Given that lack of infrastructure and the high cost of building the infrastructure, it is doubtful fuel cells will ever achieve wide use. I suspect they will be limited to trucks and busses which leave and return to the same facility each day. Also, the generation of hydrogen via electrolysis requires electricity and the end-to-end efficiency of the process is not as high as battery powered EVs when you consider all the aspects of producing, compressing, and transporting hydrogen. It is not correct to say that fuel cell vehicles are emission free as the process of producing hydrogen takes electricity and currently 60% of electricity in this country comes from gas and coal.
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Originally Posted by ThirdOfFive
As has been pointed out in other posts, alternatives to petroleum-powered vehicles will become more available when they become as cheap and as reliable as petroleum-powered vehicles. That appears to be far in the future however.
Another technology that shows great promise is hydrogen power. A hydrogen-powered vehicle is essentially an EV but without the huge and expensive (to produce and to own) batteries. Instead the hydrogen is pumped into a fuel cell, and a reaction takes place that produces electricity to run the car. They have about the same range as battery-powered EVs and the running gear is pretty much the same. The difference is that you can fuel up a hydrogen-powered car in about four minutes vs. "X" length of time to charge a battery.
This technology already exists, albeit in infancy. Toyota makes a hydrogen-powered car (the Toyota Mirai) and a couple of other car manufacturers make one too. I don't think the infrastructure exists here yet, but it is available in a limited manner in California where you can fuel up with hydrogen at the some of the same stations that sell gasoline, and hydrogen tanker trucks are available to deliver it. I have no idea of the cost (probably a whole lot more at this stage than either petroleum - or battery - powered vehicles), but that should come down as the technology advances and infrastructure is adapted.
Best of all, absolutely emission-free.
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