NREL Driving Research on Hydrogen Fuel Cells
Hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles (FCEV) were the belles of the ball at recent auto shows in Los Angeles and Tokyo, and researchers at the Energy Department's National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) continue to play a key part in improving performance and durability while driving down costs.
The driving public has long been tantalized by the allure of a vehicle that emits nothing but water from its tailpipe, but now that Toyota, Hyundai, and Honda have all committed to putting them on the market by 2015, the stakes have changed.
It's one thing for the automakers each to sell 1,000 or so cars the inaugural year, but quite another to ramp it up to 10,000 and beyond until these cars are an appreciable percentage of the marketplace.
Sunken engineering costs and the drive to improve economics through economies of scale are challenges for any new vehicles introduced to the market, including early internal-combustion hybrids, said Bryan Pivovar, fuel cell group manager in the Chemical and Materials Sciences Center located at NREL's Energy Systems Intergration Facility (ESIF). But, no one doubts that the Prius is now a success—not just in being the best-selling hybrid on the market, but by enhancing Toyota's image as a green company and technology leader, he added.
Fuel cell electric vehicles could follow that same trajectory, but they have an extra hurdle to clear. They won't become commonplace until there's an infrastructure of fueling stations—and only a fraction of what is required has been built so far. "Nobody wants to have a hydrogen fueling station if there aren't enough fuel cell cars to support it," Pivovar said. Likewise, auto manufacturers are reluctant to go into full-scale production if there aren't enough places to fill up. "It's a chicken and egg scenario."
(Come from: http://www.nrel.gov/news/features/feature_detail.cfm/feature_id=10321 )