Slew of new mirai articles

Those are more than weasel words, let's just call that a flat out lie.

Gasbuddy.com shows that premium is available in Sacramento for $2.65-2.70 a gallon (there are some even cheaper stations there).

A Hyundai Tucson conventional model gets 25 mpg EPA. The FCV version gets 49 miles per kg. so, take the H2 price per kg and divide by 2 to find the equivalent gasoline price. That makes H2 equivalent to $6.80 per gallon.

Since premium is actually $2.67 per gallon that means H2 is 250% the cost of premium gasoline, or 150% higher, not "30% higher".

Now, sure, gas prices have been falling and maybe the reporter called the guy a few weeks ago and just got around to posting the story. Even if you reached back a year or two ago when urban CA premium gas was $4.50, today's equivalent cost of H2 would be 50% higher than that.

So....lier, lier, pants on fire.

 

US Congress lets $8,000 hydrogen vehicle tax credit expire

 

The Mirai looks worse with every new photo I see. Like the first generation Tiburon, it's different, but nothing stands out as bad or good on first impression. Then you notice that the corner grill, which is mostly blocked off, and the front corner panel look like a jet intake. Which could work on a dedicated sports car, but this is a 4 door sedan. Those panels and grill make the car look front heavy.

Then there is the headlight height gap between the corner panel and hood. It makes the hood look like it didn't quite belongs on the car. Or if the engineers needed more engine bay top space, but forgot to tell the team doing the exterior until the last minute. It invokes the weirdness of that European hatch with the head lights or high beams right at the base of the windshield.

I don't want to see the rear now, and rather look at the manga artwork that comes up on Google images first.

 

Good article from Engadget! What you need to know about hydrogen fuel cell vehicles

Yes, FCV is not ready for prime time. And when they would be...we'd probably have better batteries by then anyway and therefor have EV rule..

 

That's sort of a good big picture article with links off to other detailed articles.

On the other hand, some of it is pretty misleading. Hydrogen is $3 GGE? It's actually $10-14 in reality, so that's more than a little off.

It also describes the NG steam reforming process as emitting only a little bit of CO2 and doesn't describe the energy needed to refrigerate, compress, and/or transport the hydrogen.

The actual overall CO2-equivalent emissions from steam reformed hydrogen in an FCV is about the same as a gasoline hybrid car and so is still 2/3 the amount emitted by an convention gasoline version of the same car.

You wouldn't know that by reading the article.

 

Although the speculated future scaled-up prices in that NREL doc are in 2007 dollars so add 14% inflation.

 

Here's an English-language article on a fuel cost comparison in Japan of the Mirai, the Prius c, and the Honda Civic HF (non-hybrid):
Japan’s hydrogen fuel cell stations begin to open, but are they worth the switch? | RocketNews24

 

The numbers in that article are messed up. Perhaps a bad translation to English from Japanese?

The article can't decide if there are 100 yen to the dollar or 120. It thinks it makes sense to equate a kg of hydrogen to a liter of gasoline. It thinks a Honda Civic HF (non-hybrid) goes 3.6 times farther than a Prius C on a yen worth of gasoline.

Even after all that it still correctly concludes that the Mirai is a weird bird that doesn't give a cluck.

 

PHEV still has gas engine, therefore they are not zero tailpipe emission. BEVs and FCVs should get the same incentive, in my opinion, depending on how clean they are.

The real question is, why is Volt getting the same incentive as the Leaf? That's the uneven level playing field.

The chart said Toyota calculation so, it was probably made by them. As discussed, the data is still valid when the Japanese fuel economy numbers are used (as the chart indicated).

Where can I buy a fusion powered, air powered, PM powered car anywhere in the world? Do you still see FCV as a pipe dream? Wake up, they are here.

Are you forgetting that PHEV has gas engine that needs to be maintained?

BEV need standard super fast charging stations and more driving range. Grid electricity needs to be cleaner as well.

FCV don't have the same challenges as BEV instead, new ones. In my opinion, they are not difficult. Since FCV has the advantages of both HEV and BEV, it is worth pursuing.

H2 is not a primary fuel, just like electricity. You can generate is with any primary fuel. Why invest in it? Well, to remove the bottleneck. What bottleneck? The refueling speed and vehicle range scalability -- doing it without a combustion engine.

I like a nice toasty warm home. It is better/cheaper to heat homes with NG than with electricity.


Merged consecutive posts, please use multiquote

 

Theoretically, yes. In practice, the source fuel is going to be NG at best, petroleum or coal at worse.

Heating homes with NG is silly. Insulate instead.

 

Some places you have to do both.
However, I prefer heating with electricity over natural gas via geo thermal.
This doesn't work everywhere, but for us it maximizes the percentage of renewables.

 

That would be an unusual place. PassivHaus spec'd homes are also built in Finland.

Now, I know that the overwhelming number of houses in the US are poorly built. My point to USB was that much more sensible future housing development be based on well insulated homes and not homes heated by NG.

 

Sure, Passivehaus is great, just sucks on the cost.

Instead of getting perfect, you can much more easily get to 95%.
While there is still a need for hvac, it has such small requirements that electric heat works just fine.

 

Germany now builds to PassivHaus standards at the same cost as conventional. To me it is a no brainer for a country to invest in local PassivHaus industry rather than a NG based hydrogen economy. Pennies on the dollar, and vastly more sound environmentally.

PV+ASHP is pretty damned awesome, particularly when combined with smart passive building and conservation.

PassivHaus is not 'perfect,' it just lowers the home heating and cooling loads way down.

 

We don't have the info to call on whether maintaining a fuel cell and hydrogen tanks will be the same or better than an ICE. Early stacks had short lifespans. No hard numbers have been released for the latest ones. DOT requires expiration dates for CNG tanks. No details about this in regards to hydrogen tanks holding a more aggressive gas at higher pressures have been released.

Gird can always be cleaner. You just need less electric to move a plug in the same distance as a FCV using renewable hydrogen. Until there are some lab breakthroughs, renewable hydrogen will be made by electrolysis. Clean electricity going onto the grid can't be shuffled away from plug ins to hydrogen plants. They will both be using the same mix.

Without mandates and/or subsidies, the hydrogen for these cars will come from natural gas. Pretending that hydrogen generation will quickly move to some renewable method while plug ins are stuck using an unimproving grid is a disservice to the discussion.

ICE's aren't limited to gasoline or even diesel from petroleum. We have powered them with peanut oil and coal dust in the past, and currently run them of ethanol, methanol, CNG, LNG, biodiesel, SVO, WVO, plus there is ongoing research into biomatter to liquid for diesel and gasoline. if pushed, we have the means to net up the flotsam plastic fields in the oceans and convert it back into a sweet crude.

The fuel cell still has advantages. Long term it should be better than an ICE for a range extender on a plug in. Continue to pursuit of it isn't the same as forcing commercialization now. The latter may even hinder the possible advances. After spending millions to billions on hydrogen infrastructure, how easily will a government shift to methanol or ammonia powered fuel cells?

 

See ? Even AG cannot be wrong all the time.