TPT March 2015

85 / 108

Global Marketplace
March 2015 83
Automotive
Toyota forces the discussion
of whether the time has come
for an enormous investment
in infrastructure for hydrogen-
powered cars
“Unlike most new cars, whose computer-rendered carapaces
conceal retrograde combustion technology, the Mirai’s
swoopy bodywork cloaks a truly sophisticated power plant:
a hydrogen fuel cell whose only emission is water vapour.”
In his report for the “Joyride” feature of BBC America on his
recent test drive of the Toyota Mirai, the San Francisco-based
journalist Nick Czap described “a fully realised and perfectly
personable car.” Taking its name from the Japanese word
for “future”, the Mirai even so delivered a ride that “borders
on the unremarkable.” (“Toyota Mirai: Miracle Machine or
Vaporware?,” 23 December)
It is the Mirai’s fuel and powertrain that are exotic. Toyota
claims a range of up to 300 miles on 5kg of gaseous
hydrogen, stored in two high-pressure tanks made from
carbon fibre. The carmaker notes that a kilogram of hydrogen
has the same energy content as a gallon of gasoline. In broad
strokes, wrote Mr Czap, the Mirai’s fuel economy is thus
equivalent to 60 miles per gallon (mpg), which would best the
Prius’s 50mpg rating by 20 per cent. He needn’t have noted,
but did, that Toyota has a good record of predicting – and
dictating – consumer tastes. Its ultra-reliable Camry has been
the best-selling car in the US for the last 12 years. And in 2012
and 2013, in California, its Prius hybrids were not merely the
best-selling cars of their kind but the best-selling over all.
› Will history repeat itself with Toyota’s newest vision, more
ambitious by far than any other in the company’s history?
Challenges abound, beginning at the fuel pump. California,
the global launch market for the Mirai, currently has just ten
hydrogen filling stations. In comparison, there are in the state
some 10,000 stations dispensing conventional gasoline and
more than 1,800 electric-vehicle charging stations. On the
increasingly important environmental front, hydrogen presents
a mixed pedigree. It can be extracted from water with the use
of electricity generated from solar, wind, and hydropower. But
most hydrogen produced in the US derives from natural gas,
the extraction of which can pollute the environment.
› “Futuristic appeal and drinkable emissions aside,” Mr
Czap wrote, “whether the world’s first mass-produced fuel-
cell car succeeds is a matter of timing and infrastructure.” That
is to say, if the newest Toyota brainchild is to succeed in the
manner of its siblings, an enormous investment in hydrogen
infrastructure will be necessary. The Mirai – a “perfectly
personable” car that delivers a borderline-unremarkable ride
– is about to jump-start the discussion.
Dorothy Fabian, Features Editor (USA)