SAE 2009: Honda's fuel cell friendly exhibit
It's no secret that Honda - even with a new and popular hybrid, the Insight, on the market - doesn't see a bright future for plug-in vehicles. Nope, the Japanese automaker is all about hydrogen, as the company's booth at the SAE World Congress made abundantly clear. There was an Insight on display, as were Honda's walking assist devices, but the main message was: here's how fuel cells work and here's why Honda will make them the right way. You can pretend you're on the scene by clicking through the gallery below.
One portion of the display, pictured above, had a little solar panel that used artificial light to electrolyze water. We're all fully aware of the problems with the coming hydrogen economy, but seeing the system work, even in miniature, makes Honda's decision to go heavy on the H seem a bit more reasonable.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
gorr 8:56PM (4/24/2009)
I don't understand them, i said to them through this website many times to put that electrolyzer inside the hydrogen car to make the fuel for free and without pollution while we drive or parked.
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Serryl 10:15PM (4/24/2009)
Yes, and many times people on this site have explained to you why an on-board electrolyzer is not an ideal solution to the problem of hydrogen storage.
Chris M 11:39PM (4/24/2009)
Gorr, the feeling is mutual, they don't understand you.
Sorry, but the auto engineers simply do not believe that it is practical to power a car using an onboard electrolysis cell, considering that the electrolysis cell would require about 3.5 times more electricity than a H2 fuel cell fueled by it puts out, and a staggering 14 times more electrical power than a H2 IC engine fueled by it could put out!
Hey, even Blencoe understands that, and he is all gung-ho for H2!
Greg Blencoe 10:32PM (4/24/2009)
Honda is no doubt one of the great engineering companies in the world. They know far more about what will work with cars than me or anybody else who reads this blog.
Honda is aggressively pursuing hydrogen fuel cell vehicles and has completely rejected plug-in battery technology. But it should be noted that the FCX Clarity will make good use of lithium ion batteries. Therefore, batteries will play a helpful role in the hydrogen economy. However, plug-in vehicles that require large, expensive, heavy batteries that take up a lot of trunk and passenger space simply don't meet customer needs.
Think about it, Honda is still pursuing hydrogen fuel cell vehicles despite the hydrogen fueling infrastructure problem. That's how much better the technology is!
Hydrogen fuel cell cars like the FCX Clarity can give customers the same driving experience as the vehicles that are on the road today. But the hydrogen fuel will come from domestically produced sources of energy (starting with natural gas and later from wind and then solar) that are much cleaner.
Hydrogen fueling station cooperatives mean that the oil companies do not have to be involved in building the hydrogen fueling infrastructure. Frankly, oil companies don't want to have anything to do with hydrogen (outside of phony interest at conferences), because they know it is a huge threat. Companies like Air Products and Linde will be the ones that build the hydrogen infrastructure and in doing so replace the oil companies.
History has proven Honda right when the company did not follow the SUV herd five or ten years ago. And Honda will once again be proven right when hydrogen fuel cell vehicles are written about in the history books.
It's time to solve the oil crisis by starting a hydrogen revolution! And the Honda FCX Clarity will play a huge part in this.
Greg Blencoe
Chief Executive Officer
Hydrogen Discoveries, Inc.
"Hydrogen Car Revolution" blog
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Chris M 1:42AM (4/25/2009)
Sorry, Blencoe, but Honda DID follow the SUV boom and still makes the CR-V, the Element, the Pilot, and the Ridgeline SUT, that calls into question your other statements on Honda.
Honda does have great engineers, but the engineers working on the fuel cell project won't tell their executives that batteries are a lot less expensive and much more efficient than fuel cells. They certainly won't tell them that it will be decades, if ever, before H2 FC vehicles will be affordable to the general public. After all, if the executives realize H2 FC cars are a waste of time and money, those engineers could be out of a job! So, the Honda executives keep getting glowing reports on progress, just a little more research and a little more development, then it'll be ready really really soon - and they've been saying that for over a decade.
Yes, H2 does come from local sources, including natural gas and renewables, so does electricity for plug-ins. But plug-ins are 3x more efficient in using electricity from renewable sources, leaving more renewable electricity available to displace fossil fuel usage.
It's absurd to pretend the "oil companies don't want to have anything to do with hydrogen", when the oil companies right now are the worlds biggest producers of H2, they have the cheapest source of H2, and they fully intend to sell that profitable new fuel when the oil runs low. All the major oil companies have hydrogen promotional efforts and are dues paying members of almost all the hydrogen promotional groups. Shell Oil has already built H2 refueling stations! So, go ahead and try to get enough people willing to donate $2,000 to build a "hydrogen co-op", it won't matter, the oil companies still want to control the hydrogen market, and they have a lot more money and marketing clout.
I don't know everything that the future historians will write about, but I think it likely they'll describe the FCX Clarity as beautiful and ambitious but doomed to fail, and how Honda's late entry into the plug-in auto market cost them market share.
Derk McRockgroin 12:33AM (4/25/2009)
Look, look, see H2 Fuel Cells. Praise it, lemmings, praise it!
Pay no attention to those $500,000 price-tags...
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Dude 10:45AM (4/25/2009)
Honda is delusional and so are a couple of other automakers. I see what they are doing thou, if the ICE was your differentiation in the market, and you are about to lose it, what will be the difference between a Honda and a Toyota? If you build EVs then you go against the Sony, Sanyo, Panasonic...etc. in the cell manufacturing business. Besides automakers are mainly mechanical engineering companies, not material or chemical.
I guess for them the FC system is more appealing to them. In practice automakers have invested orders of magnitudes less into battery development then in FCs. And still battery technology is improving by leaps and bounds. I read every day of new materials and better performance.
The reality that automakers will have to come to grips, including the one I work for, is that FCs are an unworkable proposition. They will have to see themselves as an integrator of electrical power train powered by batteries.
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jake 2:00PM (4/25/2009)
I expect Honda has some plug-in development under wraps. They have to have some insurance in case hydrogen doesn't fly (and the chance it doesn't is pretty high).
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jharlan 2:10PM (4/25/2009)
Only one question: How much per copy? Come on, How much? If you are
that dam proud of those things, how much are they going to cost (or
is NASA the only agency that will ever be able to afford them?)
It never made sense to me to use megawatts of power to split water
for kilowatts of yield. It just takes a huge amount of energy to produce hydrogen from water, but you can split it from methane, but what's the point if you have to use fossil fuel to produce it? Maybe some of you can explain to me how you can get energy out of nothing.
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Throwback 5:24PM (4/25/2009)
I will defer to honda on this. They have been a highly successful company and made hybrids before anyone else. If they think FC are the future I see no reason to doubt them now. Look at their track record going all the way back to the CVCC. I don't think there is ONE solution to our personal transportation needs. BEVs will have a place but I can see FC cars as well. Personally i would love a Clarity, even if I had to fuel it with a home natural gas unit.
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Derk McRockgroin 12:16AM (4/26/2009)
Honda was not the first to sell hybrid cars. The first Prius went on sale in December 1997 in Japan. The Insight was introduced in 1999--and total global sales for the Insight amounted to only around 18,000. On June 7, 2007, toyota sold 1 million hybrid vehicles globally, and 757,600 were Prius. Honda's Civic hybrid wasn't as successful, but has been profitable.
There are many good reasons to be skeptical with Hydrogen Fuel cells. Despite what Honda has said, it's unlikely that Hydrogen power will ever make economic sense, no matter how much R&D is put into it.
This is the report from a engineer who has been researching Fuel cells for many years.
http://www.efcf.com/reports/E17.pdf
Bill 9:36PM (4/26/2009)
Hydrogen is simply too inconvenient a fuel for a light passenger vehicle.
Too lossy, too bulky (hard to handle), too expensive ($10/kg from the cheapest source - natural gas)
If fuel cell manufacturers want to see their products used in cars, they need to develop a fuel cell that can run directly on natural gas or an alcohol (ideally E85)
Chris M 11:59PM (4/26/2009)
Bill, solid oxide fuel cells can run directly on natural gas and other hydrocarbon fuels, but their rather high operating temperature causes some problems that must be solved before they can be used as a practical automotive power source. Volkswagen is reported to be working on it.