Off Topic » Potholes on the Hydrogen Highway

According to this article in my newspaper today, it is looking like the Hydrogen Highway in California is developing some potholes and no one is fixing them. Why am I not surprised? Sorry about my circling of some bullet points in the article that I thought were worth noting.

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Teething problems. Early days😉

I think it was Arnold that was the first high profile politician that got on the H2 band wagon when this was first proposed. I heard this H2 hwy was to make it all the way up to BC on the west coast.
I work at a place where H2 gas is a by product where it is lightly compressed and burnt in a boiler. Companies have approached us to farther compress the H2 but it has
never gotten off the ground. I am guessing it would take a fairly large investment from government in grants to make this happen. I am not holding my breath.

This is an interesting discussion regarding H-2 powered buses and their cost of operation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSeTHOCHryc

H2 vs. electric power is back in the news again: https://electrek.co/2022/02/15/study-hyd...ctric-vehicles/

An article in my newspaper today said that the H2 fueling stations in California are not very numerous and are not being maintained very well. There are roughly 12,000 H2-powered cars on the road in California. And H2 fueling stations are hard to come by. There are only two in Sacramento (where the reporter lives), 62 in the entire state, including 22 in LA, 12 in Orange County, one in San Diego County, ten in Santa Clara County and three in San Francisco. The article says that not only are H2 stations hard to find but in the Sacramento area the fueling stations have been down almost as much as they have been up, according to John White, a longtime environmental activist who drives a Toyota H2 car. "That is not a good situation." he says.

Here is something that I didn't know: The article says that another problem with H2 is the "exorbitant cost of filling the tank", around the equivalent of $16 a gallon or higher. State Senator, Josh Newman, D-Fullerton, drives a H2 cars and loves it, but he says that "it's a challenge to keep it fueled."

My newspaper had a comment in a column today from a SF Bay Area driver of a hydrogen-powered Toyota Mirai complaining about the cost of hydrogen fuel for her vehicle. She said that the cost per liter has risen from $16 one year ago to nearly $36 now. She was asking why the price has increased so much. She also commented that: "The half-dozen hydrogen stations in the greater San Jose area seem to be offline an awful lot, especially lately." She goes on to say: "Half the time we can't even pay the high prices if we wanted to! It is becoming a real inconvenience." She asks what is going on with H2 fuel and the poorly maintained stations?

The fellow writing the "Roadshow" column commented that: "Our daughter drove a hydrogen-powered car for a few years and also found the refueling very inconvenient at times." He asks his readers if they know more about the hydrogen fuel market than he does.

The attached article contains more information regarding public H2 fueling stations in California. Apparently Shell has lost interest in the public H2 business.

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Today we have more hydrogen highway news. This time it compares H2 busses with all electric busses. It would appear that the Santa Cruz bus transit plan is to go all in on H2 and just hope it works out.

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The hydrogen highway is back in the news again: An long article written by Toss Woody, published by Bloomberg, titled "Navigating California's hydrogen highway with $200 and few stations" was in my newspaper today. The former long-time chief climate regulator used to drive a Toyota Mirai, but now drives a BEV Ford Mustang Mach E, which gets the same 300 mile range as her Mirai used to.

The article goes on to say: "Despite billions of dollars of investment, fuel cell cars in the U.S. are disappearing in the rearview mirror, overtaken by battery-electric models and stalled by hydrogen shortages and soaring fuel prices. Last year, drivers bought just 3,143 hydrogen cars in California - the only state that sells them - compared with 380,000 EVs."

It then goes on to say how last year Shell declined a $41 million state grant to build 50 stations in the state and that California scaled back its 200 station target to 130 stations by 2027. In February, Shell shuttered six of its seven retail hydrogen stations in the state.

A total of 66 H2 stations in California remain, but 12 have been offline for more than 30 days and others sporadically shut down due to supply shortages or equipment problems. Whereas there are currently 105,000 EV charging stations in the state (the article didn't mention how many of those are working).

Complaints about fuel prices are common. Filling up an H2 powered car can cost about $200 - the equivalent of paying $14.60 a gallon of gas.

So nothing new. Apparently the best use for hydrogen vehicles continues to be to power long-haul semi-tractor trucks.