GM’s $1.5 Million Hydrogen Fuel-Cell Vehicle: Won’t Be Available for At Least 10 Years
GM’s Equinox Hydrogen Fuel Cell Vehicle Makes a stop at the International Trade Center, and I get a first hand look. The car costs approximately 1.5 million dollars to produce, and by General Motors estimates, wouldn’t be available for sale for another 10 to 15 years.
Editor’s Note: This post is a guest contribution by Adam Shake.
It was an overcast Friday morning in Washington D.C., and stepping off the Metro at the Federal Triangle stop in Washington D.C., I had been thinking about how Global Warming was contributing to the strength of Hurricane Hannah. Hurricane Ike was right on her coat tails, and looked to be like one of the largest Hurricanes on record.
Rounding the corner of the International Trade Center to enter the building from Pennsylvania Avenue, I saw an S.U.V. parked on the plaza with a small shelter positioned near it. Inside the shelter were stacks of brochures and four people standing beneath it, staying out of the impending rain.
Intrigued, I stepped over to the vehicle to have a closer look. The doors were open, showing a spacious interior and well designed dash board. The vehicle was running, and idling quietly as I stuck my head into the front seat, inhaling that new car smell.
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“Can I help you?”, asked a young lady, who had a moment ago, been standing under the shelter.
“Yes”, I answered. This vehicle runs on Hydrogen, right?
“That’s right. It runs on a Hydrogen Fuel Cell, and the only thing it emits is water vapor.”
Knowing a little bit about hydrogen cell technology and the struggling logistics behind it, I asked “How long do you estimate, until Hydrogen Cell Vehicles will be available on the American market?”
It was at this point that she referred me to the expert. A man showing another interested consumer the “gas” tank fuel door. I stepped around to that side of the vehicle and waited while the expert answered the mans questions.
When it was my turn, I asked him a series of questions that he didn’t really seem comfortable answering. It turns out that the particular vehicle I was looking at, cost approximately 1.5 million dollars to produce, and by General Motors estimates, wouldn’t be available for sale for another 10 to 15 years.
Some other interesting facts that I was able to pick up were that there are only about 12 locations in the United States where these vehicles can be re-fueled, and of course they are not open to the public. This is a serious logistical problem as the vehicle can only travel between 150 and 200 miles on a single hydrogen charge. This particular vehicle had been fueled in New York City and driven to Washington D.C. where it re-fueled at Ft. Belvoir.
After taking some brochures, I headed up to my office and after returning home, started doing some research. It turns out that General Motors, in conjunction with the Environmental Protection Agency, have collaborated on a program called “Project Driveway.” General Motor’s explains Project Driveway as “The first large-scale market test of fuel cell vehicles with real drivers in the real world.”
So how does Hydrogen Fuel Cell Technology work?
A fuel cell is a lot like a battery. What it does is convert the chemicals hydrogen and and oxygen into water, and it’s this chemical process that creates 
electricity. The fuel cell, or battery, doesn’t hold a charge though, so it needs a constant stream of hydrogen to power the electric powered drive-train.
As with any new technology, there are a lot of questions that surround it. Now I’m all for a technology that offers a clean alternative to oil dependency, but it would be even better if it was safe, economically viable, and didn’t use too much energy to create it. So here are some answers that I was able to come up with.
How much does Hydrogen cost, or how much will it cost when it becomes available to consumers?
Right now, hydrogen that is used in commercial applications costs between $2.00 and $5.00 per kilogram. A kilogram weighs approximately 2.2 lbs and a gallon weighs about 8 lbs, so it would take between 3 and 4 kilograms to equal the weight of 1 gallon. This equates to $6.00 and $20.00 dollars in weight equivalency in today’s dollars. (A huge variance at the present time) But the Department of Energy states that when it does become commercially available, it will be available at or below then current gasoline rates.
Does it take more energy to produce Hydrogen than it saves?
Most sources claim that Hydrogen, which is created by using a natural gas process, uses less energy from “Well to Wheels” than Gasoline, and of course, being a non-contributor to CO2 exhaust, off-sets the “Fuel Pollution” equation. “Hydrogen Now!” advocates utilizing renewal resources to produce Hydrogen, saying ” Since renewable energy, such as wind, is inexhaustible, we will never run out of the ability to produce all the hydrogen we need.”
Is it safe?
Like any other combustible gas or liquid, Hydrogen is flammable, however the technology and practices to keep it safe are already in place. Hydrogen is just as safe as Gasoline.
Like any new technology, Hydrogen Fuel will take a while to catch on. But do we have that kind of time? There are a lot of fuel alternatives in the works. Which one is the best answer to our addiction to oil and all the negative side effects that result from it? Well, Hydrogen is certainly a contender, but the question remains to be answered. “Can enough people get behind it, quick enough, to keep another alternative that is not as environmentally friendly, from making it to mass market?”
Image Credit: Socal Mom and Jersey JJ under a Creative Commons License
Souces: Hydrogen Now! and Project Driveway
It just seems like it isn’t worth it to me.
Sure it’ll probably be 10 years before we have a significant number of 100% electric vehicles on the road or plug-in hybrids in half the drive-ways that can afford them across America, but at $1.5 MILLION right now- who the hell would think this the affordable option?
And just because it’ll be more efficient to produce “from Well to Wheel” than gasoline- and less costly by time it hits market- does that mean it is worth the infrastructure costs and supply line economics?
I mean, I’m all for free-market capitalism, and the Oil-Industry and Government has been resistant to electric cars and green technology for long enough that jumping on this (even at the cost of more immediately practical solutions) might actually be a step forward for Corporate and Governmental bureaucracy…but seriously folks, we have a chance to ween ourselves off of foreign oil and reduce our overall energy costs- even our extremely wealthy Natural Gas reserves will deplete if we strain them enough. We WILL need petroleum, natural gas and coal for things OTHER than just cars pretty soon.
Hell, even from an aesthetic standpoint- you can make any damn car an electric these days- be it a Mustang or a Honda if you want.
Despite my skepticism and distaste for the politics and politicians behind this technology, I certainly appreciate the reporting and research and information. Hell, it actually looks better now that I have this perspective shown.
Andrew,
Thank you for you’re well thought out comment. I can’t find one single flaw in you’re view on this issue.
I believe though that it is important to educate consumers on the different alternatives that are possible solutions to our oil dependence, and the people who are bringing those solutions to the forefront.
One of the problems may be that we simply have too many choices, and with so many people behind so many different types of alternative power and fuel sources, it will take, as you said, time for the infrastructure to come on line for any one of them.
It’s my hope, that by helping put the information out there, that people can become educated enough to make the sound decisions and choices that will ultimately benefit everyone involved.
Thanks again for your very articulate and thought out response.
Adam
I think the 1.5 million is for that specific proto-type and does not reflect any pricing that would apply to a production vehicle.
What I believe the issue with hydrogen vehicles is that its a solution to the pollution focus of the prior two decades. That focus was on toxic or ‘dirty’ tail pipe emissions. Hydrogen in a fuel cell can be consumed with very very clean emissions. As a consequence you also don’t get tailpipe C02 emissions. How much of a C02 reduction depends on the source of the Hydrogen, though.
If you wanted to fix LA’s smog problems, hydrogen would be a very effective solution. No one is interested in that anymore.
My name is Pete Barkey. I have been working for General Motors for the past eight years in Advanced Propulsion, with a specific focus on fuel cells and hydrogen. I would like to offer some information here to help you better understand some of the issues raised by the author.
According to the National Hydrogen Association, there are currently 70 operating hydrogen fueling stations in U.S. and Canada - and there are another 41 planned. That number will keep growing as more and more vehicles are deployed.
The vast majority of our 100+ Project Driveway vehicles are concentrated in Southern California, New York City, and Washington, D.C. Our Chevy Equinox FCEV drivers will be regularly using 12 of the stations in those markets.
As for the statements about vehicle costs, it is typical when you are talking about any vehicle that is basically hand-made in small batches to have much higher costs than the versions that go on sale to the public. Whenever you build a small volume of prototype vehicles (in this case 100 Chevy Equinox FCEV vehicles) there is always high-cost (regardless of the technology) - this cost will come down as volumes grow. This is not unique to the auto industry either. Prototype-production models of any kind are always costlier than the versions that go to production for sale to the public.
The cost of these prototype vehicles is not the issue. What is important is that when we sell significant numbers of fuel cell vehicles to our customers, the cost be competitive with other vehicles in that market segment. Clearly our goal is to be cost-competitive. We intend to make as big an impact as we can on reducing oil consumption. The more you sell, the bigger the impact.
We intend to bring these vehicles to market as soon as we have competitive solutions to important consumer issues such as durability and cost. We are steadily bringing cost down, durability is improving, and we’re working hard to increase range and add infrastructure. We plan to deploy increasingly larger fleets of vehicles as we move closer and closer to a competitive product. Today, we are deploying more than 100 Chevy Equinox FCEVs in the U.S markets mentioned above as well as Germany, China, Japan and S. Korea. We’ll take all the learnings from these Chevy Equinox FCEVs in the Project Driveway program and we’ll incorporate these learnings into the next generation of technology in larger fleets of say 1,000 and then 10,000 and then 100,000 etc… This is a normal progression of new technology into the marketplace.
Most of our drivers are getting close to 200 miles per tank of hydrogen. While we intend to offer a vehicle that has a range of around 300 miles or more, it’s important to point out that 78% of the American public has a daily commute to and from work of less than 40 miles each day.
Finally, we would be more than happy to have the author or the editors of this site come and take a drive in the Equinox. We have no doubt they would be pleased with this vehicle in the way it performs. And while you’re driving around, we’d be more than happy to discuss any of the issues on the road to commercialization of fuel cell vehicles.
We hope you have the opportunity to take an actual drive in one of our Chevy Equinox Fuel Cell Electric Vehicles - and see for yourself how real the technology feels and how much closer it is than you think.
This technology sounds great. Do you have any information about how it works in high altitude and freezing cold?
When you started off a “news story” with Global warming makes hurricanes worse you lost me. EVERY serious expert says it is not happening. The technical problems of storage, and distribution make the manufacturing problems of hydrogen seem quite small.
1.5 Million to produce?? Production advances and economies of scale will address that issue. The cost of the fuel cell is no more than the cost of the battery packs in the Volt, so this cost is clearly being used as a scare tactic since these unites were likely hand crafted. GM is obviously too bloated to get the job done right.
Toyota has a FC vehicle that has a 600 mile range and surely they don’t cost 1.5 Million. GM is using scare tactics and stalling as much as they can to keep sucking on Big Oil Teet.
You can convert an internal combsution engine to run on H2, since the 70’s. This first step would legitimize the installation of H2 refueling stations. As USA falls further in debt and behind in technology, Europe is contracting to install H2 stations all around Germany with the support of BMW, Mercedes Benz and others.
Since GM is about to go bankrupt, I guess their opinion doesn’t matter anymore anyway. what a symbol of failure for the nation - All to keep those oil profits rolling. Seems like a high price…surely more than 1.5 Million.
doesnt Sanford Ovshinsky the inventor drive a Toyota Prius Hybrid which he claims he converted to run on H2 instead of petrol?…using a solid state tank to store the H2 fuel NOT high pressure tanks &such…why is this seen as so far off???
So that’s how far behind GM is? 10 years? No wonder their stock is in the toilet.
[...] cell research center in Honeoye Falls, about 20 minutes south of the city. That center has been developing a fuel cell SUV based on the Chevy Equinox. Test models of the car have attracted considerable attention, and been [...]