EV&AE(FCEVS closer to reality with a little help from their friends)

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EV&AE(FCEVS closer to reality with a little help from their friends)
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EV - AutoWeek (ATWK) CLEAN POLITICS: FUEL CELL CARS INCH CLOSER TO
REALITY, BUT THEY'RE GOING TO NEED FRIENDS IN HIGH PLACES Kevin A.
Wilson 03/29/99 Copyright (C) 1999 Crain Communications, Inc. All
rights reserved.

You probably saw something about it on CNN or your local TV news, read
about it in USA Today or your local paper: DaimlerChrysler has a car
running on pure hydrogen, a pollution-free fuel cell car that leaves
nothing in its wake but water vapor. The fuel cell car, based on the
Euro-market Mercedes A-Class, was billed as the first such car to
drive the American road.

True? Yes. Except. As usual, sound bites tell only part of the story. 
The press conference took place not at the Detroit or Geneva auto
shows, but in Washington, D.C. That's because the car, Necar 4 (that's
New-Electric CAR, and the fourth in a series), is as much a political
lobbying tool as it is a motor vehicle.

DaimlerChrysler plans to sell fuel cell cars by 2004. So, too, do GM,
Ford and others who have invested in advancing the technology. The
cars to be made available to the public are not like Necar 4 in that
they are expected to a) run on methanol, not the cleaner hydrogen used
in the Necar 4 unveiled in D.C. on St. Patrick's Day, and b) will be
costly, even after five more years of development, at least as
"overpriced" as GM's EV1 is today.

Do not underestimate, however, the extent of DaimlerChrysler's
technical achievement. It is remarkable. In less than a decade since
the former Daimler-Benz began research, and only five years after the
first driveable fuel cell car (Necar 1), the technology works at a
nearly acceptable level. (We'll tell you about driving Necar 4 in a
future issue.) Weight is down by a factor of five, range is up by a
factor of five (to a very un-electric car-like 280 miles), packaging
size is vastly reduced. But Necar 4, as "real" as it seems, is also
far from producible.

Such a car, today, would cost "well into the six figure range" DC
chairman Bob Eaton admitted. Right now, a fuel cell costs 10 times as
much as a car engine, not including the cost of reformers to turn
methanol into hydrogen, or of the electric drivetrain.  Such cars
would also need an infrastructure of hydrogen or methanol fuel
delivery that is all but non-existent. (The Chrysler-touted gasoline
fuel cell, based on Arthur D. Little research, is still being
developed but won't be ready until 2010 according to DaimlerChrysler,
or six years after it pledges to have fuel cell cars on the road.)
And, at current costs, the hydrogen or methanol would cost more to buy
than gasoline that would take you as many miles.

The point of making the announcement in Washington was evident when
chairman Juergen Schrempp, even while asserting that the project was
initially undertaken without any government subsidy (though it has
benefited heartily from investment under the U.S. government's PNGV
program), said: "We need partners in government and in the oil
industry" to make fuel cell cars a reality.

There's the nub of the matter. Tax incentives, like those offered
consumers of battery-powered electric vehicles, could be extended to
fuel cell cars under legislation being negotiated in D.C., and that
could make a big difference in the eventual "affordability" of that
2004 Necar.

The problem, DaimlerChrysler engineering vp Bernard Robertson said, is
that fuel cell technology has advanced to the point where it needs to
sell in high volumes in order to reduce costs, and it won't sell at
high volumes until the cost comes down. "We may need some sort of help
to get over that hump." 
Photo/Graphic: TAX INCENTIVES could put fuel cell cars on the road by
2004.
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