On 16 Aug 2021 at 14:03, Peter Eckhoff via EV wrote:

> The article used Bar instead of PSI.  Engineers and Scientists may
> know that one Bar is 14.7 pounds per square inch at sea level but the general
> public understands PSI a whole lot better.  

I guess it depends on who the intended audience is.   I'm not familar with 
the article, but I'm pretty sure that PSI is really only spoken regularly in 
the US.  It might also have some use in Canada and the UK.  The sensible 
metric world uses bar and/or kPa (1 bar == 100 kPa).

> The 2,000 hours [for fuel cell life] came from Bill Moore, Editor of EV
> World ... back in the early 2000 ... I see where Toyota is touting the
> Mirai has a 150,000 to 200,000 range ... 

If Toyota has accomplished that kind of life extension, congratulations to 
them!  

I have to wonder, though, how much Toyota spent on FC development, and what 
they could have done to improve EV batteries with the same resources.

> I understand your love for HFCEVs but from some of the responses here, a
> lot more development has to take place and then an infrastructure build
> out.  

I can understand it too.  I think most of us tend to glom onto certain 
developments as "the future."  At some point either that future really 
develops, or you and up with a large "sunk cost" of sorts and have trouble 
breaking loose.

Mark's observation that  (paraphrasing) FCEV uptake is 7 years behind BEVs 
is interesting.  That may yet be turn out to be the case.  But I think that 
BEVs and FCEVs are "disruptive" in such different ways that there may not be 
room for both to fully develop.

One example pops into my mind right away.  

FCEVs face the same chicken-and-egg problem that EVs did 10 years ago.  
Nobody wants to buy one because there's no place to fill it up with H2, and 
they're sure not going to fill it up at home.  But there's no place to fill 
it up because there aren't enough FCEVs on the road to make building H2 
filling stations viable.

Also, H2 filling stations are fairly expensive.  I've read that it's about 
$2.8 million to build one.  However, an existing gasoline/Diesel filling 
station can add 150kW DC fast charging at about $140k per pedestal.  

That's a HUGE difference in cost, and it goes a long way toward explaining 
why Total Petroleum is dropping fast charging into many of their motorway 
filling station stops, and not (as far as I know) building hydrogen 
stations.  (They're involved with H2 production using renewable energy, 
however.)

The other thing that might explain Total's fast public charging expansion is 
enormous gains in EV sales in Europe.  EU Vehicle sales were generally down 
in 2020 thanks to the pandemic, but 2020 EV sales there increased 142% over 
2019. 

It seems to me that BEVs and PHEVs have all the momentum.  I could be wrong, 
but I just don't see it as very likely that, in 7 more years, FCEVs will be 
where EVs are now.

One possible bright spot for FCEVs is Japan.  The Japanese government's 
support for EVs is really tepid.  Meanwhile, Toyota is all in for FCEVs, and 
they have a lot of pull in that government.  I can squint hard and maybe see 
a future for Toyota FCEVs kind of like Sony minidisks were 15 years ago - 
modestly popular in Japan, while of mostly specialist uptake elsewhere.

David Roden, EVDL moderator & general lackey

To reach me, don't reply to this message; I won't get it.  Use my 
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     The phrase "May you live in interesting times" is the lowest in 
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     attention of those in authority," and finishes with "May the 
     gods give you everything you ask for."  I have no idea about 
     its authenticity.  

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