Featured Drove the Mirai

It is a bad idea to go with the perception that Austingreen has been putting on.

California has already spend at least $577 million on EV rated incentives. See below:

Green Car Congress: California Governor announces $120M settlement with NRG will fund electric car charging stations across California; new Executive Order to accelerate commercialization of ZEVs

Green Car Congress: California gives Tesla $34.735-million sales and use tax break, its second

Green Car Congress: California Air Resources Board adds another $25 million to expand clean vehicle rebate program

Green Car Congress: California ARB announces $24M grant solicitation for zero-emission truck and bus pilot commercial deployment projects

Green Car Congress: California ARB approves $373M funding plan for advanced vehicle technologies in FY2015-2016; up from $150M last year

California is now spending $50 million on hydrogen refueling stations to kick start the roll out and you guys are calling foul?

News Release - California Investing Nearly $50 Million in Hydrogen Refueling Stations

 

Incredibly disengenious...

Going all the way back to 2000? Why don't we do the same for hydrogen expenditures? The amount spent on charging infrastructure was $100 million.

This was a business issue, not infrastructure. This is small compared to the tax benefits Toyota's home country is giving it.

This has nothing to do with infrastructure, and includes FCV state rebates.

For freight. I have said repeatedly, I think freight is a very good place for FCV as the infrastructure will need much less money.

This is for advanced vehicle tech, not solely electric but also CNG, FCV, etc and is not limited to infrastructure.

And how much have they spent since 2000?[/QUOTE]

 

So, $50 million on H2 stations is less. Your post is disengenious. You should compare the money spent for the roll out.

If you want to go back to the beginning, how much did it cost to build the current electric grid?

I think tax payer spent less on H2 infrastructure than the electric grid to build as maintain it, as well.

 

So the correct perception is AG-Bad
USB-good ?

500 million (yielding 1000's of EVSE's both commercial & residential & ½ of their costs were via the owners/property management) -versus 50 million - which WON'T realistically yield any more than 10 stations capable of filling cars with the advertised fill rate. Trying to do the rough math for which one is a waste - Back of the napkin -
EVSE's & 100's of 1,000's of cars per unit, somewhere in the $1,000's per.

Hydrogen stations alone, no cars, somewhere in the MILLION's ??

And FC stations - that's a cost that'll likely grow even bigger? So, if Toyota can somehow give away (high number) 5,000 hydrogen cars over (example) next 5rs?
At least a 10 figure cost per car ...
- if you count incentive costs for the cars too, the number goes up.
Maybe a magnitude of 3X the benefit going to hydrogen cars is a close guess?
.... for a car that can least expensively run on coal & natural gas. Did i miss anything?
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Don't believe what I said either. Do your own research and make up your own conclusion. Do not rely on perception because you could be mislead.

 

If you went to the rest of the post - you'd see I'm trying to do research. I haven't yet found anything that isn't condemning of hydrogen, unless of course I get it from Toyota & the Honda group. Honda though is more believable in that they're not slinging mud at their own plugins, just so they can make the clarity look like more of a bargain.
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Forgive me for deleting the noise articles. Good try at trying to baffle with bs, throw up a lot and see if anything sticks.

Let's dig into that biggest battery incentive article, which said the biggest program was CVRP.

Plug-ins get a lot more money from the CVRP. This gives $5000 for each fcv no matter the cost or income of the individual. It mean tests for plug-ins and provides $1500 for phevs and $2500 for bevs.

I can understand claiming the program gives a lot more to plug-ins than fcv, because it does, lots more plug-in vehicles sold.

But it gives a lot more money per vehicle for fuel cells. This is how you baffle some with bs, pretend the total spent is the key number.

Absolutely we have other programs you have listed like plug-in heavy vehicles and manufacturing in state. We don't see the fuel cell manufacturing subsidies because you have left them out as they are in other states and countries. We don't see the much higher fuel cell bus subsidy, because omissions is part of the plan.

For fueling we only see this $50M chunk. We see nothing pre 2014, we don't see the other $170 allocated to carb, it makes it look like none of that was spent or the DOE money. Where did the 9 existing stations come from, magic? That NRG settlement is also mainly fiction but count it. NRG is building similar stations in texas without a lawsuit settlement, they wanted to do it anyway, they may be doing a few more than they would have.

Here we have about equal funding for hydrogen station and plug-in chargers, but how many cars does it service. Since 2014 funding for hydrogen has been much higher than plug-ins. I definitely was pro a demo of 25 stations and a couple of mobile refuelers. I think this $220M budgeted (about $60M spent) is over kill but ok. CARB though since these stations are more expensive than it thought is talking about needing more than that $220M. I say $220M is enough. They don't need more.

On zev credits which do have a big economic value as tesla has shown on their income statement ($39M last quarter selling them) the batteries if you ignore quantity have a big advantage. Nissan and Tesla sell them and make money. No fcv manufacturer is planning on selling any.

Drill into the numbers though and you can see how stacked these are in favor of fcv. Phev's get 0. The bmw i3-rex skates through a loophole by having a tiny gas tank, less than 2 gallons, and gets 3. Short range highway going bevs like the leaf get 3. The tesla S and X a 300 mile range (old epa used by california) gets 4. Any fuel cell vehicle gets 9 credits, more than twice as much as the tesla, and 9 more than the volt.

Only someone working as part of the lobby or one of the manufacturers would seriously say that
$5000 + 9 zev + $220M of new refueling is less per vehicle than plug-ins.

There is no possible way to work the numbers without leaving a lot out. There is also $100M of doe funds every year for R&D.

Yes of course in total dollars plug-ins have more. There are now about 400,000 plug-ins in the US, and about 500 fcv. Of course if you are giving any money at all per vehicle those plug-ins will get more total money.

 

If I want? You are the one posting links showing costs of things back to 2000.
Many of these things have nothing to do with infrastructure.

 

Bringing up the electric grid is a red herring, and not comparable to building hydrogen refueling infrastructure.

First, while there where BEVs around during the grid's birth, it wasn't built for cars. It was built for lighting, appliances, and power to factories. The private sector built the grid to meet those demands. The cost to do so doesn't matter because it was paid for by the investors, and recouped through profits from the service.

The government didn't step into building power plants and grids until the Great Depression and the New Deal, and most of its focus was in extending electricity to rural areas which were ignored by the private sector for being a low return on investment.

Which is the problem for the hydrogen infrastructure; the private sector doesn't want to invest because of the really low demand for the product. So the government has to built it in the hopes that FCEV come down in price, and demand grows. Meanwhile, it also has to help pay for the cars. Edison didn't need subsidies on his light bulbs to sell them.

 

you gotta feel for USB & his hydrogen passion .... when all you got is stinky rotten fish - that's what you gotta play. I really don't mind - because after all - contradicting hydrogen (as kindly as possible) ensures that the uninformed will hear both sides - because when you understand how wrong hydrogen is in its present - day form - it would be crazy to remain silent. Now if Toyota were simply telling about their hydrogen experiment - and not bashing plugins - that would be a different story.
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Toyota Mirai Featured In Fully Charged – Video

 

Love that Bob. Now, I'm waiting to see when Alex on Autos tests one.

 

So much for the honesty of its cost versus financial Loss on Toyota's hydrogen car. At the end of the video it quotes price at €66,000 ... a quick back of the napkin says that's over one hundred thousand US dollars. So when will Toyota break even? Yeah they're going to have to knock off at least another fifty thousand to make it even quasi affordable.
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Doesn't Prius cost more in Europe due to import tax?

Not surprising Mirai also cost there more than in US.

 

Prius is double there? Wow - who'd of thought
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Huh? Mirai isn't double there.

$58k in US and €66k there.

 

Toyota Mirai: prices, specs and release date | Carbuyer
That's pounds not euros in the british pricing.
But yes, at today's exchange rate 66 thousand pounds is $100,140 which is not 2x the US price of $57,500 its 1.74x, after the tax credits its 1.9x. For the price difference you could buy a volt or leaf and solar panels in the US.

We have two choices to believ here. Either the mirai really only costs toyota $50,000 to make and ship to London or los angelous and is making a huge profit on each one they sell in england, or perhaps its only the fuel cell system and not the hand built car with the system that costs toyota $50,000.

I guess if you believe the former toyota is price gouging in Europe. I'm not sure why a hydrogen fan would be chearleading price gouging.

I'm of the opinion that there is no way it costs Toyota $50,000 to manufacture and ship a mirai. My opinion comes from toyota's own PR, but of course they could be lying. That was a past goal that they failed to meet, and there is no reason to pretend they did it. Even if the vehicle cost them $50,000 variable cost, how many do you think they could sell? There would be no reason to only have it ramp to 3000 production if they are making a big profit in europe and there is high demand. What did toyota say they could sell every one they make. They could say drop the price to $80,000 (53,000 pounds) in England and sell more.

 

I know that but with many states and fed kickbacks the Mirai would be about 50k here in the US. I think I kinda didn't make the point so - oh well - I'm still guessing others got it.
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Toyota makes a lot of noise about shipping fuel cell vehicles nationally, but only firm plans hit california, the chief compliance state gives it 9 zev credits and $5000. If we only count the cash the mirai is 1.9x more to a consumer. If we count the credits and VAT both numbers are around the same for toyota, and the gap is small. Of course its the zev credits that make all the difference and toyota is not price gouging, it costs them a lot more than 50,000 for each unit sold, as most of us know.