@suckacheese: that's crazy cool. way farther out then hydrogen i'd think.

EMoShunz

This car looks sweet.

Pensador

Wow, I saw this commercial and absolutely fell in love with this car. The only question I have, is where do they refuel these things, and how big are the hydrogen tanks they store fuel in? Gotta hand it to Honda... first to the market with a hybrid vehicle (insight), and now this. You know, people gawk at the $600 a month lease price, but if you think about it it's bound to go down once they gain some economies of scale in producing these cars. Much like other things in life, the price goes down with time. Let's just hope this car goes down 1/3 in price within 69 days like the iPhone did!

methodlimp

@boe: agreed
personally, i think hydrogen will end up being gov't vehicle (central fuel) only for quite a while, and diesel electric hybrids for the masses (with the diesel getting ethanol or similar addatives) until there is a major infastructure change.

EMoShunz

Anyone out there interested in the rebirth of nuclear? There's an interesting tech being developed called Pebble Bed Modular Reactors that is apparently "inherently safe" (at least against meltdowns) and has the additional benefit of being so godawful hot that you can put water in the bottom and get hydrogen and oxygen out of the top as a byproduct of the power generation process. So you get electricity from the turbine, and hydrogen for free. Cool stuff. Read more here:

[www.wired.com]

suckacheese

My understanding is that you can't simply 'refuel' the cells, but rather they need special equipment. It's essentially a battery, so you have to separate two different materials, only allowing them to mix in a controlled manner which results additionally in a release of electricity.

I don't know if this is a problem, but it's unclear how recyclable these cells will be. Can you simply send one back to a company to 'fill up' again? How long will one last for? Are they light weight enough to carry around extras in your trunk (and would that be safe?)

Also, a larger issue is the energy expended to create the separation of materials (no free energy!). While the fuel cells create no waste in the release of energy, some type of power source will be needed to create the potential.

It could very well be that gasoline would be one of the primary sources employed (some have speculated that was why the Bush regime has pushed strongly for fuel cells). It's still advantageous in some ways -- you don't have to worry about constant acceleration/deceleration which consumes a lot of energy. Also, it's much much easier to chance the primary source (e.g. use nuclear energy instead).

abes2

There is bound to be some myopic idiot who says it costs much more than a standard car and you'd have to drive blah blah blah miles to make up the difference. Or Volcanos produce more blah blah blah or what about the polution created to make the hydrogen...

I for one am stoked we are moving forward even though it isn't fast enough for me I'm glad we are trying a little harder as of late.

boe

@strider_mt2k: i wish it could change overnight, but this is a nice start.

everyone that can afford $600/month should demand honda make more, and buy their own hydrogen plants...oh crap, not gonna happen :(
maybe some day.

EMoShunz

Double dumbass to you too, fella.

Seriously, this is pretty cool stuff happening.
Maybe it's not all-encompassing yet, but it's a continuation of a start of the beginning.

strider_mt2k

Are they any Hydrogen stations in Souther California? or for the matter in the west coast?

DJJS

@weatherman: It will be really difficult to create a fuel cell, because as they are now, cells are really really tiny. So to grow one big enough to power a car would mean some pretty intense petri dish action. That, plus I don't know how much torque you get from a mitochondria. If it's not enough to pull my boat, I don't want one.

Pope John Peeps II

Are any of you paying attention? They are restricting leases to people in Irvine, Torrance and Santa Monica because they ARE NEAR HYDROGEN STATIONS. You fill it up just like a regular gasoline car. The home refuling kits are still being worked on.
Educate yourself at [fcx.honda.com]

Mr. Kite

The reason this gets the equivalent of 68mpg is because it is using electricity to create the hydrogen. This is ultimately the reason that I believe fuel cell cars are doomed before they hit the market because an electric car can get three times the equivalent 'miles per gallon'. (What we are measuring is CO2 released to create the miles per gallon equivalency.)

If you can get a vehicle that is three time greener and will ultimately cost significantly less ('real world' cost, which for both is much higher than current internal combustion engines), wouldn't we want the one that is greener and less expensive? That is why electric cars really appear to be our future.

Add to this picture that electric vehicles can be recharged in the evening with very little impact to the current electrical grid (and the fact that we need to replace coal plants with greener alternatives), and you can see why many are declaring the fuel cell vehicle heading toward a dead end.

That said, it is impressive engineering, Honda. Hope you are working on an electric vehicle, though.

Monty

@mikebabcock: I don't think you understand what fuel cells are.

weatherman

It has a range of 270 miles, which is pretty decent.

As for the pollution argument, of course the big advantage comes when all the sources are renewable, but no matter how the hydrogen is generated it's still centrally created and therefore the waste can be dealt with much more efficiently. Non-point pollution sources, such as cars, are much more difficult because they have to treat waste locally - and in this case, carry it with them (ie catalytic converters). That's much less effective. So even with fossil fuel sources, the pollution can be a lot less.

weatherman

The one thing to keep in mind is that fuel cells need to be made, and it takes a lot of energy to create one. Think for a moment of how that energy (in the form of electricity for separating hydrogen and oxygen from water) will be created, and how much of it will be used to create your 'clean' driving experience.

Hydrogen fuel cells are really cool powerful batteries, nothing more. We have no large stable supply of hydrogen, we make it en masse by pulling it out of water with energy, so if that energy is solar or wind or geothermal or water, then great. But what if its coal or oil power being used to make the fuel cells for you to drive, what have you accomplished?

mikebabcock

Since Toyota got upper hand in hybrid(prius), Honda now just try to get even. Commercial propaganda is how I see this vehicle. Hydrogen can't save this planet.

The global warming cause by just two reasons: Too many people and too much industries. Only if human can provide answer to this two(or even just one) issues then we can start to talk that human have a hope.

[en.wikipedia.org]

PHJ

the car comes with a home fueling station which converts natural
gas to hydrogen (that probably why the high lease) and the dealers will have refueling station which converts solar electricity to hydrogen.
You couldn't drive it to vegas from ca, you either run out hydrogen or
be hard up for a fueling station.
but for daily commuter Cool!

tomaartist

@methodlimp: Actually, Toyota was the first to market with hybrids. But the market was Nippon, not LA...

I love the idea of only water emissions, but I remain skeptical about the viability of hydrogen, in terms of power storage efficiency & reclamation.

PS, don't get me started on nuclear...

ideaman2020

To tie a lot of this together:

1) Yes, we need a more eco-friendly way of producing the hydrogen. I've also heard about bacteria as a viable form as well as solar. Otherwise, we're shifting one means of pollution to another.

2) Yes, a while back when Bush was pushing the Fuel Cell, his plans explicitly called for gas to power the hydrogen fuel generation. Its quite ingenious actually, every thinkgs they're Molly McHippy with their clean car, but never bother to consider how the fuel is made.

ARP

Anyone have a house to put the hydrogen fueling appliance in Silicon Valley for less than $1,000,000?

heroineworshipper

In either case it's great news - once more the rules of economics take over. $1 per gallon of gas = oversized SUVs. $3+ per gallon of gas = reasons to look for something else

image18301

schwarzenegger started soem initiative to build hydrogen fueling stations for the entire state a few yrs back. not sure how far along it's come

Weihovah

I've read stories about dozens of ways to produce hydrogen. Everything from the (increasingly common) bacteria farm to the wonderfully star-warsy "lasers in space and collectors in the oceans". Lets hope some of these efficient methods materialize and make it cheap and available. Then they just have to find a way to make the electric motor sound like an old V8 and I'll be set.

OneMHz

@emoshunz: It's closer than you'd think. Germany has already built 2 for research purposes, China has one running at Tsinghua University, and a South African company at pbmr.com plans to start selling them commercially around 2015 with the first plant to come online in 2013.

[pebblebedreactor.blogspot.com]

The biggest issue right now is waste storage, but if the US would allow recycling of spent fuel, it would reduce that problem dramatically. France has been doing that for decades, but we prefer to just put viable, 95% usable spent fuel out in the desert somewhere.

suckacheese

Water vapor accounts for the majority of the greenhouse effect, which warms the Earth.

Chew on that a while...

But also know that I'm being a smart arse.

CajunGuy

Coal companies love hydrogen. Why? Because they provide the fuel. It's still just substituting one pollutant for an equally harmful one.

NcSchu

And just where does electricity come from? Coal and Diesel are still very prominent for making electricity, since the environmentalist keep telling everyone that we can't use cleaner alternative methods like Hydro electric.

Impressive car. Being in Alaska, my 1st question is always, how much heat can it produce. Electric cars do ok in warmer climates, but in the winter they don't do so well.

TheBear91

@suckacheese: nice

EMoShunz

@Pope John Peeps II: you make an excellent point. I yield to the superior logic.

weatherman

damnitttt whynot in sarasota florida!!!? i would get this in a second.

astrograph

"...equivalent of 68mpg in a conversion metric that (we'll be honest here) confounds us since the car uses no gas at all." -- What, gasoline is the only thing measured in gallons?

@Monty: I would love a pure electric car (particularly the Tesla Roadster), but until batteries can be charged in minutes instead of hours, they will be out of reach to many consumers simply because so many live in townhomes and apartments without nearby access to power outlets for their cars, particularly for overnight charging. Plus, there's also the issue of not being able to quickly recharge in an emergency. For the foreseeable future, the masses must rely on chemical fuel.

sumocat

HAHA, wow! I saw 2 driving the other day with funky license plates and was wondering what was up with that. They were rolling down PCH (pacific coast highway) and the cars looked too sleek to be honda's, but hey. I saw them live.

Jamez

Alright... so... here's the thing about fuel cells... it is entirely possible to make them without the restriction of refueling stations. Nearly a decade ago I presented an alternative fuel system design at a conference at the Smithsonian (my team was focused on systems for farming... bet you thought your organic produce was healthy and good for the environment... but that's another discussion). One of the other presenters was a group from UConn (I think info about that program can be found at [www.ctfuelcell.uconn.edu] though foundations and projects have a tendency to change names over a decade) who perfected the fuel cell (and their tech is now found, in one way or another, in every fuel cell vehicle out there). They were powering a city bus with a 1' x 1' x 4" fuel cell. It also had passive solar panels on the roof of the bus.

The way a fuel cell works (if I remember correctly... it has been a decade) is you allow hydrogen to flow into one side of the cell and allow oxygen to flow into the other side of the cell. In the cell is a precious metal which reacts to the hydrogen and oxygen. That's where the electricity is extracted. When the H meets the O it combines to become H2O. The team then took the water and used the solar cells to power induction of electrolysis (I think that's their patent # 5,651,929) which split the water back into H and O. There is some loss in the system but when the system ran low they'd just add water.

Granted, it took a lot of solar panels to balance it but for buses that worked well; lots of roof real estate. Further, solar panels have become considerably more efficient in the last decade. Bottom line: if we can wean our society off of the idea that we need filling stations we'll do fine. The real problem is the precious metal in the chamber... limited commodities are by their nature expensive. On the other hand the UConn team was fond of pointing out that the cell was so powerful there was plenty left over... no reason one couldn't plug the house into the car at the end of the day.

I worry that what we are actually seeing is big oil recognizing that they need a new fuel to keep hold on the economy and so they find a way to make something that could easily be stationless and made it stationed. I think it's time to give new meaning to energy independence.

ArielZusya

@Weihovah: The score stands: Ahnold 3, Shell 3 million... Gotta' love our Governator.
@tomaartist: I use Costco gas as a rule, and I make it to Costco about 1 time in 3. If you mess up with a hydrogen fuel cell ride it's an automatic call to AAA. No thank you. I'll stick with my Prius.

Spiny Norman

@Pope John Peeps II:
I sincerely hope that your comments were intended to be humorous - if they weren't the the question would be "What planet did you go do school at?"

ScottKin

@PHJ: I normally loath personal attacks on message boards, but: You craven douche. You'd jump immediately to scaling back all of humanity and our progress in lieu of working for a technological solution? Pathetic.

HonusWScruggs

@ArielZusya: you have to be lying...at least i hope you are...otherwise this means that if this was implemented 10 years ago we could already have been free from fossil fuels.

EMoShunz

On nuclear option:
HTGR (High Temperature Gas Reactor) designs were around and producing electricity (lookup Peach Bottom) as an intrinsically safe fission reactor long before we needed hydrogen to power cars. Might be the ticket.

On the car:
Totally jealous. Must. Have. Now.

reefdweller

Sorry if I repeat anything already said.

So if you go to Honda's website you can read a little about the car. Apparently you can only get the car if you live in a few places around Los Angeles, Santa Monica, Torrence and I think Irvine but I can't remember if that's right. The reason for this is so you can be near a qualified dealer for maintenance and to make sure there are refilling stations nearby. Apparently this means that there are a few stations around LA. Also the 600 a month includes collision and maintenance so its not quite as expensive as you think considering.

Also with the energy used to separate the hydrogen thing... There are greater environmental protections involved when a giant corporation is producing the energy. Just think about how many people are driving cars that wouldn't pass emission tests. It's not going to solve any climate issues but at least it can be regulated easier.

avrohim

$600/month (428euro) renting is ridiculously cheap for a car like that, as the renting convers all the maintenance, includes full-cover insurance and replacement car if needed.

I hope we get initiatives like this one here in europe.

RebootEDC

@EMoShunz: Sorry... sucks but true... sorta... remember, the precious metal aspect of fuel cells still raise all sorts of issues with mass production. The problem has never been H production... water is plentiful. It wouldn't have to potable... just as long as it has the two basic components, H and O, the rest can be cleaned up (usually) with a coffee filter or something similar (metal micro-mesh or ceramic etc). We used to joke that in places like Florida it would be effective to put a dehumidifier in the car and power the car off of the local climate. I don't know about you but back when I lived in more humid climates I would often use the air conditioner to dry off more than to cool off. Now that I live in a dry place (Denver) I rarely run the air... even on 80+ days. A car that used H2O could suck some moisture out of the air, break it down into H and O, put it together in the chamber, and start the whole thing over.

ArielZusya

better than Prius!

Palestina