Development of hydrogen vehicles gets first cash infusion

Automakers, oil companies, utilities and dozens of private firms and institutions Tuesday received $350 million in federal funds to research and develop hydrogen vehicles and fueling stations.

By David Kiley, USA TODAY

http://www.usatoday.com/money/autos/2004-04-28-hydrocars_x.htm

The effort, a series of projects to be carried out over five years, is the initial installment of the Bush administration’s $1.2 billion commitment to developing hydrogen vehicles. The government and the auto industry say those vehicles will replace gasoline-powered cars and trucks over the next several decades.

Private industry will add an additional $225 million to the first-phase effort. The $575 million total is about what it costs to develop an all-new, gasoline-powered, internal-combustion vehicle.

More than 130 research institutions and companies are involved in the Energy Department-sponsored projects. Among the projects:

• Ford Motor will place up to 30 hydrogen-powered vehicles in Orlando, Detroit and Sacramento. BP plans to build fueling stations to support them. The stations will test real-world viability and safety of different methods of harnessing hydrogen for fuel, such as reforming it from natural gas.

• BMW, Toyota, Honda and Nissan will put 80 hydrogen-powered vehicles in California. ConocoPhillips and Air Products and Chemicals will construct 24 hydrogen fueling stations in Pennsylvania. Those stations will draw hydrogen from renewable sources such as wind power and will use waste hydrogen from industrial work sites.

• DaimlerChrysler will put from 20 to 37 fuel-cell vehicles into fleets in Michigan and California by this summer.

Fuel-cell vehicles are powered by electricity made on board by combining hydrogen from a fuel source, such as natural gas or electrolyzed water, and oxygen from the air. BMW is the only automaker testing vehicles that run on liquid hydrogen as a fuel to power an internal combustion engine.

Fuel cells are significantly more efficient than combustion engines, and the only exhaust produced is water. Debate continues, though, about whether hydrogen can be produced more cleanly than gasoline.

Some automakers say that consumers should be able to buy hydrogen-powered vehicles in some markets, such as California, by around 2010. But some estimates say significant market penetration won’t happen until after 2025 because of the high cost of generating and storing hydrogen.