Launch of fuel-cell sedan has Toyota all in on clean energy
Print Edition
JAPAN’S government and top carmakers, including Toyota Motor Corp, are joining forces to bet big that they can speed up the arrival of the fuel-cell era: a still costly and complex technology that uses hydrogen as fuel and could virtually end the problem of car pollution.
Toyota, the world’s biggest carmaker, unveiled its first mass-market fuel-cell car yesterday, which is due to go on sale in Japan next March priced about 7 million yen (US$69,000). A US and European launch will follow in the summer.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s growth strategy, announced on Tuesday, included a call for subsidies and tax breaks for buyers of fuel-cell cars, relaxed curbs on hydrogen fuel stations and other steps under a road map to promote hydrogen energy.
That will bolster plans by Toyota and Honda Motor Co, Japan’s No. 3, to start fuel-cell vehicle sales in 2015.
“This is the start of a long challenge to make hydrogen a standard feature in society and to make the fuel-cell vehicle an ordinary automobile,” said Toyota Executive Vice President Mitsuhisa Kato.
With two of Japan’s three biggest carmakers going all in on fuel cells, the country’s long-term future as an automotive powerhouse could now hinge largely on the success of what they hope will be a key technology of the next few decades.
The ruling party is pushing for subsidies and tax breaks for consumers to bring the cost of a fuel-cell car down to about US$20,000 by 2025. It is also aiming to create 100 hydrogen fuel stations in urban areas by the end of March 2016.
A fuel-cell vehicle, running on electricity from cells that combine hydrogen and oxygen, emits only water vapor and heat. Hydrogen fuel production from hydrocarbons emits some carbon dioxide, though Japan hopes to implement carbon-free production by 2040.
The challenges for fuel-cell cars remain daunting, however, and growth could be slow, especially given the cost of building an infrastructure of hydrogen fuel stations and the likely reliance on subsidies until costs come down.
“Even after 10 years, fuel-cell cars are likely to be less than 10 percent of the Japanese market,” said Ryuichiro Inoue, a professor at Tokyo City University and an expert in the auto industry.
“This isn’t a strategy to talk about for the next 10 years, but for the next 20 to 30 years.”
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