Hydrogen cars lack fueling stations
Automakers say zero-emissions vehicles can't advance without solid infrastructure.
Christine Tierney and Bryce G. Hoffman / The Detroit News
PORTLAND, Ore. -- After investing money, time and effort to develop ultra-clean hydrogen prototypes, automakers are frustrated that they're not seeing more fueling stations for these vehicles.
Honda Motor Co., Toyota Motor Corp., General Motors Corp. and Daimler AG have developed road-ready hydrogen models but there's hardly any infrastructure to support them, Bill Reinert, national manager for advanced technology at Toyota Motor Sales, said at a conference here organized by Toyota. "They're all tethered to areas with these pathetically few stations," he said. "We haven't learned how to establish a hydrogen infrastructure anywhere in the world."
The U.S. government and California pressed automakers hard in recent years to develop zero-emission vehicles, he said, "and then everybody walked away."
His remarks were echoed by other auto executives in the United States and in Germany, where BMW and Daimler have tested hydrogen-powered vehicles in fleets and want to start marketing them to individual customers.
"We certainly would like to see hydrogen infrastructure development move faster," GM spokesman Pete Barkey said. "We have been very public that we need energy companies and governments to accelerate their efforts."
GM has one of the most advanced fuel-cell vehicle programs and has put around 100 Chevy Equinox fuel-cell SUVs in the hands of average consumers to see how they perform.
But with hydrogen vehicles numbering only in the hundreds, it's hard to persuade energy companies to make big investments.
"It's sort of a chicken-and-egg situation, where some energy companies may be hesitant until more hydrogen vehicles are on the market," said David Iida, a spokesman for American Honda Motor.
That's why Honda moved forward with its program to lease hydrogen-powered Honda FCX Clarity cars to 200 people over three years. Honda dealers began leasing the cars in July, but only in the Los Angeles area. "They're the only region that has a bit of infrastructure in place," Iida said.
Hydrogen technology holds tremendous appeal because it has the potential to be entirely clean, from the production of the hydrogen to the tailpipe emissions.
But any transition to hydrogen will be long and costly. Energy experts estimate it could cost hundreds of billions of dollars to establish fueling networks, and automakers need to further reduce the high cost of the cars.
John Merson, senior manager at Sandia National Laboratories, said he doesn't expect hydrogen to become a major source of energy in the United States before 2030.
Customers pay $600 a month to lease an FCX Clarity, but the car's true cost is probably more than half a million dollars. Honda will only say that the new car costs less to produce than its $1 million predecessor. Automakers say they could reduce the cost per vehicle if they produced more vehicles.
The auto and energy industries are grappling with a major technological hurdle: the challenge of storing or containing hydrogen. Jan Kreider of the University of Colorado, one of the speakers at the conference, said little progress had been achieved in recent years in hydrogen storage.At Ford Motor Co., some executives say hydrogen no longer seems to be the best alternative. Derrick Kuzak, Ford's head of global product development, said recently that there appears to be no will on the part of government or the private sector to make the immense investments in infrastructure needed to transition to a hydrogen economy.
He discounted hybrids as a long-term solution, saying that putting two powertrains in every car and truck -- one electric and one gas -- will never be economical. Kuzak now thinks electric vehicles are more promising because they rely on existing infrastructure: the electricity grid. That is also Nissan Motor Co.'s view.
But Toyota, Honda and others still see hydrogen as perhaps the best long-term solution. After testing hydrogen models in fleets, which operate vehicles under controlled circumstances, they are reaching out to consumers.Daimler plans to put a hydrogen-powered Mercedes-Benz B-Class fuel-cell car on the market in 2010, even though there are only a handful of hydrogen stations in Germany.
"Everyone's waiting for the other side to move, so nothing happens," said Daimler spokeswoman Eva Wiese. "This isn't helpful."
Meanwhile automakers are reporting impressive gains in the driving range and performance of their hydrogen vehicles, as well as cost reductions.
Last fall, Toyota's fuel-cell Highlander SUVs ran more than 400 miles without refueling during a 2,300-mile trek from Fairbanks, Alaska, to Vancouver, British Columbia. They were fueled by hydrogen compressed at 10,000 psi. "There's not one 10,000 psi hydrogen station in the United States after all the work we've done," Reinert said. "Eventually, hydrogen will happen because it is a renewable resource that we have in this country that has zero carbon emissions," said Jim Hall, managing director of the consulting firm 2953 Analytics LLP in Birmingham. "Electrical vehicles charged off the grid do not solve the CO2 (carbon dioxide) problem. They just shift it somewhere else."
Hall said Honda was trying to find a way around the infrastructure dilemma by developing charging stations in people's homes. Honda's Home Energy Station technology, which uses a steam reformer system to produce hydrogen from natural gas, is now in its fourth generation. If Honda succeeds, that would change everything, Hall said.
He said he thinks the chief reason why Ford was backing away from hydrogen is because it does not have the money now.
News Staff Writer Robert Snell contributed to this report. You can reach Christine Tierney at (313) 222-1463 or ctierney@detnews.com.
