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this post was submitted on 01 Mar 2024
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Aside from hybrids, Toyota has also put a lot of work into hydrogen cars. Those have some real benefits -- range, fast fueling time, running the heater is "free", like in a gasoline vehicle and doesn't hurt range, don't have range reduction in cold environments -- but they're more-expensive to fuel than a pure EV, because you've got the overhead of conversion from electricity to hydrogen.
I don't think that the EV user experience is as good as the hybrid gasoline/electric experience or the hydrogen user experience, but I also don't think that hybrids are gonna be able to achieve enough carbon reduction. Like, if we had figured out a really good, cost-effective way to do carbon sequestration, that'd be one thing. But that isn't the case in 2024.
And if it comes down to hydrogen or EVs, I think that ultimately, the lower fueling costs of EVs will dominate.
Do you have a hydrogen car?
Right now, there are 59 public hydrogen fueling stations in all of the United States, all of which are in CA. Good luck on a road trip. Even in a big city like Los Angeles they are hard to find and far apart. Pretty awesome to drive 30 minutes in traffic just to fuel up!!
And before you say something like, "we just need to build out the infrastructure;" think how fucking expensive that will be. We already have a MASSIVE infrastructure for electricity and for gas stations. Each hydrogen station costs around $5 million to build. There are roughly 116,000 gas stations in the US, so even adding a quarter of that number in hydrogen would cost $143 billion. It would be better to spend that on beefing up the electrical grid, especially in places like Texas who can't even handle a tough winter.
As far as the experience, there is nothing better than pulling up to your house and plugging in. It absolutely sucks having to go to a dirty gas station and stand outside in cold or heat or rain while some homeless person asks for money to fill up their car to get to a doctors appointment. Take that gas station experience and then spend time trying to find a far away hydrogen station to fuel up. Even on road trips, I can take a 30 minute lunch break to get 50-80% before driving again. In a hydrogen car I'll be lucky to find a place to fuel up at all.
Finally, the economics of hydrogen for cars is dumb. Why spend money converting electricity into hydrogen, then put it in a tanker truck that uses diesel to drive it to a station, where it takes electricity to run the pumps, to put hydrogen in a car that TURNS HYDROGEN INTO ELECTRICITY. Compare that to just sending electricity down some wires to charge a battery.
People said the same thing when BEVs were coming out. Personally, I think the main hidden benefits of hydrogen isn't fast refueling and range, but rather weight and ease of storage.
Hydrogen may be the solution to enable mass adoption of variable renewable power plants, allowing relatively cheap energy storage between seasons. Doesn't matter if you only get 50% efficiency if you can produce it when electricity is dirt cheap and then store it nigh indefinitely.
As for the weight - the real money in vehicles is in the commercial sector, where weight is precious. Any weight lugging around batteries is dead weight - and hydrogen means less weight than lithium batteries.
I don't have to stand in -30 weather filling up my EV. Hydrogen is a step back. Also, humans suck at not leaking gasses, and unburned hydrogen isn't great for the environment.
That's such a shit excuse. You do realize CNG is a thing? It's a compressed natural gas powered vehicles. They are everywhere. Where I live every gas station has a connector for one of those. Hose like any other. You click and it starts filling.
I plug in my ev and go to sleep. No worrying about gas stations, high pressure gasses, leaks, price gouging etc.
Not to mention, BEVs have the simplest drivetrain ever. I'm half convinced Toyota and GM are going hydrogen so they can maintain their spare parts businesses. Though for reals it's likely because they missed out on all those sweet BEV patents.
Do you have an EV?
For those of us who can charge at home, nothing beats the user experience of just plugging your car in overnight so you always have plenty of charge and never have to think about finding a gas station. Nothing beats the silence or feeling of effortless acceleration.
It’s only charging on road trips that os currently not as good a user experience, but those are uncommon, not as bad as people online think and getting better all the time.
But that's the thing, we can have both. But EVs alone can't replace all the cars on the roads now. Either because mining Lithium is a chemically dirty process and there's not enough of it or simply put weight to range ratio is not where it needs to be. Sure, let people have EV for short commutes and similar use, but we can also have ICE hydrogen engines for trucks, locomotives, boats and cars if you so desire. We already have cars powered with CNG, diesel and gasoline. What makes you think there should only be one replacement for fossil fuels?
I've been in favour of hydrogen for years over electric. Honda had some really interesting ideas and concepts, plus a long term study in california. Mercedes initially looked to be heading into hydrogen over electric then pivoted, but BMW look to have just decided to move more to hydrogen from their electric development... Does look like batteries are beginning to take a step up though. Should be interesting in the next few years
Because hydrogen is primarily made from natural gas (fossil fuel). Hydrogen is not a viable solution since efficiency is crap
Hydrogen being viable fuel has nothing to do with its production. Its viability comes from high energy density, ability to refuel faster, better performance in the winter compared to EVs, etc. Production, sure, currently it's fossil fuel based because that's the cheapest way to produce it. The thing is, it's not the only way to produce it. There's electrolysis, then there are bacteria which can produce it, etc. If the demand jumps so will the production and prices will go down. Plus there's no OPEC controlling prices.
But all of it matters very little. It means you can use fossil fuels to produce greener fuel, and then just switch along the line somewhere. Far easier transition.
A little outdated that view, there's been several breakthroughs recently and production cost/ efficiency. The shear convenience of only having a three minute refill time instead of recharging problems etc
Hydrogen is a horribly volatile compound, inherently unsafe. Regarding costs, I'll believe it when I see it.
Besides there isn't enough of vital rare earths for the fuel cells. Currently it's a dead end.
But do indulge me with links if you will
You realise hydrogen comes from water not fossil fuels right? You know the H in H2O? You just use electrolysis to split the H2O into hydrogen and oxygen.
Except that is not how hydrogen is generated on an industrial level. The vast majority of hydrogen comes from a process called steam reforming, and it is worse for the environment than just going directly with gasoline.
Over 95% of the world’s hydrogen is produced using the steam methane reforming process (SMR). In this reaction, natural gas is reacted with steam at an elevated temperature to produce carbon monoxide and hydrogen. A subsequent reaction — the water gas shift reaction — then reacts additional steam with the carbon monoxide to produce additional hydrogen and carbon dioxide.
Natural gas is a fossil fuel and non-renewable resource that is formed when layers of organic matter (primarily marine microorganisms) decompose under anaerobic conditions and are subjected to intense heat and pressure underground over millions of years.