Japan's HV Plans Stumble

I don't think anyone should have been banking on these small electrolyzers. That was always a long shot to satisfy regulators and get low priced. honda couldn't even get the phil down in price, what chance would it have on these?

The abe government has cut regulations to allow many things that wouldn't fly in the US, but doing that is slow. The government just keeps putting out money for the bigger stations, but like in california and germany they are proving to be harder to build than the governments thought. The money is there for the olympics. Just don't think appartment complexes and office buildings are ever going to have their own affordable little electrolyzer for 5 or 10 cars. Add a bigger battery and a plug, if you want that functionality.

 

As the article said, it is bureaucracy to blame. There is no technical or safety barrier.

 

Here are some details of these magic hydrogen stations that government is keeping down.
Honda Sets Up Compact Hydrogen Station in Japan - Nikkei Technology Online

Just in the specs are hard to understand. In 12 days in can fill 4.5 cars 4kg each. well but this thing can only do half fills, so realy 12 days 9 x 2kg fills, I'm not sure how many cars that is. If they get 66 mpge, this can provide for 36,000 miles per year. Lets say 5 cars 7200 miles, and they refill the rest at higher pressure hydrogen stations.

Now how much would you pay. The Phil was $5,000 per car and did not do well.

Lets go to the low ball estimate of 40 million yen, that is $330,000 at today's exchange rate or $66,000 for each of those 5 cars plus the cost of maintenance and electricity. If it takes no maintenance and lasts 30 years and works at 100% output that is only about $20/kg of hydrogen for the unit, but the governments paying for them so who cares

No, I don't think slow government modifying the laws of these expensive toys is really slowing japan down. Japan's problem is the big stations cost so much to construct and are behind schedule so honda wants to put out these band aids. Add the cost to manufacture the cars and its going to go slow. Government of japan only expects 6000 cars in 2020. If you needed to install these for the first 7200 miles of those 6000 you would need 1200 of them at a cost of $400M plus the cost of those other high pressure stations to allow for longer trips and provide full fills.

 

yea - this story reminds me of the ripple we see in many things before the collapsing failure. Fear not though. Toyota may still up their advertising budget with stories of how horrible re-fueling your plugin at home is.
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It kinda defeats the purpose of Smart Key entry. Sure, you won't need to take out your key to unlock, start the car and drive away BUT you need to unplug the cord and hang it.

 

Ok he lied .... 20 seconds x 2.

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I don't think smart key ever saved me any time. My brother loves it though, so do other people, I simply don't care. A remote unlock and a key in the ignition was fine for me.

Some people love the convenience of filling up in their own garage. Some people don't have garages. Some people don't even have homes or apartments or cars. or even citizenship in a country where they can live safely. All in all plug-ins and fcv are for the privaged classes today.

Tomorrow? Maybe we will have battery swap stations, and quick chargers at all the parks and libraries (Where I live there are chargers at the parks and librarys, but they are slow level 2 -)). Maybe someday people will figure out how to make hydrogen cheap and available. I'm seeing advertising for fuel cell drones, and I've seen a lot of fuel cell fork liftss

For now I don't think of this thing as a stumble, just a really bad idea, that japan is having trouble implementing. If you want something that can charge in your building, build it with a battery and a plug. Its pretty simple. This $400,000 honda contraption to fill 5 cars and needs some kind of building code safety things removed by the japanese federal government because somehow its going to get cheap. That $400K doesn't include the cost of electricity. There are over 5000 chademo L3 chargers in Japan, and they have a lot less plug-ins than the US. These things are not well thought out. Nissan said it needed infrastructure. Japan gave it to them. What they really needed was a better looking plug-in and more range. I don't think these high pressure electrolyzers would really get many fcv on the road.

Japan has big bucks behind fuel cell vehicles. They expect 6000 by 2020 (much more reasonable than CARBs 50,000 by 2017 (2009 estimate). then 10,000 by 2017(May 2014 estimate). now maybe 10,000 by 2018 (july 2015 estimate). Then Japan is promising 100,000 by 2025 and they have the budget to do it. I would not count them out. Will it be as convenient as plunging in at home? No of course not, but the Japanese grid is a mess too.

 

Bureaucracy - right. Not the obscene cost, no. No safety barrier either - never mind Toyota got safty waivers after not meeting required safety standards.
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I can see how one might see this as a "chore" when the cars' charge port isn't in a convenient location but mine is right by the drivers door and takes me a whopping three seconds (I counted one Mississippi, two Mississippi) to unplug, hang the cord, and shut the charge port door. Combine that daily "chore" with the two trips to the gas station I made this year.

 

Yea - pooping & shaving every morning is a chore too - - maybe I should move the toilet & shaver next to the bed so those few moments of horribly wasted time walking to the next room won't be so unendurable either. I wonder if I can get the refrigerator upstairs too...

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