Hydrogen Road Tour ready for 1,700-mile Cali-to-Canada drive
Stating next week, a little thing called the Hydrogen Road Tour will visit 28 cities over nine days. The Tour will cruise north along the West Coast, starting in Chula Vista, California and ending in Vancouver, British Columbia. The point of the trip, if the name doesn't make it obvious, is to promote H2 vehicles and to "highlight the communities where fuel cells and hydrogen stations are entering early commercial markets." Some of the 12 vehicles that will join the tour include:
* Daimler F-Cell
* Chevy Equinox FCV
* Honda FCX Clarity
* Hyundai Tucson FCEV
* Kia Borrego FCEV
* Nissan X-Trail
* Toyota FCHV-adv
* Volkswagen Tiguan HyMotion
* Volkswagen Caddy Maxi
If you live on the West Coast, and want to spend some time with these vehicles, check out the Road Tour's website to see where and when they'll be nearby..
Gallery: 2009 Honda FCX Clarity First drive
[Source: Hydrogen Road Tour]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
meme 2:35PM (5/22/2009)
Poor buggy whip manufacturers.
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Derk McRockgroin 2:52PM (5/22/2009)
Ooooh. Another distraction.
I guess all of these cars will be carried in semi-trucks most of the way.
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Stew 3:22PM (5/22/2009)
Hey, quit being so negative. The semi trucks are probably only going to ship the cars to the starting point, pick them up from the finish point and carry the hydrogen to the refueling points.
jake 3:50PM (5/22/2009)
Yeah, hopefully they don't pull that that semi-truck BS they pulled the last time they did a tour. It should be easier since we have multiple tax payer funded hydrogen stations in California.
Chris M 5:58PM (5/22/2009)
The California H2 filling stations consists of 5 in the L.A. area, and 1 in Sacramento. There was one planned for the Bay area, but I don't know if it was ever opened. So, the distance between LA and Sacramento is too great for all but the Toyota FCHV, and there are no H2 fueling stations between Sacramento and Vancouver, BC.
So, yeah, that pretty much demands that both cars and fuel supply be trucked from city to city - by diesel powered big rigs.
Patrick 8:37PM (5/22/2009)
There are currently 27 operational fueling stations in California 19 are in the LA area. Look it up: http://www.hydrogenassociation.org/general/fuelingSearch.asp
Stew 12:29AM (5/23/2009)
Patrick:
Have you looked at the board of directors for The Hydrogen Association? Among it's esteemed members are:
Phillip Baxley - Shell Hydrogen
Jeffrey Jacobs - Chevron
Anand Kumar - Indian Oil Corporation
Hmmm...
Stew
Chris M 2:27AM (5/23/2009)
Patrick, thanks for that link. Most of those H2 stations are for corporate fleets and research and transit districts, some are for warehouse forklift trucks, and they counted the LA H2 pipeline as a "fueling station"?! Those are not open to the public, should they really count? Count only those open to the general public, and the totals really plummet. Oh, and one was a "hythane" station, that mix of natural gas and hydrogen won't work in H2FC cars, and gives reduced range for CNG vehicles.
Total worldwide H2 refueling stations (including that pipeline) is only 72! Compare that with this map of EV recharging stations:
http://www.evchargermaps.com/?Address=Anaheim&Want=SPI%20LPI%20AVC%20OC&Zoom=9
The LA area alone has many more EV charging places than the worldwide total of H2 stations.
The fact remains that there are no H2 refueling stations between Sacramento and Canada, meaning they still have to haul the vehicles and fueling facilities.
Shock Me 2:56PM (5/22/2009)
What about the manure haulers?
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paulwesterberg 3:26PM (5/22/2009)
Also keep a lookout for the tanker truck that will be hauling the fuel for these cars. It will probably have a big Shell or Exxon logo on the side(and be powered by diesel of course).
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Chris M 5:52PM (5/22/2009)
Of course. It would cost too much to even consider making a fuel cell powered big truck, and the low volumetric energy density of H2 would guarantee a very short driving range if the truck use an internal combustion engine fueled by H2 - there would be no fuel left for the cars!
So, those vehicles will be hauled from city to city on flatbed diesel trucks, and the H2 fuel (or H2 fuel generators) also hauled by diesel trucks.
paulwesterberg 6:30PM (5/22/2009)
I can't wait until I can get in my hydrogen powered car and drive it onto the nearest hydrogen car transport truck so it can haul me to work every day!
Patrick 8:41PM (5/22/2009)
The hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles will be driving all 1,700 miles. Not something a battery-only car could do. It'd take you twice as long to wait for it to charge up every couple hours of driving.
XYZ 10:49PM (5/22/2009)
Patrick 8:41PM (5/22/2009)
"The hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles will be driving all 1,700 miles. Not something a battery-only car could do. It'd take you twice as long to wait for it to charge up every couple hours of driving."
You spend that small amount a hydrogen car costs and spend it on an electric car and do you then still think 1,700 miles are not achievable?
paulwesterberg 12:13PM (5/23/2009)
They are taking 9 days to complete the trip. A tesla roadster could easily complete the trip in 7 days.
Derk McRockgroin 4:02PM (5/22/2009)
Stew, I have a very good reason to be negative and disapproving towards Hydrogen fuel cells and those annoying H2 PR groups. As they brought those excuses to California to shut down the ZEV mandate, which required every automaker to produce an electric vehicle.
"These FC cars will be ready in a few years."
"The only exhaust is water!"
"We just need to get the cost down, it will only take little while."
It turned out to be a long while. As the years went by, I waited, and learned more and more about fuel cell cars, and my views toward it were getting uglier and uglier.--Expensive platinum catalysts, almost a million $$ per FC car, in need of extensive infrastructure, and 3X less efficient than an electric car.
I once was very hopeful and excited for H2, and believe it or not, a Hydrogen economy chauvinist... But now, I see it as a distraction to keep people's attention away from much more affordable and efficient electric cars, that may help us transition away from a world powered by oil--and into a world driven by electrons--coming from the forces of nature around us. (Sun, wind, waves, hydro, geothermal)
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Throwback 4:20PM (5/22/2009)
Perhaps the EV PR machine needs to organize an EV caravan along the same route. The cars could be charged only with Sun, wind, waves, hydro, geothermal only.
I am all for variety, let's see who makes the best case.
Stew 6:20PM (5/22/2009)
My earlier post was tongue-in-cheek ;-)
Chris M 8:36PM (5/22/2009)
McRockgroin: I, too, once had high hopes for H2 fuel cells, but reality has a way of intruding. When the facts behind H2 became apparent, it also became obvious that H2 really wasn't a very good automotive fuel, after all.
Throwback: Yes, organizing EV enthusiasts to trail along - no trucks needed - and local EV enthusiast groups to meet them just might be the ticket, all right. They could even cheerfully announce that they have the same goals of cleaner air and reduced oil consumption, like the H2 enthusiasts, but they're doing it now, not several years from now, and doing it cheaper and 3x more efficiently.
Shock Me 4:02PM (5/22/2009)
As opposed to a Tesla owner driving to the nearest airport and flying to British Columbia by way of Minneapolis.
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