
Hydrogen follow up: Toyota's future - sagarm
http://ssj3gohan.tweakblogs.net/blog/12292/hydrogen-follow-up-toyotas-future
======
sandworm101
> Personal cars are going the way of the dodo.

I have to laugh every time I read such statements. It's like the man who
invented the apartment claiming houses now obsolete. Price is not always the
driving force. If it were, SUVs would not exist, nor would BMW, Merc, Ferrari
any every other performance car brand.

Cars are as much personal statements as houses, probably more so. Relatively
few people see you in your house, but everyone sees which car you drive.
Setting aside the robot driver debates, these are fashion items. Society isn't
going to abandon such vanities simply to better leverage a new technology.

~~~
superuser2
Most people who own cars can't afford fun or fashionable ones, or don't choose
to allocate their budgets that way. SF is a distorted perspective: car
ownership is unnecessary, so the only cars you see are those owned
voluntarily. I was struck by how new and expensive all the cars on the road
looked when I lived there this summer. In Chicago, the overwhelming majority
of the cars I walk by are 10-year-old beige econoboxes.

 _Luxury_ cars may be around for the long haul, but I suspect cars of
necessity will not.

~~~
Swizec
> I was struck by how new and expensive all the cars on the road looked when I
> lived there this summer.

That has less to do with "we don't need a car so we're only going to buy
fancy" but with how affluent SF is. The quality of cars on the road directly
correlates to how wealthy a neighbourhood or town or country is.

I was in Luxemburg two years ago. A brand new BMW 3 series was downright
pedestrian. I don't think I've ever seen so many fancy cars in one area as I
did there. SF by comparison, is a shitshow of crappy cars.

You can see this effect if you drive down the peninsula. SF has normal cars,
south SF has old beat up cars, then the fanciness of cars waxes and wanes,
until you reach the general Palo Alto area where there's a shitload of Teslas
and other fancy cars. Even Maseratis are relatively normal. And then you go
further south and the quality of cars starts dropping again.

But what you will see rarely in the Bay Area are supercars like Lamborghini,
Ferrari and such. I don't know why, but I would venture it's got to do with
the fact that most people use their cars for commuting and supercars are
terrible commuters. Or maybe the Bay Area just isn't affluent enough for those
kinds of cars.

~~~
nopinsight
I suspect it has to do with the culture of _not_ showing off. Most of the tech
multimillionaires probably do not care as much about such vanities as their
reputation and/or impact on the world and therefore has better use for their
money.

Anyone with actual knowledge of the matter please chime in. ;)

~~~
superuser2
Alternate theories:

\- There are actually only a small handful of tech multimillionaires.

\- The sufficiently rich have enclosed garages and don't drive very much.

\- The truly rich prefer to live in the suburbs.

------
IanCal
> Guess where we are now? I'll calculate this for you. Tesla announced that
> their replacement batteries cost $12000 for the 85kWh version. That is
> $140/kWh. Right now, in 2015, we are to the left of this entire diagram
> already.

Does the Tesla do 240 Wh/mile? I searched quickly and saw 480 from someone, is
there an official figure for this?

~~~
harpastum
Tesla claims [1] that the 85kWh pack will get 270 miles of range on the 85D
(265mi on the 85).

85kWh/270mi = 315Wh/mi.

[1] [http://www.teslamotors.com/models](http://www.teslamotors.com/models)

~~~
vvanders
That's pretty in-line with real-world usage. I think my lifetime usage is 311
Wh/mi over ~16k miles.

------
vvanders
Yikes 60kWh = 1kg of H2. I knew it was expensive to generate H2 but that's
very high. 3-4x worse than BEV depending on your efficiency.

Given that we're going to see sub 30k BEVs in the not distant future it's a
shame to see Toyota back Fuel Cells.

~~~
toomuchtodo
We've known fuel cells are a terrible tech for cars for a while.

[http://insideevs.com/tesla-ceo-elon-musk-hydrogen-fuel-
cell-...](http://insideevs.com/tesla-ceo-elon-musk-hydrogen-fuel-cell-
vehicles-are-mind-boggingly-stupid/)

"Where does hydrogen sit in this equation? Currently, filling up hydrogen
costs $12/kg at the moment in California. This is roughly in line with the
actual cost of hydrogen - a bit on the low side if you want to commercially
exploit one of those expensive filling stations, but we can safely assume that
if hydrogen were ubiquitous, the price is roughly in this order. This will get
you about 60 miles, so your cost is about $0.20/mi. An electric car costs
about $0.06/kWh to fill up, and drives 4-6 miles on that charge. That's about
a cent per mile. Yes. A 20-to-1 difference in running costs. This isn't
percents change, this is orders of magnitude."

[http://ssj3gohan.tweakblogs.net/blog/12292/hydrogen-
follow-u...](http://ssj3gohan.tweakblogs.net/blog/12292/hydrogen-follow-up-
toyotas-future)

~~~
RodericDay
I've worked on hydrogen fuel-cells, and I wasn't particularly enthused by
them. However, passing off a competitor (Tesla's Elon Musk) trashing the
competition as a factual _" we've known"_ reeks of fanboyism and idol worship.

~~~
toomuchtodo
Its not fanboyism at all. How many Model S vehicles are in the wild? They can
charge almost anywhere, have range above 250 miles per charge, and have a
Supercharger network that's fully operational. (And that's only the Model S, I
neglect the Leaf for the moment even though there are for more in the wild,
regardless of their range)

How many fuel cell vehicles are in consumer hands? Can they charge at home? Do
they have a nationwide refueling network?

~~~
avmich
Pointing to existing state of affairs as an argument why this is ever more
efficient is to deny the existence of progress, which is clearly wrong.

Current advantage of electromobiles on the market over hydrogen cars is not
important.

------
csours
Source of Battery Graph: [http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-
klein/wp/2012/07/12...](http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-
klein/wp/2012/07/12/as-battery-prices-drop-will-electric-cars-finally-catch-
on/)

Naughty Mux - link your sources!

------
skrause
Discussion on the previous blog posts:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9090525](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9090525)

------
bischofs
It is incredibly frustrating to not have more options outside of California
(from Michigan) over IC engines. Modern gas engines are getting more and more
complex in order to meet stricter emissions standards while still delivering
fuel economy and power. I have no interest in direct injected engines that
make 200hp/liter, they are far more complex and unreliable than engines from
10 years ago. The IC engine is far past its prime and yet the political and
market forces are keeping it around because of legacy costs.

~~~
Johnny555
What would be a viable option for you? For many people, an 80 mile range EV is
already viable for a daily commute car.

------
OrwellianChild
Man, this guy needs to cite his sources...

It is interesting to read a thorough refutation of the legitimacy of hydrogen
fuel cells, specifically because I thought this was a known quantity... It
feels like reading about how wood-burning stoves just aren't going to work out
for central heating.

------
upofadown
If someone comes up with a cheap practical H2 fuel cell then we will have
widespread H2 powered vehicles.

If someone comes up with a cheap practical battery then we will have
widespread battery powered vehicles.

That's pretty much it. The two things are not exclusive. We can and probably
will have both.

------
ZeroGravitas
What does the author mean when he says:

 _" Toyota has gone, to put it midly, full macintosh._"

I assume the fuel cell stuff is mostly running on inertia at this point, as
full electric vehicles and battery tech advances they'll be first to go except
for a few tiny niches.

------
SCAQTony
Okay, not to be obtuse, but isn't water a green gas gas? (The wiki article is
noted as controversial.)

~~~
CarVac
If you mean "greenhouse gas" yes, but it also falls out of the sky naturally
unlike other greenhouse gases.

~~~
SCAQTony
Thank you, I appreciate the response. Presuming we create a low cost process
to produce hydrogen and all our cars and power plants were burning hydrogen as
fuel, it would not be an extreme statement to say we would have more rain and
snow?

I kind of like that idea.

~~~
ceejayoz
Water is used to produce hydrogen, so it'd get cancelled out.

~~~
abfan1127
not necessarily, right? Aren't hydrocarbons (gasoline) used as well?

~~~
ceejayoz
Interesting, looks like you're right. I'd guess that's unsustainable if
consumption ramps up with a bunch of cars on the road, though.

------
amalag
What about hydrogen fuel cells for planes? Planes need that extra energy
density.

~~~
ju-st
Hydrogen is stored in pressurised tanks which are heavy. And pressurised tanks
are tube-shaped, so you can't really use the wings as fuel tanks.

~~~
TeMPOraL
Put people inside wings and hydrogen in the fuselage? Could work for a big
enough plane.

~~~
dyladan
I'm imagining a plane this big and it's awesome. I can already see the Michael
Bay film. A little impractical right now though I think we can all agree. I
think by the time hydrogen becomes feasible for planes, the landscape will
likely be wildly different.

