Finally, some first hand reports on living with a FCV

would not use the word rational and plug-in advocates in the same breath.
it's "freeload" mentality of most plug-in owners,not all!
free electricity,
free $7,500,
want employers to provide free charging.
Wonder how far out of the way for that free supercharging electricity!

 

How many Volt and Leaf buyer/leasee got them because electricity is either cheap(coal source) or provided free at work? I know many here.

 

Saying they aren't ready isn't the same as saying they are bad. They are expensive in terms of cars and infrastructure, and you need to have both for them to work. Plug ins were expensive at first but prices are coming down. The same should happen with FCEVs, but the infrastructure they absolutely need is expensive to build out, even with some future price reductions. A BEV doesn't need charging infrastructure beyond what is in a person's garage to work as a daily driver. Plug in hybrids don't need a fast DC one to cross the country in a reasonable time.

No matter how great you think hydrogen FCEVs are, there is no denying it will cost billions to build out the infrastructure for them in the US. How is it bias to say so?

Then making the hydrogen renewably is pricy. Yes we can have advances that will bring down the price, but why can't the same happen for renewable methane, diesel, gasoline, and alcohols in the same time? All of what makes hydrogen FCEVs supposedly better than plug ins and alternate fuels for ICEs relies on us believing the fuel cell lobby when it says FCEVs will get better in time, but the others won't.

I have repeatedly said my beef with FCEVs has been the hydrogen. Bring on the natural gas, diesel, methanol, or other fuel powered fuel cells, I say. I even think metal hydride hydrogen storage might work, but only because, like batteries, the disks or cartrigdes can be swapped, or more accurately, like a propane tank for a grill.

Then you would be fine if hydrogen stations put the price per kilogram up like the price per gallon for gas right now? If irrational plug in advocates are just free loaders, then rational FCEV ones would be proud to pay for the fuel themselves. Heck, I bet they would be willing to pay for it if it meant they had a station within range that could fill their up faster than a Tesla at a Supersharger gets a 100 miles of range, or simply one that worked.

Compared to what they were paying to fuel the replaced car, green electric would be cheep for many Volt owners.

How many PiP owners got the car for HOV access? How many FCEV ones are doing the same?

 

Yes, let's just give this corrupt cartel all the money they need to force hydrogen onto the public because, after all, the car only emits water! Who cares about the mess along the way? I'm pretty confident hybrids used to be recipients of tax credits as well (reference: Government incentives for fuel efficient vehicles in the United States - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ), and frankly I have a hard time getting too upset about folks being able to keep more hard-earned money in their pockets in spite of the avenue taken to do so. As far as I'm aware, the only "free" energy plug-in owners get is from the supercharger network, and they already paid with a hefty surcharge when they bought the car. So what if someone's place of employment offers an electric charging benefit as part of the compensation package?

 

I don't have any problem with the DOE doing a reasonable funding of a fcv test, and a pressurized hydrogen test, and R&D. 50 years from now, who knows gasoline could be expensive and mr. fussion could be running creating lots of cheap electricity from hydrogen, that can be wasted in plug-ins, or used to make central located hydrogen for fcv.

Let's face it the doe has spent about $3B so far on hydrogen and fuel cells, that is about the same amount the government pissed away for cash for clunkers.

What I don't like is the lies. That fuel cells need more more money to be fair to them. Why not get a dozen stations working right before wasting more tax payer money in the northeast? Somehow they will have more fcv there in 2 years than japan in 2020 (source the hydrogen lobby) From the lobby's point of view its clear. They want to get more states on board to get congress

 

What lies? All I have seen is you misunderstanding by taking it out of context.

How about in EVs? I believe it has been almost 100 years. How much so far were pissed away?

I think gov should continue to give well designed clean EV incentives to level playing field with gas cars. Ditto to clean FCVs.

 

what's a clean FCV?

 

Likely still less than for FCEVs.
At the beginning of car history, I don't think any government was supporting any of the new fangled automobiles in the way governments do now. The first fuel cells also were made around that time. Was there any programs for plug ins between then and the first ZEV program? Did that ZEV program directly support BEVs, or was all the financial incentives tied up in avoiding fines/taxes?
If you have any figures for your questions, let's hear them.

 

I don't know how you can put out 2 internet ad saying how hard it is to live with a plug-in car, and take a couple of things out of context. You remove the gas door on an i3-rex to pretend it can't use gas stations on a trip to vegas. You show a leaf at a quick charger then claim 4 hours. In what context is that telling the truth?

The us government spends on plug-ins not necessarily on bev. The Japanese government has said it's MITI spending for plug-ins led to most of the technology that panasonic and toyota used for the prius (outside the trw then public intellectual property).

Well it looks like if all the appropriated money is spent it will be about $11B by 2021 for R&D and commercialization,, and all estimates will have over 1 million plug-in cars and price per kwh will have fallen from $1200/kwh (toyota 2009) to under $300/kwh. As I said I think we should be spending for R&D. All that R&D money $3B of the $11B also helps fcv ;-) In all a little less than $11,000 per car.

In terms of fcv it looks like about $4B will have been spent on stuff that can not be used for hybrids or plug-in cars. CARB estimates now that we will have less than 34,000 vehicles by then, and thinks it will need to spend more to get there. That is over $100,000/vehicle. I'm all for doing R&D but these vehicles are at a precomercial stage, why not set up the test to not keep getting more expensive. Toyota now says only 2 of the very expensive hydrogen stations that were built in the 2004 hydrogen highway plans are good enough today. CARB and the fuel cell lobby plan for this "commercial" roll out has stations that can produce only 100 kg of hydrogen a day. Those surely will be obsolute before any real commercial roll out.

$8000/car for commercialization of fcv, just like plug-ins get from federal state tax credits and fueling infrastructure programs? 4zev for a fcv same as a long range bev, 3 zev credits for bevs that can get 100 miles on the , maybe 1 credit for phevs with aer greater than 40 miles (should get more than half as many zev miles as a fcv). I'd be for that. Maybe even $15,000/fcv. Unfortunately commercialization costs much more because the cars and stations are not ready. What is the rush? Sure you need more R&D than for plug-ins, those are getting non-government R&D funds.

Let's not pretend the CFCP wants a level playing field. They want higher dollars in R&D, tax credit per vehicle, fueling subsidies, fueling infrastructure, zev credits, etc. The reason they say they deserve it is included in some of those lexus internet advertisements. Unfortunately when you point that out, you are accused of being scared of fuel cells, or anti-fuel cell.

 

Same here. A couple of leased Volt owners told me one of the major reasons for leasing the Volt - "free" electricity. I told them you got to be kidding. How cheap can one be?

DBCassidy

 

See the latest figures from UCS, using California fuels.

So, a few bad Lexus ads trying to sell their hybrids (and stated advantages) is now a strategy to make Mirai look good?

You sure are a politically sensitive person. I would caution your own political agenda.

 

Your argument is as silly as a horse and carriage owner complaining of Federal Aid Road Act of 1916.

H2 stations are also coming to East Coast. The obvious goal is to connect the two coasts and network the states together.

A lot of them are true. Plugins take a long time to charge and looking for public station is not fun when you need it most. Highlighting advantages of a regular hybrid is part of marketing. So, it stepped on a few toes and your feelings were hurt? They pulled the ads, didn't they?

It seems someone over at marketing dept needs a boot. For example, this should read "An Electric Car That Breathe In Air"

 

Sure. Refueling a mirai with is only a little worse than a volt if you do it with smr produced hydrogen. If you project a cleaner mix california is building into the future a mirai is a little cleaner but not as clean as a leaf. The question is will other states actually build hydrogen stations and will they pay to build the more expensive renewable ones.

Your claim was that I was taking TMC anti-BEV PR out of context. Here in those Lexus advertisements you can see the clear intent to give false and misleading information about plug-in cars. Pretending that correcting the facile and misleading statements doesn't show that some one is anti-fuel cell, it means they don't like the false and misleading statements.

These pretend advantages of fuel cell vehicles in the near term (next decade) often spoken by officers of Toyota are given a very anti and misleading BEV tone. If toyota wants to stop the push back they need to stop pretending they are being honest.

No phevs actually have gas tanks you can refill them fast. No Fast chargers will not break the grid. No it doesn't take 4 hours to charge at a quick charger. No there is no technical reason a bev could not refuel in 5 minutes, there are demonstration battery swap stations in the US and China.

Which leads to no, fuel cell cars are not getting a negative shake from the government. They are being highly funded for R&D, fuel infrastructure, etc.

Stop with the misleading statements and Plug-in advocates might agree, but when you lead with the false statements, you are going to get push back.

Many people think that this fuel cell push is mainly to try to slow plug-in sales. The constant barrage of misleading press releases go with that narrative. It seems very much like when bob lutz was pushing hydrogen as a reason not to buy a prius.

 

Why would they complain? Pot holed roads aren't good for horses and carriages either.

You getting line for a FCEV then? You can't be a supporter if you don't drive or own one, am I right?

Looking for a hydrogen station is going to really suck then, isn't it.
The advantages of a hybrid that they highlighted, are just advantages of an ICE. Way to move forward.

 

"in just 10 more years" - it will get better

.

 

Really that is not toyota's fault. They tried their hardest to get the fuel cell lobby and CARB to do a good job for them. They even sponsored a study at UCI saying how easy it would be, and now are loaning that professor money at his start up that is building the hydrogen stations. Really if toyota could snap its fingers and get the federal government to build the infrastructure it would be done.

But of course those studies at UC Irvine were optimistic. Stupid Hyundai belived them. Toyota knows the stations aren't ready for prime time, but will find 200 enthusiastic individuals this year to lease the mirai. Really that will only double the number of vehciles on california's roads. These stations were from 2014-2017 spending ($80M state plus probably the same federal) get ready for 10,000 vehicles. By the end of the year they will have spent half that money and claim 44 stations. That should be enough to support 4% of the vehicles they thought it would in 2017. No people will wait longer than 5 minutes and most of the stations, but the most enthusiastic 200 probably won't complain too loud. Much more of a challenge will be to only spend $60M more from 2016-2018 and get the other 9600 fuel cell vehicles on the road. That is when I expect the big complaints and the request for higher taxes to build these hydrogen stations. CARB in its latest report thought car manufacturers would be station restricted in 2018, based on how progress has gone so far.

200? I think they can do 200 this year. 2800 more in the US in the next 2 years, that is harder, but really how many days does it take tesla to sell that many cars in the US? I think around 40 days, toyota should be able to do it in 2 years.