With the debate still raging over electric cars vs. hydrogen cars, BBC’s Top Gear recently drove the Tesla Roadster followed later by the Honda FCX Clarity. They proclaimed Honda’s FCX Clarity “the most important car in 100 years.” They interviewed Jay Leno in the same program. He calls it “the savior of cars.”
I don’t believe that hydrogen vehicles are still years and years away. See for yourself:
Tags: electric, FCX Clarity, honda, hydrogen
Now I could get into that car. I wonder what the MSRP will be for thise? This puts the standard electric car in the rearview mirror…
I’m digging the consumption ball/light thing.
I’m curious with supposed water shortages, how that would affect the amount of fuel available for the cars..
Ben, have you done much in the way of research on hydrogen stations?
Hydrogen cars require an array of hydrogen filling stations equal in number to the number of gas stations in the US, about 150,000.
It takes four times as much energy to produce, transport and store hydrogen as it does to transmit electricity.
In order for hydrogen fuel cells to become affordable, about a half dozen huge technological breakthroughs have to occur.
For battery electric vehicles to become practical, well, they already are. To become cheap, they need to be produced in quantity and will benefit from battery capacity per unit weight continuing to improve at about 8% per year.
As for charging infrastructure, nearly all charging occurs at home, so we only need a few charging stations sprinkled along the 42,000 miles of Interstate highways. With about 500 charging stations, which are really just locations with high-power outlets, we’ll have a charging infrastructure that will allow the use of EVs for the tiny fraction of miles driven in the US on long roadtrips. Until that happens, EV still are perfect for nearly everyone’s daily driving.
Hydrogen fuel cells are a technological stalling tactic used by the big car companies that don’t want to change how they build their cars or give up the huge revenue stream that comes in from the ridiculous amount of maintenance that internal combustion engines require.
Don’t be distracted by fool cells.
Looks like the video was removed. In terms of electric cars, I thought this article offered an interesting side you don’t hear often: http://www.lowtechmagazine.com/2008/01/bumper-cars-o-1.html