LA Times: Carmakers prepare to shift to hydrogen fuel cells

[nationalize the fed]

Toyota Hydrogen Electric Fuel Cell Concept Car Interior

Carmakers prepare to shift to hydrogen fuel cells
Charles Fleming LA Times October 26,2014

Concerned about slow sales of electric cars and plug-in hybrids, automakers are increasingly betting the future of green cars on hydrogen fuel cell technology.

Even Toyota Motor Corp., maker of the popular Prius gas-electric hybrid, will use hydrogen instead of batteries to power its next generation of green vehicles.

"Today, Toyota actually favors fuel cells over other zero-emission vehicles, like pure battery electric vehicles," said Craig Scott, the company's national manager of advanced technologies. "We would like to be still selling cars when there's no more gas. And no one is coming to our door asking us to build a new electric car."...


"We would like to be still selling cars when there’s no more gas. And no one is coming to our door asking us to build a new electric car,” said Toyota’s Craig Scott. (Bob Chamberlin, Los Angeles Times)


...Hydrogen fuel cells are designed to power electric motors much the way batteries do. But instead of storing their energy in a battery pack that takes hours to recharge, the fuel-cell vehicles store hydrogen gas in an onboard tank that can be refilled in minutes, just like a gasoline tank... Poppe believes the future is hydrogen, because fuel cell vehicles address the two main shortcomings of today's battery-powered cars: short driving range and long recharging times.

Car companies agree...>
MORE: http://www.latimes.com/business/autos/la-fi-hy-fuel-cell-cars-20141026-story.html#page=1

"Hydrogen Claptrap"

[caraher]

1. Yup. More claptrap

It's clear that hydrogen is more congenial to the business model of traditional automakers. Yes, electric cars have comparatively short range and it takes longer to charge them than it would take to fill a hydrogen tank.

But for the foreseeable future, hydrogen has a negligible refueling infrastructure and building it to a robust level will be vastly more expensive than creating a comparable network of fast charging stations. The dominant source for hydrogen will continue to be methane, so large-scale hydrogen car use will continue to drive increased demand for natural gas. (Yes, we know, electric cars also use fossil fuels when the power plants used to charge them do...)

It would be naïve at best to assume that an automaker's preference for hydrogen means its widespread use is wise policy. Should range and refueling time be the most important performance measures? Only if one is trying to forestall adoption of a competing technology inferior on only those two benchmarks.