A couple of weeks ago, GM VP for Research and Development Larry Burns spoke to the National Hydrogen Association. The focus of his talk was to encourage energy companies to get moving with deploying hydrogen filling stations to support a fleet fuel cell vehicles. GM, Toyota and Honda were all at the NHA conference and the three - along with Daimler - have all indicated their confidence in the efficiency, effectiveness, and durability of fuel cell technology. Burns acknowledged it will take several generations of the technology with increased production volumes to get to a point where it is as affordable as today's powertrains. However, it's difficult for automakers to justify building cars if energy companies won't open retail filling stations. In order to make its Project Driveway program happen, GM had to purchase hydrogen fueling systems to support the 100 Chevy Equinox fuel cell vehicles. Burns called on the industry to roll out 40 stations within the three counties of Los Angeles and along corridors to Santa Barbara, Palm Springs and Las Vegas and San Diego. Such an implementation would put hydrogen with convenient reach of the entire population of the the Los Angeles area. Burns would like to see this happen before the next wave of fuel cell vehicles is rolled out in the next few years. You can listen to Burns speech here.

[Source: GMnext.com]

So far all the Hydrogen 7s that BMW has produced and distributed have been dual fuel vehicles that are capable of running on either hydrogen or gasoline. This is helpful since the H7 only has a range of about 100 miles from its tank of liquid hydrogen. BMW has now built a mono-fuel hydrogen only version of the H7 that has been optimized for running on the alternative fuel. By not having to compromise the engine to run on gasoline, BMW has been able to improve performance, reduce fuel consumption and extend the range. The mono-fuel H7 was recently tested at the Argonne National Lab which found out the exhaust gases were actually cleaner than the ambient air going into the engine. BMW will release more specifics about the mono-fuel H7 in two weeks at the SAE World Congress. For now, the mono-fuel H7 is just a tech demonstrator with no production plans.

[Source: BMW]