Why is Hydrogen important to my Project

How will I use Hydrogen to fly my airship?

Whilst researching for this project I have been trying to work out how its possible for me to fly my whale airship.

I will be using the same concept in the book about DNA manipulation and applying it to my project.

In the book Leviathan, the airship has been manipulated to exhale the element Hydrogen. Hydrogen is lighter than air and helium which is why Leviathan is able to fly through the skies.

Option One – To allow the whale to fly through the air as an airship I need to harness the hydrogen exhaled from its body so that it reacts with the other elements allowing it to fly. My first thought was to use air pockets from the whale and funnel them into the balloon above, much like an air balloon. These pockets will be sealed off until the ship needs to ascend. When the whale needs to descend, pockets in the balloon open, allowing this to happen.

Option Two – Another option which I can use to fuel my airship is to use an internal combustion engine. “The internal combustion engine is an engine in which the combustion of a fuel (normally a fossil fuel) occurs with an oxidizer (usually air) in a combustion chamber. In an internal combustion engine, the expansion of the high temperature and pressure gases produced by combustion applies direct force to some component of the engine, such as pistons, turbine blades, or a nozzle. This force moves the component over a distance, generating useful mechanical energy.”

Option Three - The third option which I could use to fly the airship would be fuel cells. “A fuel cell is a device that converts the chemical energy from a fuel into electricity through a chemical reaction with oxygen or another oxidizing agent. Hydrogen is the most common fuel, but hydrocarbons such as natural gas and alcohols like methanol are sometimes used. Fuel cells are different from batteries in that they require a constant source of fuel and oxygen to run, but they can produce electricity continually for as long as these inputs are supplied.”