Toyota Ammonia Engine

I didn't see any thread about this yet, but I just saw Toyota claims that they are going to kill off EVs with their new ammonia engine.

Toyota Takes Aim at EVs With Ammonia Engine

Seems like they are trying to do anything but electrify their fleet. The most common process used today to make ammonia is the Haber-Bosch process which costs about $3.50/gal to produce.

Ammonia production costs? - Thunder Said Energy

The process also produces a fair bit of CO2. There are some other processes that are in the lab that could potentially produce ammonia cheaper and without the CO2 production, but those processes are not available today. The Haber-Bosch process will be with us for a while.

Ammonia is also not very energy dense compared to gasoline. Gasoline has about 33 KWh/Gal of energy, but ammonia only has about 9 KWh/gal. If an ICE that burns ammonia has the same efficiency as a gasoline ICE the car is going to have 1/4 the fuel efficiency of a gas ICE today everything else being equal (same size, weight, etc.) So ammonia ICE will have to have 4X the gas tank size to get the same range.

This seems in some ways loonier than hydrogen fuel cell cars. At least those cars are taking advantage of a technology that is already working. The new ammonia ICE is in the prototype stage and has had to overcome a lot of obstacles because ammonia burns differently than gasoline.

Just like the processes to make ammonia in other ways is years from seeing the market, so is this engine. Meanwhile BEVs will be steadily increasing in market share during the years Toyota is burning on this tech.

There have been some ideas for using ammonia made with solar energy in places that will have an over abundance like Australia to fuel ocean going ships. We will need something other than batteries for that. BEV ships are going to be limited to short run ships like ferries. They are not well suited for ocean going vessels. But for ground transportation we have a perfectly viable propulsion type with BEVs. BEVs are not universally suited to all ground transport needs, some kind of ICE might still be used in places like the Australian Outback and some remote areas in North America (we never got rid of horses for all transport needs, but we did replace most of them with ICE), but BEVs will eventually be used for almost all ground transport applications (once we have enough battery production).

I'm not sure Toyota is going to survive the transition to BEVs. They seem to be overly focused on coming up with some cunning plan to keep the existing infrastructure with a new fuel source flowing in it instead of accepting the reality that BEVs are the future.

"Toyota" by danielctw is licensed under CC BY 2.0.
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[dm121721]

Here's what an ammonia leak looks like from the air:

CDC: Twice as many affected by Beach Park ammonia leak than initially thought; confusion about ‘smoke’ led to more injuries

A lack of communication led to healthcare providers and first-responders exposing themselves to a toxic gas after the release of an agricultural fertilizer in Beach Park, according to a CDC report.

www.chicagotribune.com

This happened in 2019 not to far from me. I read a later article about how most of the trees in the area have since died.

Here's a more recent ammonia leak:

5 who died from ammonia exposure after semi crash near Teutopolis ID'd by medical examiner

An attempt to pass a tanker may have led to the deadly chemical crash, an official said.

abc7chicago.com

 

[Doggydogworld]

it should be the other way around then---should be developing solar & nuclear to have independence.

Japan was a nuclear power leader in the '90s, getting 30% of their electricity from nuclear (compare to US at less than 20% today). They were also active in next-gen reactor R&D. Accidents and coverups, e.g. Monju and Tokaimura, shook public confidence over the years. Fukushima was the death knell.

 

[cbdream99]

Unlikely to work any time soon.

https://www.motortrend.com/news/china-gac-ammonia-powered-internal-combustion-engine-car-innovation/

 

[bruce4000]

My family used to be a diehard Toyota family. Their dealers basically forced me to look elsewhere which is what led me to Tesla. Gotta say I’m forever grateful for that and given Toyota‘s latest round of BS news releases I can’t see going back unless they really pull a rabbit outta their a$$!

At this point I don’t trust Toyota to develop / deploy new technology. My son bought a RAV4 Prime and he got a recall letter in July.saying his car is being recalled because of a fire risk in the dc-dc converter that can happen when charging below 41F. Now it’s mid October and he lives in New England with winter approaching and no word from Toyota yet. Actually dc-dc converters are not exactly new tech, WTF? So a new Ammonia engine, not buying it.

 

[father_of_6]

I think ammonia is more realistic.

There's zero chance anyone's going to be okay using ammonia to fuel their vehicles. Hydrogen, the general public might accept (even though it's folly compared to BEV), but folks have a preconceived notion of ammonia as a toxic gas. Not happening.

 

[AC Traction]

Toyota's marketing preys upon the uninformed. Around here, their commercials are still pushing their "electrified" lineup which are mostly straight hybrids with a few PHEV models sprinkled in. Earlier this year, they were pushing their hybrids as being smarter and better than BEVs, because "they charge automatically. It's genius!" like nobody's ever thought of that before.

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

There's zero chance anyone's going to be okay using ammonia to fuel their vehicles. Hydrogen, the general public might accept (even though it's folly compared to BEV), but folks have a preconceived notion of ammonia as a toxic gas. Not happening.

Re-read the post on which I commented.

 

[Rocket_man]

Perhaps Japan is working on Hybrids and other transportation solutions because they have very few of their own natural resources. They need to import most of their gas/oil/natural gas from other countries. China produces cheaper batteries because the CCP gives almost free money to companies developing advanced battery production technology.
US perhaps has the best home field advantage. Venture funding for promising technology, flexible customers and perhaps some of the most brilliant minds in the World. We have tremendous oil reserves and the technology to produce them.

There are a lot of hybrid cars in Japan. And I've seen a few Tesla's last year when we were visiting. Not many. More likely to see a Ferrari or Lamborghini than a Tesla. And I've never seen a DC fast charger of any kind. I know they exist, I've just never seen one. A friend of mine would love to get a Tesla but he doesn't know where he'd charge it. Once the Japanese Auto industry was the fast-moving innovators that disrupted the big three and eventually bankrupted GM. Now the shoe is on the other foot and China will do to them what Japan did to the US.

 

[Todd Burch]

At first I was against this, but now I’m rooting for Toyota on this idea.

I have three cats. If Toyota goes forward with the ammonia engine, I realized we can empty out the litter box, install a strainer and a pump at the bottom, then pump the remaining cat pee directly into the tank.

Should be good for a gallon of free fuel a month. That sounds good to me.

 

[shahryaran]

I didn't see any thread about this yet, but I just saw Toyota claims that they are going to kill off EVs with their new ammonia engine.

Toyota Takes Aim at EVs With Ammonia Engine

Seems like they are trying to do anything but electrify their fleet. The most common process used today to make ammonia is the Haber-Bosch process which costs about $3.50/gal to produce.

Ammonia production costs? - Thunder Said Energy

The process also produces a fair bit of CO2. There are some other processes that are in the lab that could potentially produce ammonia cheaper and without the CO2 production, but those processes are not available today. The Haber-Bosch process will be with us for a while.

Ammonia is also not very energy dense compared to gasoline. Gasoline has about 33 KWh/Gal of energy, but ammonia only has about 9 KWh/gal. If an ICE that burns ammonia has the same efficiency as a gasoline ICE the car is going to have 1/4 the fuel efficiency of a gas ICE today everything else being equal (same size, weight, etc.) So ammonia ICE will have to have 4X the gas tank size to get the same range.

This seems in some ways loonier than hydrogen fuel cell cars. At least those cars are taking advantage of a technology that is already working. The new ammonia ICE is in the prototype stage and has had to overcome a lot of obstacles because ammonia burns differently than gasoline.

Just like the processes to make ammonia in other ways is years from seeing the market, so is this engine. Meanwhile BEVs will be steadily increasing in market share during the years Toyota is burning on this tech.

There have been some ideas for using ammonia made with solar energy in places that will have an over abundance like Australia to fuel ocean going ships. We will need something other than batteries for that. BEV ships are going to be limited to short run ships like ferries. They are not well suited for ocean going vessels. But for ground transportation we have a perfectly viable propulsion type with BEVs. BEVs are not universally suited to all ground transport needs, some kind of ICE might still be used in places like the Australian Outback and some remote areas in North America (we never got rid of horses for all transport needs, but we did replace most of them with ICE), but BEVs will eventually be used for almost all ground transport applications (once we have enough battery production).

I'm not sure Toyota is going to survive the transition to BEVs. They seem to be overly focused on coming up with some cunning plan to keep the existing infrastructure with a new fuel source flowing in it instead of accepting the reality that BEVs are the future.

View attachment 982134
"Toyota" by danielctw is licensed under CC BY 2.0.
Admin note: Imaged added for Blog Feed thumbnail

If it has exhaust, it's a thing in the past

 

[BigNick]

At first I was against this, but now I’m rooting for Toyota on this idea.

I have three cats. If Toyota goes forward with the ammonia engine, I realized we can empty out the litter box, install a strainer and a pump at the bottom, then pump the remaining cat pee directly into the tank.

Should be good for a gallon of free fuel a month. That sounds good to me.

I think this is proof that Toyota is run by a shadow cat conspiracy.

Their goal is to make the entire world a litterbox.

Beware the Furluminati.

 

[THEbuz]

I didn't see any thread about this yet, but I just saw Toyota claims that they are going to kill off EVs with their new ammonia engine.

Toyota Takes Aim at EVs With Ammonia Engine

Seems like they are trying to do anything but electrify their fleet. The most common process used today to make ammonia is the Haber-Bosch process which costs about $3.50/gal to produce.

Ammonia production costs? - Thunder Said Energy

The process also produces a fair bit of CO2. There are some other processes that are in the lab that could potentially produce ammonia cheaper and without the CO2 production, but those processes are not available today. The Haber-Bosch process will be with us for a while.

Ammonia is also not very energy dense compared to gasoline. Gasoline has about 33 KWh/Gal of energy, but ammonia only has about 9 KWh/gal. If an ICE that burns ammonia has the same efficiency as a gasoline ICE the car is going to have 1/4 the fuel efficiency of a gas ICE today everything else being equal (same size, weight, etc.) So ammonia ICE will have to have 4X the gas tank size to get the same range.

This seems in some ways loonier than hydrogen fuel cell cars. At least those cars are taking advantage of a technology that is already working. The new ammonia ICE is in the prototype stage and has had to overcome a lot of obstacles because ammonia burns differently than gasoline.

Just like the processes to make ammonia in other ways is years from seeing the market, so is this engine. Meanwhile BEVs will be steadily increasing in market share during the years Toyota is burning on this tech.

There have been some ideas for using ammonia made with solar energy in places that will have an over abundance like Australia to fuel ocean going ships. We will need something other than batteries for that. BEV ships are going to be limited to short run ships like ferries. They are not well suited for ocean going vessels. But for ground transportation we have a perfectly viable propulsion type with BEVs. BEVs are not universally suited to all ground transport needs, some kind of ICE might still be used in places like the Australian Outback and some remote areas in North America (we never got rid of horses for all transport needs, but we did replace most of them with ICE), but BEVs will eventually be used for almost all ground transport applications (once we have enough battery production).

I'm not sure Toyota is going to survive the transition to BEVs. They seem to be overly focused on coming up with some cunning plan to keep the existing infrastructure with a new fuel source flowing in it instead of accepting the reality that BEVs are the future.

View attachment 982134
"Toyota" by danielctw is licensed under CC BY 2.0.
Admin note: Imaged added for Blog Feed thumbnail

For the record, I’m all in on BEV’s. That said, I wanted to point out that you can’t decry the cost of producing ammonia today without considering economies of scale. If ammonia were produced in a volume that compares with gasoline production today, then I have no doubt that the cost of production for ammonia would come down dramatically.

I agree with you that Toyota may not survive the EV revolution if they continue down this path. I mean, at the very least, I can’t see why they wouldn’t do what FORD did and split the company into two divisions: One division to focus on EV technology and the other division to focus on ammonia technology.

My question is to what extent is ammonia more abundant than crude oil? While you’ve claimed that ammonia engines do emit some CO2, I would love to see a comparison of the total CO2 emissions over the average life of a BEV versus the average life of a vehicle with an ammonia engine. We know that BEV’s result in greater CO2 emissions than ICE vehicles prior to the point-of-sale, so it would stand to reason that the production of a vehicle with an ammonia engine should also emit less emissions than the production of a BEV. Given that, I wonder if a vehicle with an ammonia engine would emit less CO2 than a BEV over the life of the vehicle.

 

[Bikeman]

Big, giant, smelly, dark and expansive ammonia production facilities, with thousands of citizens as indentured or slave laborers, as a sub plot, sound right out of some dystopian future sci-fi movie starring all the usual actors of that genre. I hope we're not there yet, nor are ever going there, as a society.

 

[wdolson]

For the record, I’m all in on BEV’s. That said, I wanted to point out that you can’t decry the cost of producing ammonia today without considering economies of scale. If ammonia were produced in a volume that compares with gasoline production today, then I have no doubt that the cost of production for ammonia would come down dramatically.

I agree with you that Toyota may not survive the EV revolution if they continue down this path. I mean, at the very least, I can’t see why they wouldn’t do what FORD did and split the company into two divisions: One division to focus on EV technology and the other division to focus on ammonia technology.

My question is to what extent is ammonia more abundant than crude oil? While you’ve claimed that ammonia engines do emit some CO2, I would love to see a comparison of the total CO2 emissions over the average life of a BEV versus the average life of a vehicle with an ammonia engine. We know that BEV’s result in greater CO2 emissions than ICE vehicles prior to the point-of-sale, so it would stand to reason that the production of a vehicle with an ammonia engine should also emit less emissions than the production of a BEV. Given that, I wonder if a vehicle with an ammonia engine would emit less CO2 than a BEV over the life of the vehicle.

Ammonia is an important industrial chemical being a major component of one of the most common fertilizers. Ammonia is also a component of common explosives too. The raw starting ingredient to make ammonia with the Haber-Bosch process (the most common way to make it today) is methane and water. The carbon from the methane is released into the air as CO2. There are some new methods in the lab to make ammonia that might prove it possible to make ammonia without producing CO2, but nobody is using those methods commercially and probably won't be for a decade or more.

Pretty much nothing matches gasoline production for volume, but ammonia is one of the world's most produced chemicals today. They have the scale thing pretty well in hand. The world produces about 343 billion gallons of gasoline a year, but worldwide ammonia production is around 6.54 billion gallons. Almost 2 orders of magnitude less, but I don't think there are many big gains in the remaining gap. Ammonia production is high enough to be getting pretty close to maximum efficiency.

Because of the Haber-Bosch's output of CO2, until there are better ways to make ammonia at scale, the process of producing ammonia is going to be CO2 intensive. It's estimated that ammonia production today accounts for 1% of all CO2 production. Scale up to gasoline production levels and you're getting CO2 outputs equal to about 50% of all CO2 produced from human activity today.

BEVs today are running on electricity generated from coal and natural gas, so the tail for driving a BEV is not CO2 free unless you are sure all your energy comes from renewable sources. However, the CO2 output from a power plant is less per energy unit in than an ICE. To get the fuel for an ICE it needs to be refined, which has outputs and then burning it in the car is only going to be about 10% efficient. Power plants usually need less refined fuel than cars and even the worst quality coal is around 50% efficient when you burn it to make electricity. Natural gas is around 70 or 80% I think if I remember right. I last saw the figures a couple of years ago. I do clearly remember one type of coal was the least efficient and it was around 50%.

 

[dbeiler]

There are a lot of hybrid cars in Japan. And I've seen a few Tesla's last year when we were visiting. Not many. More likely to see a Ferrari or Lamborghini than a Tesla. And I've never seen a DC fast charger of any kind. I know they exist, I've just never seen one. A friend of mine would love to get a Tesla but he doesn't know where he'd charge it. Once the Japanese Auto industry was the fast-moving innovators that disrupted the big three and eventually bankrupted GM. Now the shoe is on the other foot and China will do to them what Japan did to the US.

Japan's EV infrastructure is aging as market fails to take off

Rising number of closures of charging stations delays spread of electric cars

asia.nikkei.com

Japan was the first country to make an actual effort to install an EV charging infrastructure. Now the infrastructure is aging and the country is having a hard time justifying replacement. Imagine being a Japanese automotive executive, driving past all the empty and aging chargers, on the way to work where you need to answer questions such as: why aren't you all in on EVs?

 

[Chunky Jr.]

Ammonia? I guess those straws aren't going to grasp themselves.

 

[MC3OZ]

Japan's EV infrastructure is aging as market fails to take off

Rising number of closures of charging stations delays spread of electric cars

asia.nikkei.com

Japan was the first country to make an actual effort to install an EV charging infrastructure. Now the infrastructure is aging and the country is having a hard time justifying replacement. Imagine being a Japanese automotive executive, driving past all the empty and aging chargers, on the way to work where you need to answer questions such as: why aren't you all in on EVs?

Tesla has around 93 Superchargers in Japan, however for driving around a local city, slower charging for 50 kW fast charging is adequate.

Moreover, about 60% of high-speed chargers in Japan have an output of less than 50 kilowatts, while 250 to 350 kW chargers, which enable faster charging, are mainly used in Europe and the U.S. Most chargers in Japan have only a single port, forcing drivers to wait in line at busy stations such as those on expressways.

Anything Japan does with hydrogen or ammonia will not help their export markets.

If Japan can't sell EVs to the Japanese, they are going to find it hard to export them in sufficient volumes to maintain a significant global market share.

So that Japanese executive driving past all of the empty and aging EV chargers might be thinking, "That is a metaphor which sums up our car industry".

 

[dbeiler]

The Nissan Leaf and Mitsu Mivec were the only two EVs readily available to the Japanese a decade ago when the country had that big push to install an EV charging infrastructure. In hindsight, it seems like complete insanity to install a country-wide charging system for these two cars that were barely even worthy of the term 'car'. Was the Japanese government running on completely blind faith that the auto corporations would suddenly start pumping out desirable EVs?

 

[MC3OZ]

The Nissan Leaf and Mitsu Mivec were the only two EVs readily available to the Japanese a decade ago when the country had that big push to install an EV charging infrastructure. In hindsight, it seems like complete insanity to install a country-wide charging system for these two cars that were barely even worthy of the term 'car'. Was the Japanese government running on completely blind faith that the auto corporations would suddenly start pumping out desirable EVs?

Compact vehicles with limited range should have had reasonable success in Japan.

However, a bigger issue is the lack of meaningful progress over the decade.

Tesla and BYD have made a lot of progress over the decade, significant progress from Japan is harder to identify.

 

[Rocket_man]

Some of those older chargers may be CHAdeMO. I did a Google Maps search on Tesla Superchargers near my mother-in-law in the greater Tokyo area. 25 minutes away and only 4 stalls. Home charging though really makes more sense if you have a car in the Tokyo area. Most people don't have a need for a car in Tokyo. Outside the big metro areas you need a car but as been mentioned, not a lot of charging infrastructure for distance driving. Plug in Hybrids may make for sense for Japan but most people don't actually plug in their PIH on a daily basis and that makes the car pretty inefficient. I don't know what is going to happen to Japan's domestic auto makers, but it is not looking good. Thier US plants will eventually make EV, their Japan plants make ICE cars for domestic consumption. In a country with a shrinking population.