Toyota rep: If you buy the Mirai, you pay for the hydrogen yourself

FCVs are harder to roll out, hence bigger incentive. Plugin show is over, after 5 long years -- not really, because incentives continues.

Plugins had a complete dominant incentive over regular hybrids. Those regular hybrids should be rewarded the most if we want to displace ICE only cars with cleaner cars (best bang for the buck, as you are suggesting). I've been saying this for years, criticizing plugin incentives of not being cost effective.

FCV and hydrogen has higher roll out curve but it has full potential of both gasoline convenience and EV low emission/efficiency. In the long term, it has the highest chance of replacing gas cars without compromise going electric.

Once FCV roll out reached critical mass, both BEV and FCV ZEV credits should equal out depending on a set of criteria -- the range, for example. It is only during the launch stage, you may see FCVs getting more credits. Plugins got even better treatment during it's launch.
merged, use multiquote.

Almost all PV home systems are grid-tied. Going off-grid is very expensive and requires a big home battery pack(s).

A grid-tied PV system relies on fossil grid to "store" the energy. PV system owner supplies the solar electricity during the day but demand fossil electricity at night. Of those plugin owners with PV system, they often charge at night.

Since electrons are fungible, I can say my home and plugin car is powered by solar energy.

Carbon footprint is another story. For me, half of my electricity consumption is directly from the solar panels. The other half is pulled from the grid. I am 50% cleaner than my neighbor. If I want to be 100%, I'll need about 23 Tesla Powerwalls.

In summary, what you are suggesting is not feasible.

 

I know 2 people with Volts zero issue and the cars have close to 100k on them any issue they have was fixed quick. Now hydrogen is just another choose like E85 and other bio fuels will it find its niche maybe but to bash it is silly.
I think E85 is a joke since we make it from corn its more cost effective to make it from suger cane.

How so? I'm not very familiar with with Hydrogen production as the only filling station production plant I've ever read about was solar and used water. So I'm just interested in learning more about what you ment.

I agree just look at Tesla they said Teslas would never work and look where they are now.

 

Number 1 method is Steam-Methane Reforming (SMR), it accounts for over 95% of hydrogen produced in the US. Other hydrogen in the US comes from oil fractions, coal, or renewables. SMR can work on biogas (also methane) from sources like agricultural waste or landfill gas, but those often are not located anywhere near where a hydrogen station should be located. Some of the california stations use biogas.
Hydrogen Production: Natural Gas Reforming | Department of Energy

The cheapest hydrogen while there are not many cars on the road will come from centrally produced SMR from natural gas pipelines. This will then get liquified, and trucked to a station. When hydrogen is produced this way it produces more ghg than a hybrid.

If its right by the refineries in southern california pipelines can supply it. The hydrogen station at toyota in Torrance does it this way. This is more efficient as you don't need to spend the energy to liquify and truck, but pipelines are expensive, and without much demand, you won't build big pipelines.

If volume is high enough SMR at the fueling station is more efficient than pipelines. NREL predicts with current tech, and large volume costs can go down to around $5/kg.

biogas for those few locations it will work in the country is much more efficient. You still will use grid tied electricity to compress and pump, but it is mainly renewable.

Grid tied renewables, or stand alone renewables can also be used. Grid tied renewables are less expensive as you can sell the peak, but produce hydrogen off peak, lowering the renewable costs with the spread. This still has a net 0 fossil fuel burn, or negative if renewables are overbuilt for the hyrdrogen. NREL sees central wind as the cheapest renewable at around $8.50/kg.

And there you see the problem. If natural gas is that much cheaper, someone needs to be willing to pay the spread, but that could be the taxpayer or other stations. If the renewables are set at 33%, and costs are like NREL predicts for high volume, you could tax the non -renewable at $1.17, and subsidize the renewable by $2.34, but that is much higher than the gas tax. That is why many think that if a significant amount of fcv, say 2 million get built, the majority fuel will end up being fossil natural gas. Of course there could be technical breakthroughs that lower renewable cost. For the first 50,000 vehicles of course the state through income taxes, and registration fees can pay for the renewable premium.

 

EDIT: Austin beat me to it.

 

OK thanks.

 

Then why not an incentive that encourages the car company to build more and invest in mass production of FCEVs? As it stands, the higher ZEV credits just allows a car maker to make fewer ZEV cars to meet their quota. Which makes the current FCEVs just another test like the Clarity and F-Cell, at best, or just lets a company sacrifice fewer high profit ICE sales to meet tha quota.

Because hybrids are still ICE cars, and the goal of CARB's program is to get more cars with zero tailpipe emissions on the road. This is why PHVs are barely better in terms of ZEV credit calculations than hybrids were, and why BMW had to hobble the i3 REX in terms of hybrid performance in order to get any credits for it.

Except for the high price of the infrastructure.

I thought we are discussing CARB's credit incentives. In what way did plugins benefit more than FCEVs there? The only thing they don't get that plugins do is the federal tax credit, and fuel cell research is still receiving federal funds. FCEVs always got more ZEV credits, sans the fast refuel, than BEVs under CARB.

Almost all PV home systems are grid-tied. Going off-grid is very expensive and requires a big home battery pack(s).

How is grid tied solar not feasible? Because it still uses some fossil fuel energy. Even though wind energy tends to be available at night, and places have nuclear and hydro now.

Wouldn't that make hydrogen unfeasible? It will be fossil fuel based without government mandate. If any private hydrogen station is built in California, it doesn't have to follow the state's 33% renewable bit until 3.5 million kilograms of hydrogen is made in the state. That will take decades going by the number of Mirai Toyota plans to sell. Then some of the renewable hydrogen is stealing renewable electric from plugins through RECs.