Toyota still bullish on fuel cells

reading over the posts, this seems so much like 1999 all over again. Propaganda and misinformation spread by one industry to block start of another. Oh no, hybrids could never be fesable... there is no infrastructure, they cost too much, there are only 2 vehicles, long term reliability is unknown.

What is funny is that big oil has now moved to electricity generation and they are one of the biggest producers of renewable energy out there... heck biggest solar company in the usa is owned by Chevron.

 

Hold on there!
First, you need to watch this:

I found it while trying to get a stand-alone video of Tesla CEO Elon Musk saying the exact same thing. FUEL CELLS ARE BS!!
Actually, let me say, specifically, that HYDROGEN fuel cells are B.S.

You are jumping around here.......are you comparing FCV to EV? Hybrids to PHEV? FCVs to PHEVs? EVs to PHEVs?
You need to be clear......I've run the numbers on FCVs vs PHEVs in another thread, and I can dig them up.

There is NO WAY on this planet, using any form of mathematics, that a FVC will make "more financial sense" than a PHEV (except for interstate busses and trucks you mentioned). For passenger cars (and even light trucks), NO WAY....I want to see your numbers before we entertain such nonsense any further.

I'm not sure why you do NOT see this as complicated. Look, Fuel Cells are great, zero emissions and a 5 minute fillup gets you 500 miles. I myself changed my mind about them after driving 500 miles hrough a winter storm in my ML 350.....it would have been a completely different experience if was in, say, a Tesla Model X instead of the ML. So, I think Fuel Cells will have limited appeal, but compete against EVs? No way.

Before going any further, answer the following:

(1) Where will the Hydrogen come from?
(2) How will the H2 be distributed to stations, and who will build this infrastructure?
(3) How will said infrastructure compete with a network of EV battery-swapping stations?

It is in these 3 questions that people call "B.S." on Hydrogen Fuel Cells as our transportation future, NOT because of the performance or qualities of Fuel Cell Vehicles themselves.

 

Whereas if everyone stuck 8 solar pv panels on their roof, they could charge their BEV for free

 

Sorry, no, I am anti- us taxpayer paying for the 1500 hydrogen fueling stations Carter mentioned in his talk when he bad mouthed plug-ins again.
Toyota’s Bob Carter Takes Shots at Tesla’s Elon Musk, Nissan and Volkswagen in Fuel-Cell Versus EV War of Words
If you are saying the CEOs of Tesla, Nissan, and VW are wrong about plug-ins having a good future, and that BEVs aren't ready, but fcv are, then its an insult.

The american taxpayer has given toyota billions of dollars, far more than tesla. This money was given for its autoplants, cash for clunkers, etc. It is not really any question than toyota plans to build their fuel cell vehicles in Japan with Japanese workers. Carter acted in CES and Detroit auto show like the $200M california is spending will only provide infrastructure for 10,000 fcv or $20,000 each, and Toyota wants anouther $10,000 for each vehicle on top of that. In the lastest speaches he has talked about california needing 1500 hydrogen fueling stations. Really it is insulting until they actually sell those 10,000 vehicles. According to Toyota's press the last couple of years there is no way a plug-in can go 300 miles on a fill up, well we have people doing just that. Really if you love toyota's fuel cell pr so much, you should pay them in Europe, I don't want to pay them more here.

 

You might want to get ready for that magic.
Making Lithium-Sulfide Batteries for Electric Vehicles More Practical | MIT Technology Review
Tesla CTO JB Straubel Says His Company Can Charge Electric Vehicles, With No Battery Swapping, in Five Minutes | MIT Technology Review

This seems to cut against your hypothesis re: Toyota
Toyota Seeks Battery That Stores More Energy than Gasoline | PluginCars.com

Sure, there's been a lot of vaporware, but compared to hydrogen:
New Technologies and Plausibility | The Energy Collective

Finally, it is disingenuous to demand that "batteries become "100x" cheaper and/or lighter" while not demanding the same of Fuel Cell costs and longevity.
Sure, progress has been made, but at what cost? Who knows where battery tech would be today if all those H2 FC dollars had instead gone towards research in batteries?

We should be making our decisions based on physics, to decide what gets most bang for buck, and all signs point towards EVs being way ahead.

 

We really didn't get propaganda against hybrids here in texas. It was mainly positive, with the big caveate, that they were too expensive. Now we have Toyota putting out propaganda against plug-ins. Why? I don't know. Hybrids didn't need any infrastruture. Phevs only need a plug at home, and have all the gas stations already established when they run out of juice. I have no idea why every week we get fcv stuff here in texas from toyota, but they don't bring the plug-in hybrid to sell in the state. I guess they want our tax money to sell fcv in california. You may get different pr in Europe. Carter even talked about gasoline prices remaining low here, but somehow thought that favors fuel cells over plug-ins. I can't follow that logic.

They also produce natural gas. Exxon mobile in its latest outlook saw more hybrids and phev coming in the next decade. What it did not see was a way to make a profit from hydrogen.

Toytota has said this will be a 4 seat car, like the volt, and will likely accelerate a little slower. We don't know the equipment, but they have said it will be priced about the same as a tesla. They say they expect california to have infrastructure for 10,000 fcv in 2018. Given that nowhere else in the US will have infrastructure, these will be only sold between san diago and the bay area in california, and can not travel far out of state. Last years plug-ins sold over 95,000 units. It does sound like bull shit that fcv will be much more practicle than plug-ins in the US in the next decade. Afterwords? Who knows.

Where are these busses and trucks going to fill up in the next decade? Who will build the infrastructure? Why not simply use lng as the pickens plan mentions? Or diesel?

+1

I can see in 20 years if they drop the cost of the vehicles a great deal, someone making money on the infrastructure and building it. If we are talking the next decade? The phev and bev infrastructure will be built.
+1

They also have to compete with bevs and phevs.

 

Why are most BEV's and plug in's turning out to be 4 seaters? That is a significant turn off for a lot of people. Or is that the idea?

 

I think this summarizes it:

EV advantages/disadvantages:
- recharge many places -- electricity is much cheaper than gas (natl ave prices)
- no fuel transportation issues (maybe the grid needs some upgrades here and there for mass adoption)
- anyone, today, can install a charger
- batteries cost a lot, are heavy, longevity is an issue
- batteries are good enough for a basic car as cheap as the Leaf (but could be better when considering trunk space, weight, cost)
- batteries are good enough for an expensive car like the Tesla Model S
- long distance driving and quick recharging is an issue, but solvable as Tesla has shown
- in theory if you run out of charge you can get pushed or towed a very short distance then charge for an hour and be on your way
- EVs can be powered from any one of many or future sources -- not tied to one method

FCV advantages/disadvantages
- quick refueling
- but no place to refuel, expensive to build fuel infrastructure
- fuel cost unknown but not cheaper than gas
- FC cost is high, mass production costs unknown
- if you run out of H2 you have to be towed someplace -- no one will show up with a can of H2 and for many years no one but you will know where you can get refueled
- reliability and longevity of FCV is an unknown
- H2 can come from just a couple of sources (NG, which is still a fossil fuel or the more expensive electrolysis of water with electricity which makes it 2-3x more expensive than EV power)

Did I miss anything?

I'm all for FCV as a fleet vehicle research project. Make a fleet of EVs and FCV and drive both and compare.

Mike

 

The phevs are c-max and fussion energi, mitsubishi outlander phev, prius phv all 5 seaters. With the volt and i3 as 4 seaters. The volt is the best sellling, but if you combine the others there are more 5 seaters than 4.

For bevs the leaf is 5, the tesla S is 5 or 7, and these are the best sellers. The fit ev and many of the others are also 5. the imev, smart ed, etc don't sell nearly in the volume as the leaf or tesla.

Market research from back in the ev1 days said 2 seaters would turn off buyers, but most don't carry more than 4 people. Is it true? I don't know.

 

+1

Yes you missed a major catagory of plug-in the phev.

Advantage-
less expensive than a 200 mile bev or fcv, for similar range and
Only needs plugs at home and/or work (or that wierd ford solar canapy)
Faster refueling than fcv, as can fuel at home or at any gas station.

Disadvantage -
purest don't like 2 fuel sources or having to carry an ice.
Will requre some gasoline or biofuel for longer trips.
more expensive without subsidies than a gasoline only vehicle or a short range bev.

 

Don't forget the subsidies for gasoline.

 

On a purely technical level, I think you are quite 100% wrong here. (someone can weigh in and tell me if I'm wrong)
You see, a hydrogen fuel cell can take up to 15-20 minutes to warm up (in a worst case scenario, which all cars must be designed to, but let's just say 15 minutes). During this warm-up, the battery must provide motive power.
In 15 minutes, a car can travel 20 miles (again, in a worse case scenario).
Thus, EVERY Fuel Cell Vehicle ever made would essentially be a PHEV-20, just with a FC instead of an ICE as the ranger.
Well, 20 miles would be at least 5 kwh; (more for a larger vehicle like an SUV)
So, how exactly would you get the 5kwh? Well, you can't use regen because that would take too long and is simply impractical.

That leaves you two options:

(1) Use grid energy, by cheaply putting in a J1772 socket
-or-
(2) Use the fuel cell to deliver surplus power to the battery...for example, when parked or idling

Well, of those 2, guess which on is most efficient?
Why, it is grid-delivered energy!
The FCV owner would actually be wasting H2 (and the electricity and/or fossil fuels its derived from) by doing this. Not really a big deal for 20 miles, but still.

And you know what? I guarantee you NO fuel cell driver will EVER be in such a situation (if anyone knows of any prototype FCV ever made with a plug, let me know)
Well, putting in a plug to charge the AER of the FCV will defeat its very purpose.....the owner will get a very real-world, first-hand experience of how much cheaper it is to drive on electricity vs. a hydrogen fuel cell....one can imagine them 'limping' from one EV charging station to the next, much like Volt drivers today, only to avoid using their FC as opposed to he ICE. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if many FCV drivers 'dry-tank' it, doing all their driving only within the range of the battery.
After all, gasoline in a Volt can last 6 months before going 'stale', but the liquid H2 in a FCV will evaporate in less than 2 weeks........no one ever mentions this much.

But back to my main point, you are very wrong about cost and weight of batteries.
As I said, FCV's already must have 20 mile batteries. The only extra 'cost' would be the cost of a J1772 socket, and this cost would be not much more than a gas filler door.....I'm guessing less than $500 for sure.

 

I agree with your whole list, and even this point.
But it ties in with what I said, which is that every FCV is really a PHEV-20. So, technically, a FCV that ran out of H2 could 'limp' 20 miles IF it had a plug.

And that is a very big 'if'!
As I mentioned, why would any FCV put a plug on their car? It simply proves the superiority of the plug over H2.

So, imagine your scenario, circa 2030:

A Fuel Cell Vehicle, after having run out of hydrogen on the highway, is able to 'limp' 2 miles on its battery reserves to a fuel station that happens to have a J1772 plug, but no H2. Another station with H2 is 17 miles away.
Well, that driver would be screwed! If his/her FCV didn't have a J1772 port, then forget about limping 17 miles!

 

...I was in NZ in the 1980's yes I recall the nat gas conversions.
Think we had a Holden petrol car (way pre-Volt).
I am way out of date, but presumably the NZ nat gas supply eventually came down such that the gov't was no longer "pushing" nat gas cars? The %renewable is interesting I don't recall much hydro and wind way back then. How are those off-shore wind turbines working out compared to on-shore? Here in VA we have interest in the off-shore but more costly of course.

 

I have no problem with your grid. It was statement Toyota put out. Since PPI are available in some areas of Europe, it must have been as reasoning on why not all of Europe.

Batteries have differing properties. Just look at lead acid starter and deep cycle batteries. One is good at putting out a lot of amps in a short burst. The other at supplying a steady stream of power over a longer period of time. Trying to use a starter battery as a deep cycle will quickly kill it. Investing a lot of money into batteries isn't proof of investing in batteries for plug in vehicle use.

FCEVs (I use this because FCV is used for other things) are not hybrids. They are EVs that just have a different way of getting electricity from chemical energy. The drive train is pure electric. There is no other motive force generator for the electric side to work or hybridize with.

They have batteries because of the fuel cells limitations. First one is that they need to warm up, and battery helps with that and gets the car moving until the FC is pumping out enough electricity. The other is that their response time to shifting power demands is slow. They can't ramp up or down output as quickly as an ICE, or fast enough to meet the demands of driving. The battery acts as a buffer between the driver's demands and the fuel cell's output.

No new car makes financial sense, but there are other reasons for buying one. PHVs are a way of getting the benefits of an BEV without all the draw backs. Some day they might be fuel cell. A fuel cell without a plug makes even less financial and practical sense. You don't lose the refueling rate of a gasoline car, but you can't take it beyond the area with the few refueling stations. A fuel cell plug in can at least be used as a BEV until the refueling stations arrive.

A few years ago the cost per kWh for a lithium traction battery was around $600 to $700. The most recent price for the Volt's batteries has it around $265. The lowest price quoted for Toyota's Volt sized FCEV is quoted at $50,000, more likely closer to the Tesla S price range. This is after decades of R&D.

Using the off the shelf lap top cells in the Roadster, Tesla has shown that we no longer have to wait for BEVs. The technology was ready. We just needed somebody not tied to the ICE to show the way.

Their hybrids are great, but they have no real interest in selling a BEV or even a PHV. The only BEV they sell has Tesla guts. If Toyota are the innovators, why did they have Tesla do the work? And the PPI isn't even available in all the areas that the Prius is.

Investment level doesn't matter. It's what is done with the results that does.

You can go out right now and buy an BEV with a 200 mile range. Too pricy, you can get a 60+ mile range one for about the price of a Prius. The cost to range ratio is just going to get better going forward.

I don't see what's so complicated about FCEVs not being viable without the refueling infrastructure. Doesn't matter how far they can go if they can't refuel once they get there. An alcohol or NG fuel cell would make the infrastructure issue easier, but they are farther from getting on the road than the hydrogen ones.

 

I have problems with the 100 mile total range of ICE manufacturers BEV's. Why this insistence on 100 miles? It's useless.

Tesla can do 200 for £50,000 which is out of most peoples budget (appreciate the costs may come down in due course).

Nissan, BMW, Renault, Ford etc all insist on a 100 miles (or so) max range. If the battery pack for this costs £5,000, then surely they could increase it by 50% to £7,500 and offer a car with a 150 mile range?

A Nissan Leaf costs £21,000 here. Would people not be happier to pay £23,500 and get a 150 range? I'm sure they would. It would give a real world range of 100+ miles instead of 60. Yet, new EV's are still being released with 80/100 mile ranges.

Am I smelling a rat?

 

Yes we had a Chrysler that we ran on CNG $4-$5 per fill it was great while its lasted. We remained on CNG until we eventually replaced that car. By then without subsidies and lower petrol prices ( relatively) we replaced with a petrol Vehicle .


The big Hydro Dams were a Major component of the Governments "Think Big" Energy projects in the early 80' .
There were already major Hydro networks and a couple Geothermal Power stations back then. (I was a Electrical Engineer at one Geothermal power station in late 70's for a while )
The Vehicle CNG infrastructure and vehicle conversions were only one aspect of the Government's Energy Strategy for NZ energy independence.
The other was a NG to Methanol to Petrol plant so we could also produce Petrol from MEthanol/NG. You begin to get the picture why the Oil Olg. were worried about these policies being continued.

We have so much Hydro now that there is a major concern that if the Al Smelter in NZ closes that electricity prices would slump due to excess supply in the power markets.
Privatisation came in , with the Gov. Change, allowing Corporates to take control, close that down in mid 80's But it was never fully completed.
Now this year the current Gov. is hell bent on selling off the SOE Power companies. They offered a 300 Mil sweetener to the Al Smelter to keep it running a few more years at least ... so this risk would not compromise the asset sales program in the energy sector. No doubt the Oil Companies will want to eye a stake in these energy generators if they can acquire them ( the Govt will retain 51% ownership at least for now )

But now with HEV taking off, BEV conversions, and conversions to PHEV in combination with PV prices drops the time is right for household energy independance again. The Problem with PHEV/BEV with household PV generation, if it takes off what will happen to the status quo energy distribution sector ??
Thus the Corporate PR (propogranda) machines are in FULL Swing to slow this trend down ASAP !!

"H2 Economy Future plan" is part of this "the Future is NOT ready yet" for this new energy paradigm that IS available with OFF the shelf components NOW!! as others above have stated.

 

Sounds like NZ would be an ideal place for EV's.

You're miles from anywhere so any oil has to be transported large distances, increasing cost. You have abundant electricity so plenty for EV's. Your weather isn't extreme like your neighbour, so nominal a/c or heating in the EV is required.

Population is mainly centered on the larger cities, so within reach of most EVs range. You could have a few chargers on the motorway routes between cities. NZ has much EV potential.

Just need a New Zealand equivalent of Musk or my electric company to install the free chargers. Our Electric Highway - For The Road - Ecotricity They have created a national (just about) charge grid, free for anyone with an EV who chooses to register. Great advertising and minimal cost.

 

Yes,
And we have a MotorHome( RV) tourist industry thus network of MotorHome ( RV) parks through out the country. So its not hard to find a charge point all ready. Every town, village, resort area through out the contry can supply you a park / camp spot for the RV / Motohome Vehicles to PlugIN, that can be used to recharge an EV also.
( We always charge at home and have never really charged else where but are set up to charge at any camp ground or RV site in the country if needed. )

 

^^^I agree NZ sounds good for BEV, with rental of petrol cars for the days you want to make a longer trips. Well if there's enough spare elec, we can make some H2 too. We just convert the electrolysis for Aluminum to H2 ...common let's Think Big! Yes I recall the NZ Think Big period...how do people look back on it overall? Good thing or bad thing?