as a cost comparison with FC engine so hydrogen engine is a pilot production so it’s very expensive but now also the expectation of cost at mass production so hydrogen engine do
Not use battery so we don’t it doesn’t have to use rare US which is expensive so that’s the cost benefit and you can take the convert I mean existing iice engine to convert that into hydrogen so you can leverage on the existing IC so I can think there’s a quite a potential for
Bringing down the cost of hydrogen ice temperature we are going to use the insulation uh like a thermostat to keep the temperature low foreign how are they how is it different between gas and liquid hydrogen because I asked the question to the driver is there any change so the recovery
After I mean uh and releasing attacks the gas pedal is a bit difficult that’s what the driver told me so and uh my second question is very simple question so you take a liquid so you say are you uh and you say you charge the hydrogen so in a high so
If you can come up with the right uh how should I say terminology for this charging or foreign the charging from something else so when we are supplying gas into the vehicle uh and versus liquid into the vehicle so yes we have longer lap time and uh so
That’s maybe due to a party uh yes part of the reason why we are the liquid hydrogen is slower is uh because of power because if you compare it with uh the 24 hours race last year uh we have uh made the output and talk a bit lower
So the earlier question so what’s the performance difference between the gas and Market hydrogen theoreticalization should not be a difference however but the liquid hydrogen technology uh for this race so there are three technology challenges for liquid hydrogen how are you going to keep the liquid at super low temperatures first
Challenge and in the Second Challenge a pump to drive the liquid so efficiency and performance of the pump matters very much and now we and that control is the third uh technology challenge performance efficiency and gasification so that’s that’s still a very difficult challenge we are I mean uh yes tackling
The issue with everyone’s effort now so last year we used to do this with gas absolutely so the compression pressure of our supply and hydrogen uh is we are bringing that down for this race see that means I mean so the volume of hydrogen we can supply into the engine
Is a bit smaller so that’s why the performance is a bit lower and uh season we will be uh making an enhancement here to little by little I enhance the performance of the current Powertrain do you think [Laughter] We should probably work on technology but I’ll work with the PR department and get back to you on that thank you very much so this is foreign I think at one more time you’ll be able to further your efficiency by controlling this amount of pressure right yes very much so
I mean in a supply of hydrogen you know there’s a time and the amount of the hydrogen and of course when the temperature goes higher the density vehicles of course have this control over how much hydrogen is basically pulled in and at the time of low temperature control situation driver
Would feel that the performance of the car is different so this is a point that we will be able to manipulate in the future hopefully you talked about the characteristics in response to the question earlier but at the same time I was thinking compared to one year ago uh it’s only four
Seconds is it and of course this uh 50 kilogram production is a part of that so I think aside from the power train or since the beginning of this year there are other alterations right like for example I see that the body work is different so I wonder if you can
Elaborate on the types of improvements that you have made on the vehicle itself first of all when it comes to the full wheels of course we’ve trained ourselves in terms of the technology with regard to four wheel drive the most important thing is for the driver to feel that the
Opera ability is good and that is direct to the timing in other words as a performance and then when a car is in a race for you know one year two years of course there will be kind of a natural timing as to the Bodywork redone or
Suspension being reworked on and so I think the Corolla itself is you know Generation by generation of course improving and then what we learn on the race front is of course used in a cars that we sell in the market well please elaborate on the four-wheel drive thing
You know how cute how could you add to the speed then I was just thinking about some of the previous you know predecessors effort when it comes to gaining speed with regard to come who specifically studies four-wheel drive but in short at the corner cornering work there needs to be a very
Good kind of a Talk balance and a stepping of the pedal to do the cornering work and then from Yaris to Corolla of course the weight of the vehicle is different so we need to be a you know sensitive to the specific car it’s currently optimized
So I think drivability is better as a result and it’s kind of a you know sub creation of what we did kind of a positive side effect this is I have kind of a common people’s point of views in terms of uh how hydrogen is produced it transported and used yeah
You know different colors Technologies in terms of the teams and then how is the hydrogen made the production how to produce the hydrogen that’s quite important indeed of course we are on the used side of hydrogen um heavy industry just to give another example and also Australia’s They have a liquid hydrogen that they put on ship and we have sea transportation and those are the types of hydrogen that we are using now now when it comes to here Japan going forward it’s difficult to be able to foodie yourself supplying with regard to hydrogen so I think to
Import hydrogen to Japan so it’s a important issue as well so with Corolla we like to tackle that you know aspect as well I hope that sufficient answer to your question and I would like to uh when it comes to produce this green blues and in the future of course we want to
Go to green green beaning renewable energy source to hydrogen it’s ideal but currently we don’t think that we’re at the right stage to do that just yet I think we are at the stage rather to make our team bigger we want more peers to join in in this efforts and of course
Last year in the super endurance race there are different sources uh like uh but in terms of the use of the hydrogen we are on the very Forefront of it we want to use hydrogen in an effective way and but of course there are um you know
Team members in this big challenge uh whose industry is more in the production or Transportation at the same time this what’s important is for us to continue to have this wide range of options uh we shouldn’t kind of narrow down our options and that’s where we stand now but thank you very much
As I said at the very beginning of the session we thought that we will make this session into two tier but you know we are going to ask questions um you know of any sort uh all together here you know some of these people some of the questions might be regarding the
The very kind of a basic concept um or from an economic impact point of view please come forward with your questions and it’s probably more expert geared questions what kind of person this is um you know it’s a liquid now and what is the package or the vehicle
How is it now because you’re using liquid hydrogen to give it a conclusion first the precious metal um being a part of the processing you know it’s the same actually as before and we have FIA Consulting process to come to this point and in order to be fully a
Safety concerned within the body you know this is the place and then it’s covered by carbon box and for the safety this is a must-have feature so this is separate from the mass production point of view and it’s easier to handle when it comes to you know liquid
Hydrogen for vehicles there’s no legal framework per se so for us to do this now we use the container of liquid hydrogen guidelines to design our vehicle using hydrogen in liquid form but eventually there will be you know regulatory or legal framework so we need to be Consulting with the authority
So if you can more freely design the shape of the fuel tank so what can you assume for the vehicle if it’s a gas if it’s gas so the tank format uh needed to be cylinder cylindrical so like uh you uh so you had a pilot model uh with a
Couple of SUV where the tank was uh beneath the floor so what are the uh the possibilities that we could that would open up was the liquid the hydrogen so you have seen Corolla class uh SUV so high pressure a tank it’s cylindrical so you need to have a multiple uh
Cylindrical tanks if you can use no pressure to use different shapes you can have only one single tank which could it should have an oval uh and if you can integrate all the fuel uh we could make use of space more efficiently because we don’t have to
Worry about the spaces in between not the tanks so this would be this would be the encampment of the package performance overall so just to avoid misunderstandings so you can yeah have very different shapes of a tank uh besides cylinders but it’s not 100 so because it’s going
To pick up temperature from uh outside so uh so a different shape a fuel tank would make it difficult for us to keep maintain the temperature lower so just having a deregulation on the same tank would not absorb all the issues so we have been talking about
This for a while we are focused on um so we need to have progress and the vehicle technology and Regulation and environment so these three are progress needs to happen more at more or less equal speed any other question how many minutes and which timing of the race are you expecting to replace
Uh that’s going to make the audience more happy because we know where to focus okay so as you may have expected so mechanic and engineer had made a practice on the replacement so 3.5 hours it’s going to take 3.5 hours uh to replace the pump because we need to safely discharge all the
Hydrogen then we have to I mean uh replace that with a in a gas it was nitrogen then I’ll take out the pump tank from the pump pump of the tank and then we discharge the nitrogen and then refill it it was hydrogen so these are
The steps that we to go through so it’s going to take 3.5 hours so that’s our expectations so that’s the best case and after five six hours uh we will need to make a pipe with a replacement every five six hours of driving no The driving distance per charge much longer so uh we have done an endurance uh test on the charger so I don’t think there’s any issue with the durability of the charging station now comparing that to gasoline so the driving range it’s not I mean as long as gasoline ice that’s a fact
Energy density increase the energy density of hydrogen above the current level so that means we need to I mean increase the capacity of the fuel tank driving range so how can we fit as large possible fuel tanks into particular Corolla and that’s why we want to use a different shaped tank than cylindrical
Tank thank you and you can ask your question in English the translation would be provided consecutively if you need to you can ask your question in English foreign that’s a positive expectation it’s a welcome and I really uh thank you I would like to thank you
So and uh what’s a word on yes yes so we need to prepare ourselves for the next 100 years how we can bring more energy into more Sports foreign to get into mass production carrying as much hydrogen as possible would be the only way to increase
This would be true for FCB the more hydrogen uh vehicle can carry longer the driving range that would be true for both technology how we are utilizing these two different types of Technology there are strengths and weaknesses so it depends on how the drivers are using the car whether they should be
Selected fuel cell and high hydrogen ICS and we have started analyzing uh that and we would like to yes find an exit strategy in that sense in that from that perspective thank you very much we have another question okay sorry I kind of go back to some of the
Earlier q a you talked about superconductivity and when the motor is you know made into smaller sizes you know it’s one feature or the outcome what are other outcomes by the use of superconductivity what are the benefits and effects that you are looking to realize please be specific
In terms of how small we can make it into we were still in the process of studying of course there are different types of motors and depending upon the vehicle of course the choice of the motor is made and thus the limit as to how much smaller the model can be made is
More or less determined but it’s like half you know by rough cut image or even smaller so the superconductivity will realize you know very much small size and very much lightweight I see so elsewhere is their performance benefit and of course when it’s lighter uh you know that would help to enlengthen the
Cruising distance but what about the performance itself well the other uh Advantage is that it doesn’t create heat you know when it’s a superconductivity the heat is not generating thus a lot of uh current uh can go through and when we use this superconductivity technology in combination with You know conductivity that is issue but such doesn’t happen wait that’s all foreign twice I believe is it going to be the same or is there a different types of pumps used the second time around when it comes to liquid hand pump um in terms of what the challenges are
Let me address that first when it comes to the post there are two types Is to higher the pressure Minus 253 degree environment we’ve done different case studies and have come up with what we think is the optimal uh available and when it comes to the engine a direct type and then to increase the pressure when it comes to hydrogen is very difficult because it’s molecule size so small and the Piston
Um in molecules because they’re small or kind of slip through the Piston so that was one of the big challenges that we have put a lot of effort into it and then you have talked about this uh twice replacement although it’s the same um it’s the same home because we think
That what we have is probably the best so far I don’t know in terms of a design and there’s this uh um And behind all the businesses to the manufacturing way of thinking next question will be the final question has 148 liters I see thank you right at the time to close this session uh thank you very much for joining this round table we appreciate your attention
Toyota City, Japan, May 27, 2023―Toyota Motor Corporation (Toyota) will enter the ENEOS Super Taikyu Series 2023 Round 2 NAPAC Fuji SUPER TEC 24 Hours Race, to be held from May 26 to 28, with the #32 ORC ROOKIE GR Corolla H2 Concept (hydrogen-powered Corolla) running on liquid hydrogen. It is the first time in the world that a vehicle will race with liquid hydrogen fuel.
More information: https://global.toyota/en/newsroom/corporate/39234866.html
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