"Fuel cell" "e-fuels" and "biofuels" are getting used by companies like they mean the same thing, which is both confusing and just like, deceptive and I get asked about them a lot so let's have a thread about the differences

a fuel cell is at its most basic: a bag of fuel. arguably, a pack of monster much is a fuel cell for a human being.

petrol tanks are fuel cells, the things in the back of F1 cars are fuel cells but a hydrogen fuel cell is an alternative to an EV battery, stores electricity

you can make hydrogen out of water using electricity to split the H2 and O - it's not a very efficient process rn but what you end up with can be stored in a tank (or 'fuel cell') and then used to react with oxygen in the air to re-generate electricity, like a refillable battery

that's obviously a different bit of tech to a petrol tank but *technically* both are fuel cells (even though people usually mean the hydrogen one when they say that)

which is how "methanol fuel cells" appear to have turned up as a thing: https://www.greencarcongress.com/2020/12/20201221-blueworld.html

Methanol is an alcohol that can be either synthesised out of hydrogen and CO2 or made out of organic materials (eg: compost/food waste) - it's poisonous (it's what makes you go blind in moonshine) but very combustible so is used as a mixer in petrol for road and race cars

"methanol fuel cell" as a consequence means both "putting methanol in a petrol tank" (kinda, requires adaptation) AND a process where methanol is used as a way of storing hydrogen, which is then converted to power a fuel cell vehicle (which is good)

without getting into the sticky bits: basically methanol itself does not generate electricity but a methanol-to-hydrogen reformer is possible to put in a car

it's not really at all efficient, except that it's made from waste that would go to methane anyway and is a source of H2

so that's methanol-to-hydrogen to power an EV

there's ALSO e-fuel, which is hydrogen-to-methanol

-H2 is split from water
-CO2 taken from the atmosphere
-the two are combined to form synthetic methanol
-which can then be refined to a non-oil-based petrol

it's still petrol tho

if companies generate the H2 for e-fuels from renewable energy and are reclaiming CO2 responsibly, then it is better than using petrochemicals

it's expensive and not going to generate the same volumes as crude oil but it could be a band-aid for combustion; not a fix but a cover

(tbh I hate it and I think all the money currently being spent on it is bullcrap because if we could make that much H2 on a reasonable scale we could just move to fuel cell EVs but anyway)

then there's biofuels, which is essentially methanol-to-methanol

methanol can be made from pretty much anything [your chemistry GCSE alert] because it's just hydrogen and carbon and oxygen and those are basically what most stuff is

methanol for vehicles can be recovered from awful things we do like landfill and capturing it as fuel is way better than letting it go - although it's cheaper and lazier to make it from crops, which is *much* worse so always check your methanol's providence with your sommelier...

it already gets used as a fuel mix for vehicles but hasn't always been a massive success and is a bit controversial but methanol-as-a-biofuel is basically just burning a different thing

again, better than using more crude oil (if it's recovered from waste) but not always good

anyway there's lots more to be said about all of this but there's a short and hopefully straightforward description of something that's being used suspiciously disingenuously and is a hot topic atm.

shouldn't have done this before I'd finished my cup of coffee but just on the methanol fuel cell thing an additional downside is that using methanol to store H2 means fuel cells go from byproducts: water to byproducts: water AND CO2 which defeats the point of it all a bit.