Honda, Toyota, and Hyundai answer fuel cell questions

A plug-in v? Or dare I dream, a plug-in Venza? Available in all states?

 

Doug thank you for your thoughtful responses. Here are a few areas toyota could stand to improve.

From out here, it didn't sound like toyota was saying the market was small. Most of the PR seems to be pushing that indeed toyota thinks the market is even smaller than current sales, when I here how much more sucessful it seems to think the fcv will be. If the intent was small market, then how do you square that with the push for fcv, when indeed, you are promising toyota will only make a thousand cars a year for the US, when Tesla will probably do 20,000 BEVs next year and nissan even more. When combined with the lexus advertisement of erasing the fueling door of an i3-rex to exagerate recharge times, the anti-plug-in message is rather clear. If this is not toyota's intent, plesase stop the exagerations and FUD against plug-ins.

I don't think that is subtle at all. Jim Lentz in his fortune interview claiming the fcv would be much less expensive to bevs, Bob Carter telling us fcv will sell so much it will suprise us. But here we have the price and sales projections and car, and the hype doesn't add up to the car.

It seemed to follow other anti-plug-in messaging in toyota's PR. I find it is hard to believe that no one at lexus looked at this and didn't think it was following a corporate anti-plug-in agenda. If that is not true, please, would someone stop them from doing it the next time.

This is definitely a fair statement which I would agree with. In fact I have no problem with toyota playing with these fcv toys in california to try and reduce cost. I certainly do not see them rolling out across the country in two decades or even five given the costs of the cars and the infrastructure. So when I see Toyota say fuel cells are the future, I think not when you consider the whole country they are not. I think in texas people would much rather have an open fuel standard and put methanol in a phev than to try to build the thousands of hydrogen stations you would need to cross the state. Alaska is even harder.

Certainly the field is not level. In california a fcv gets more than twice the zev credits as a bev, and phevs don't really get any. Fuel cells get twice the state subsidy of a bev, and more spending on fueling infrastructure, even though no one really expects as many fcv as bevs in the next decade. Add it all up and the fuel cell lobby has been quite successful in making the field favor them. Unfortunately the cars and prices do not.

I look forward in hearing how Toyota will be supporting plug-ins in the future.

 

We certainly hope to. I think you saw Ogiso-san talking about the enjoyable driving dynamics in the articles. The Mirai is simply a differently-fueled EV, and has most of the dynamic driving characteristics of EVs. I consider that a good thing.

1) Agreed we have most of it in place.
2) But electricity is not a source fuel either. Both are energy carriers, generated from other sources, and each has its pros and cons. I think the academics who envision the Hydrogen Economy are actually articulating a hydrogen/electric economy, where we are using each to its best advantage. This is not an either/or, it's a both.

On small market: FCV sales will be smaller than EV for some time, no doubt. But two things: 1) the near term sales disparity is not necessarily reflective of relative market demand levels at investment-recovery prices, and 2) we are talking about "relatively small market projection" in the long term. I admit we bumble with wording here, but the point is we think long-term demand for FCV will likely exceed BEV. Again, our view and open for debate.

On anti-plug-in messages: I'm in charge of Prius Plug-in Hybrid, so trust me I want to sell these puppies, as do many of my colleagues. But they are NOT easy sells, for a number of reasons. Anyway, yes we are trying to move beyond anti-plug-in messaging, while ALSO highlighting advantages of our HVs and now FCVs. Also not easy, as it's a fine line!

On location: No single technology will be right for all the world. Certain geographies and consumer preferences will choose certain techs over others. That is the reality of a very large and diverse market. Honestly, I personally wish this were not true, but I suspect the good-ole-ICE will be still prevalent decades from now in much of the country, even though HVs, BEVs, and FCVs penetration will be higher.

If you don't dream big, you don't dream at all.

Thanks,

Doug Coleman
ATV Marketing
Toyota Motor Sales, USA

 

Of course, the electricity has to be generated somehow. But, no matter how it's generated, it's far more efficient to store that electricity in batteries than to convert it into hydrogen and then back into electricity. This is not a marketing issue, or a matter of public opinion, it's simple basic chemistry, and no amount of money or research or time is going to change that. To me, this is the 'rub': regardless of costs and infrastructure and recharging/refuelling times, hydrogen will never be as efficient as batteries. There's no way I know of to eliminate the losses inherent in phase changes. I get that Toyota's in it for the long play here - we're all betting the farm here, if not the planet - but I don't get how hydrogen is supposed to be superior.

 

easy big fella, no 'facts' allowed.

 

Doug,
Thanks for the candid discussion

A lot of us here are engineers. On the 3rd point, I'd like to see Toyota's calculations on this.
For me, it seems that EVs win when you consider non-fossil fuel energy sources for electricity and hydrogen.
If you consider NG->H2->compressed H2->tank->electricity->motor vs. NG->electricity->battery->motor then let's see the analysis.

I agree that EVs have some severe limitations. Many (most?) people are somewhat irrationally scared off by these...but PHEVs solve most of this, IMO. Fuel cells do have a place in research...and I agree that EVs won't work in all form factors, but I question Toyota's plan. Specifically, There are 3 major fuel cells hurdles:
1) high cost of the fuel cell (OK, this is Toyota's problem...put the engineer's to work on it)
2) no place to re-fuel
3) high cost of fuel

At $10 per kg, 5 kg per tank and 300 miles per tank gives us 16.7 cents per mile. My Prius is 6-8 cents per mile at $3 - $4 per gallon. My Plug-in Prius gets 2 - 2.5 cents per mile (at 0.13/kwh). Note that only the gas numbers above is paying road taxes with those prices. Why would someone choose the highest fuel cost choice? Making the hydrogen without fossil fuels probably doubles the cost. Meanwhile in an EV (or mostly in a PHEV) I can never or rarely ever go to a fuel station again.

No place to refuel. This is going to cost billions. At least 100's of millions just to start. WHY doesn't Toyota start with fleet vehicles, such as buses, delivery vans, shuttles, government cars, post office -- anything else where they could all refuel at the same place? (I know Toyota doesn't make buses). The strategy seems backwards.

Mike
Note: I've owned gen 1, gen 2, gen 3 and plugin Prius. I'd buy a Prius-EV.

 

Awesome sauce! Got a time I can set my alarm?

 

I've been following fuel cell development since the turn of the century. Many things were a lot different back then than they are presently.
Moving on to a different tack here, I'm continually amazed that consumers have not been able to purchase a US ICE powered production vehicle for under $15k that gets 100mpg for a decade, adjust for inflation. That alone would reduce dependence on fossil fuels by a tremendous amount for the sector that opts in to fuel efficiency.
I understand how difficult it is to implement efficiency with the oil lobby and stock dividends which is why I'm tickled to be able to drive a PiP today.
Thank You

 

Hey, they're in Texas now, so surely it will be one of these:

 

First I'm going to admit I'm out of my league here. I have an engineering background, but don't spend much of my time these days on WTW analyses. Until I can bring in our heavy hitters here, I'll just say that I have heard from them analyses that show "comparable" reductions from EVs and FCVs, vs ICE, when looking at overall WTW. I do know that a huge number of variables go into these analyses, and we know assumptions can easily change results. So I would still submit to you that even if we agree on your quote above, the hundreds of other assumptions in the overall analysis could lead to different conclusions. But again, I admit I can personally argue no further on this point.

The other thing I will comment on here IS in my strike zone, and that's this: it is not just technical merit (in this case, pure efficiency) that should drive product development decisions. There are many, many factors; the one I appreciate most is customer preferences. A product's overall appeal drives adoption rates and penetration, and most importantly, everyone has different preferences (from slightly to huge)! So, a big fraction of our bet is tied to our view that the advantages of the FCV experience will align with a larger number of consumers' overall preferences. That drives demand, which supports adoption, which ultimately reduces all the bad things we want to get rid of.

In the near-term, yes H2 kgs will cost more per mile than Prius and PiP. That is a challenge with the introduction of a new infrastructure. What I am hearing is there is a lot of optimism for bringing fuel cost down with time. Will it happen? I have no idea personally. If it doesn't, yes of course, FCVs will suffer. The hope/expectation among supporters is that the infrastructure investment in the long-haul becomes mostly private-sector sponsored. I think anyone would agree you can't build out the entire infrastructure with public funding.

Regarding fleets: There will be fleets that implement FCVs, including some Mirais. But it is important to also start with non-fleet customers, both because we can serve the demand that exists, and because it demonstrates we are serious. Needless to say there have been hundreds of trials in the past for all kinds of ATVs that were "fleet-only", and therefore the impression was they are just "beta-tests" and not real (sometimes true, sometimes not). Since we're not beta-testing - for us this is the real deal - we don't want to give that impression.

Thanks,

Doug Coleman
ATV Marketing
Toyota Motor Sales, USA

 

I think we have a paradox here that the fuel cell lobby is slow to admit. The way prices will drop for refueling hydrogen is to produce it efficiently from natural gas, but that knocks out the ghg argument. In order to have ghg substantially lower than hybrids you need to have a large number of renewable fueling stations, and the only way to get those is state mandate and state picks up the extra cost. So it is definitely possible to drop prices to $5/kg if we have a high volume of business at the fueling station and the feed stock is reformed natural gas, but then the ghg numbers just don't work out.

Many think it is closer to 20 kg of CO2 per kg of hydrogen reformed from natural gas compressed to 10,000 psi with california electiricty, but if we use a low 13 kg of CO2 per kg of hydrogen then a fcv would need to get

48 mpge to match the ghg emissions of a camry hybrid xle
59 mpge to match the ghg emissions of a prius liftback
65 mpge to match the ghg emissions of a prius phv or chevy volt charged on the california grid (fueleconomy.gov estimate)

Now the fcv epa has not been released yet, but I would guess it comes in between that Prius liftback and prius phv. Lets guestimate 62 mpge.

Compared to the camry hybrid XLE you would put out 23% less greenhouse gasses. If gas was $4/gallon and hydrogen $5/kg after the 3rd free year, and you went 15,000 miles a year you would save $300/year. Ofcourse that fcv costs more than $15,000 more than the hybrid even after tax incentives, and you may be more than $300 more frustrated trying to find fueling stations, or finding another car when you want to take a trip without hydrogen.

That just is too much money to choose the fcv over the hybrid. It would actually be cheaper to buy a 60kwh tesla model S charged on the california grid for $/kg ghg. The only way to keep the claim that these things substancially reduce ghg is to make a significant portion of the hydrogen (at least 33% by law in california) from renewables, but that means fuel would have to be more expensive unless we get some big breakthroughs in renwable hydrogen production. That tesla is much cheaper to refuel on renewable electricity than the hybrid on gas or fcv on hydrogen, because it is so much more efficient with the electricity.

 

There was also a report several years ago of alarmingly high losses of hydrogen during refueling (Green Car Congress: Transit Agency Finds Total Operating Cost of Its Hydrogen Fuel Cell Buses 32X That of Diesel ). Hydrogen leaks have been implicated in potential stratospheric ozone losses (similar to CFC).

Has this issue been resolved?

 

No. This is part of the cost of renewable hydrogen energy loss that leads to high costs. In an effort not to give plug-ins credit for renewables we have a strange costly argument in california. The hydrogen needwd to be generated next to the renewable. Since the site of the fueling station is often bad for renewables, the hydrogen then needs to be liquified, then trucked to the station. This is just one example of the strangeness of CARB politics. I don't think CARB considers the H2 leakage as bad for the envirnoment, but I don't tknow.

An easy fix is to simply build the solar and wind where it does best then tie it to the grid, using electrolysis from the grid to make and compress the hydrogen. Losses are much lower then and so are costs. Simply account for the grid losses. Unfortuanately then these stations would report how much electricity they use, and CFCP could not obfuscate it by acting as if the energy to produce the renewable hydrogen didn't matter. I think Hygen is building 3 stations like this. When they are up and running we should have a better idea of how much electricity is required on the fleet as well as cost of grid tied renewable hydrogen production at the stations versus making of hydrogen physically by the renewables and trucking it.

 

Thanks for the feedback Doug. As is often the case - expressed replies often generate as much inquiry as the original reply. I look forward to hearing more from Toyotas' team regarding newly generated questions.

Although true, the difference is you don't waste natural gas when you refill EV's via solar. And cheep fracked NG wells are dying at an alarming rate. That means 1,000's & 1,000's of new fracked wells must necessarily be found / put on line, just to keep production from falling off - at which point (not too distant future) - cheap fracked gas goes away ... gas that COULD have heated homes & cheaply run industry. Source fuels other than NG are NO WHERE near as economical to distill hydrogen from -
yet the short term supply of fracked gas is always advertised as "best" just to come anywhere NEAR the efficiency of a standard Prius.

Isn't that in large part due to Toyota not selling 'em in the majority of the United States - year after year? Seems to many they sell pretty easy comparing sales against the Volt .... which IS sold nation wide.
.

 

For those of us still keeping an open mind, here's more fuel for thought:

Cars With Cords: Fuel Cell Advocate Strikes Back

 

not much there worth discussing. the reason bev advocates are the only ones criticizing fcv's, is because we're the only ones who care.

 

Heavily slanted and leading "questions".
Many are state incorrect facts as questions.

I certainly would be interested in 10 questions from FCEV advocates of plugin vehicles. Preferably ones that are neutral rather than accusatory.

 

Well, somebody has to counter the misinformation. The public's being told that hydrogen creates fewer GHGs, when the opposite is true.

 

Boy I hear ya! I wish I could spend a lot more time on PC discussing these issues with you, but it turns out I have this "day job" gig Right now I'm trying to figure out how to bring more resources to bear on this dialogue, because I think it's very important.

Also true, for sure. EVs on pure solar is an idealized state IF it works suitably for the particular consumer in mind. But I think the point is that both energy carriers have strengths and weaknesses, which probably means each has some market opportunity (again, because consumers are not homogenous). It may very well be that many consumers are willing to trade off NG waste reduction for any number of other factors. We shall see.

Honestly, hill, I wish. Yes there would be more opportunity with wider geography. But the reality is we are selling the plug-in in the states with a very high fraction of the US' alternative powertrain buying population. Moreover, even on a relative basis, it's a hard sell. The reality is the concept of plugging in scares the bejeezus out of a lot of people, even though it shouldn't. There is just a lot of confusion about what a PHV is, and I admit we haven't done the most fabulous job promoting them. But this has been our first go at this. We always learn and get better. We're not giving up on PHV at all.

Doug Coleman
ATV Marketing
Toyota Motor Sales, USA

 

that is very good news.