Toyota, Honda, Nissan and other Japanese automakers are serious about rolling out battery electric vehicles to catch up with the world’s frontrunners like Tesla and BYD
“We love battery EVs.”
Takero Kato, the executive in charge of electric vehicles at Toyota, said that not once, but twice, to emphasize what he considers the message at this year’s Tokyo auto show.
It’s a message ringing clear at the Tokyo Mobility Show, which will run through Nov. 5 at Tokyo Big Sight hall and where battery-powered electric vehicles are the star at practically every booth.
That’s crazy:
— US gas 140,000 EV chargers and it’s nowhere near enough, even with most charging fine at home
— US had 57 places to fuel hydrogen, all in California
— we don’t even have a cost effective way to produce green hydrogen yet, most will continue to come from fossil fuels for decades
And you think it’s cheaper and easier to build entire industries across the US and worldwide, for a fuel source still dependent on fossil fuels, at a cost probably in the trillions of dollars? And it’s desirable to save large oil companies trying to hold desperately to their existing business?
Millions of people will never have the option to charge at home. The problem with BEVs is that you need tens of millions if not hundreds of millions of charging stations. That is really expensive and likely unfeasible.
Hydrogen stations will basically replace gas stations, sometimes on the very same piece of property. That makes a replacement infrastructure very straightforward to deploy. It makes more sense than having charging stations everywhere. People are just angry that their favored idea isn’t working out, so they attack this idea.
At home charging will replace entire toxic polluting industries, including tens of thousands of gas stations, distributors, storage , transportation, refining, etc, beyond all the mining related activities. I will be very happy to never have to visit a local gas station again: just like my phone, plug it in at night and it lasts me a normal days activities. Just like my phone, I’ll occasionally need to top off during a road trip
There’s no reason people in apartments and condos can’t do the same, it’s just more complex to align competing interests on who pays vs who benefits
Its only people who park on the street who don’t yet have a good answer, and there are several possibilities we need to develop, but level 1 or 2 chargers are cheap, so no big deal if we need millions of destination chargers
FYI - I guess mine is a level 2 charger and uses similar power to my stove or air conditioner. It can be configured as a set of up to 6 to intelligently share limited power plus can be configured to bill whoever uses it, to pay for my electricity, although I’ll probably just whitelist only my vehicle so no one else can run up my power bill. It is on order for about $500 and wiring costs. It may be expensive but this is not the huge deal you’re making it out to be
While we do need hydrogen for things batteries can’t scale to, the many fewer, more industrial uses mean we don’t have to recreate those entire industries. Good riddance
Then how do you travel long distances? You still need some kind of public charging station, which basically recreates the gas station experience.
The solution just to power everything with hydrogen. It solves all use cases with a single solution. And it also replaces the need to have giant mining and manufacturing industries for the batteries. It is the fundamentally better solution.
Dude, really? Yes, batteries add mining costs to the environment and human rights … to the tune of tens of pounds per vehicle to last the life of the car, and already 90%+ recyclable into the next car. Compared to the continuous flow of hydrogen needed to power a car throughout its lifetime? You’ll find it just the opposite
Green hydrogen is made from water. The resources needed are tiny compared to the battery equivalent. You’ve pretty much inverted reality here.
Of course we’ll need superchargers at rest areas along major roads, just like we’re already building out. It is not your neighborhood gas station. Just park and plugin, stretch your legs, use the restroom, grab some fast food, and you’re back on the road
Here’s a map of Tesla’s superchargers. You can see they already cover major highways and population centers enough to make most trips with confidence. They’re also continuing to expand faster than all other charger networks combined (in the US)
https://www.finder.com/tesla-superchargers-map
A hydrogen station is not a gas station either. The only difference is that you don’t need an entire separate set of charging points in parking lots, garages, etc. In reality, this is the cheaper and more practical solution. It solves the problem for everyone and not just a minority of drivers.
To anyone out there reading these comments: in spite of other people laying out clear evidence to the contrary, this person still insists on bigging up hydrogen.
When you buy or lease a Mirai from Toyota, they include 5 free rentals so that you can leave my state of California. Don’t forget: hydrogen gas escapes a lot more easily than gasoline fumes or electrons. Consider how expensive doing something like that safely and reliably actually must be, vs plugging your car right into a wall outlet (for admittedly slow charging).
Seems like the person is being paid. Because some comments are so far from the truth it’s suspicious why they’re being made.
You’re just being duped by the battery industry. BEVs are the real dead-end. A hydrogen car is a vastly smarter idea. A car isn’t a smartphone and you don’t want it to work the same way. In reality, you want something that replicates the usage scenario of conventional cars. Trying to “reinvent the wheel” with BEVs is just making this worse.
Not to mention how much of the argument against FCEVs are either temporary or not real at all. BEV companies want you think that there’s only one solution. In reality, their solution is going obsolete.
Hydrogen is inefficient. Meaning, it’ll cost more to fill up a car. It isn’t the cheaper solution by any means.
You repeated the exact argument people used against solar panels. In reality, it’s nonsense and it’s trapped in a fossil fuel powered world. BEVs only make sense if fossil fuels powered everything. Once renewables catch on, it is the battery that stops making sense.