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| Korea's first hydrogen-powered engine for cars / Courtesy of Korea Institute of Machinery and Materials |
By Holly Chik
Hydrogen will help make fossil fuels obsolete in future transportation, according to Korean scientists who developed the country's first hydrogen-powered car engine, Friday.
The new engine running entirely on green hydrogen could reduce emissions of carbon dioxide and fine dust by 99 percent and 90 percent compared to conventional gasoline engines, according to researchers at the Korea Institute of Machinery and Materials (KIMM) and Hyundai-Kia Motor Company.
They said it would meet the European Union's requirements for new cars and vans to have zero emissions by 2035.
South Korea, the world's eighth-largest energy consumer, is heavily dependent on fossil fuels. It aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 40 percent from the 2018 peak levels by 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality by 2050.
The Yoon administration aims to transition to low-carbon transportation by distributing electric and hydrogen vehicles, converting all diesel trains to electric ones and securing technologies for zero-carbon ships.
It also announced policy tasks to increase the use of electric vehicles and hydrogen cars along with the number of charging stations, as well as promote public transportation.
For example, the capital city is set to launch an unlimited public transportation pass next year in response to the climate crisis. Through the Climate Card, Seoul aims to reduce the number of cars on the road by about 13,000 and curtail greenhouse gas emissions by 32,000 tons annually.
In the three-year collaboration, the joint research team developed a way to inject hydrogen directly into the engine combustion chamber in an existing hybrid vehicle by Hyundai-Kia Motor Company, with a pressure 30 times greater than atmospheric pressure.
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| This new engine running entirely on green hydrogen could reduce emissions of carbon dioxide and fine dust by 99 percent and 90 percent. Courtesy of Korea Institute of Machinery and Materials |
Choi Young, head of the department of mobility power research at government-funded KIMM who led the project, said the future green transportation fleet could be composed of electric vehicles, fuel cell vehicles and hydrogen vehicles, with refilling stations easily accessible.
"Each type of vehicle has its own advantages," Choi said. "We are going to cooperate instead of being in a competition."
Electric vehicles could be more suitable as passenger cars while hydrogen engines and fuel cells could be used to power bigger vehicles such as trucks and buses, he said, considering their respective durability, mileage and cost.
He said the new engine requires hydrogen of lower purity than fuel cells, which generate electricity through an electrochemical reaction of hydrogen with oxygen, reducing the cost of the fuel.
He added that existing gasoline engines could be modified to run on hydrogen fuel, making the hydrogen engine a cost-effective and eco-friendly option.
Kim Yong-rae, a KIMM principal researcher also part of the team, said the collaboration with the Hyundai-Kia Motor Company enabled them to obtain components required for building the new engine thanks to its connections with the industry.
"We needed an injector for hydrogen to deliver the gas directly into the engine. Because of Hyundai, we got it from a component company," he said.
Choi said the team will continue their research to enhance the reliability of the engine and expand the hydrogen direct injection engine technology to bigger vehicles and electricity generation power units.
Holly Chik is a science reporter with the South China Morning Post. She is currently based in Seoul, reporting for both The Korea Times and the South China Morning Post under an exchange program.
