Fuel Cell Vehicles

Although they are not expected to reach the mass market before 2010, fuel cell vehicles may someday revolutionize on-road transportation.  This emerging technology has the potential to significantly reduce energy use and harmful emissions, as well as our dependence on foreign oil.  Fuel cell vehicles will have other benefits as well. 

Fuel cell vehicles represent a radical departure from vehicles with conventional internal combustion engines. Like battery-electric vehicles, fuel cell vehicles are propelled by electric motors. But while battery electric vehicles use electricity from an external source (and store it in a battery), fuel cell vehicles create their own electricity. Fuel cells onboard the vehicle creates electricity through a chemical process using hydrogen fuel and oxygen from the air. 

They can be fueled with pure hydrogen gas stored onboard in high-pressure tanks. Fuel cell vehicles also can be fueled with hydrogen-rich fuels; such as methanol, natural gas, or even gasoline; but these fuels must first be converted into hydrogen gas by an onboard device called a "reformer."

Fuel cell vehicles fueled with pure hydrogen emit no pollutants; only water and heat; while those using hydrogen-rich fuels and a reformer produce only small amounts of air pollutants. In addition, fuel cell vehicles can be twice as efficient as similarly sized conventional vehicles and may also incorporate other advanced technologies to increase efficiency. 

Before fuel cell vehicles make it to your local auto dealer, significant research and development is required to reduce cost and improve performance. They must also find effective and efficient ways to produce and store hydrogen and other fuels. 

Automakers, fuel cell developers, component suppliers, government agencies, and others are working hard to accelerate the introduction of fuel cell vehicles. Partnerships such as the DOE-led FreedomCAR initiative and the California Fuel Cell Partnership have been formed to encourage private companies and government agencies to work together to move these vehicles toward commercialization.

Since technology is still trying to develop the perfect fuel cell vehicle, they are not yet readily available.  However, that’s just a matter of time.  Before long, we will be inundated with advertisements and pleas to switch over to “green” cars and abandon our gas guzzlers.

Fuel cell vehicles – like alternative fuel vehicles are the wave of the future.  Our environment is paying a high price for our transportation needs.  Global warming is becoming a reality and the ozone layer is being depleted on a daily basis.  When we start switching over to fuel cell vehicles and alternative fuel vehicles, we just might save the world we live in – one car at a time!

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