Here in the Ann Arbor office of ABG we don't have access to a public hydrogen filling station yet. The only ones around here at the EPA national testing lab, the NextEnergy Center in Detroit and at various automakers facilities. That means that we're not eligible to get one of GM's Project Driveway fuel cell Equinoxes. We've driven it (full disclosure: In my previous life working as an engineer I was involved in developing the brake system on the FC Equinox so I've spent plenty of time in them) on public streets for a short jaunt around Las Vegas during this year's CES. With a home base in Los Angeles, the team at Motor Trend was found to be eligible and has been given one of the Equinoxes to drive for a few weeks. MT Editor Angus MacKenzie gives his first impressions over on their blog and not surprisingly finds it to be pretty unexceptional to drive. That's not a slam by any means, but more a statement of the fact that the Equinox basically just works. Aside from some compressor whine and some occasional clicks of opening and closing valves in the fuel system, It drives like a conventional Equinox but with a better low end torque thanks to the electric drive. MacKenzie's biggest complaint? Make a car of the future look more futuristic (take a hint from Honda's FCX Clarity here).

[Source: Motor Trend]

General Motors is announcing a new partnership today with Clean Energy to install a hydrogen filling station near Los Angeles International Airport. Clean Energy is a California-based company that currently operates 170 compressed natural gas filling stations around the country and the new LAX hydrogen station will be on the same site with a CNG station. The new LAX station to be operated by Clean Energy will be available to participants in GM's Project Driveway fuel cell field test program. According to Dan O'Connel, GM's Director of Fuel Cell Commercialization, the primary user of the facility will likely be Virgin Atlantic. The airline is taking six of the fuel cell Equinoxes (up from three) that are being used for Project Driveway to use for shuttling first class passengers to and from the airport. Beyond this first station, Clean Energy is looking at adding additional stations at other locations as well as examining the feasibility of on-site reforming of natural gas to produce hydrogen.

General Motors has now built 85 of the planned 100+ Equinoxes for the program and will have delivered 40 of them to customers within the next two weeks. Customers are apparently very pleased with the performance and are regularly topping the 160mile range estimate which was based on the EPA test cycle. According to O'Connell the only real complaint they've had so far besides people not wanting to give up the vehicles after three months is they want to be more visible. Many of the first batch of vehicles had little in the way of signage to distinguish them from standard Equinoxes and people want to show off the fact that they are driving bleeding edge technology.

[Sources: General Motors, HydrogenForecast]

General Motors is building a fleet of fuel cell powered Equinoxes and they've decided to source the hydrogen storage systems from Quantum Fuel Systems Technologies. The Equinox will use a 10,000 psi tank, which is double that of most other fuel cell vehicles. Quantum will base the Equinox tank on their Type IV all-composite, polymer lined tank design. This is an ultra lightweight tank, so that should over come some of the weight issues of other fuel cell vehicles.

Quantum has developed and safety tested the configuration specifically for the Equinox program. Quantum has created their own proprietary high pressure valves, regulators and safety systems specifically for the hydrogen fuel system. This test fleet will be the largest field test yet for hydrogen fuel cell powered vehicles. The full press release and more images are after jump.

[Source: PRNewsWire via GreenCarCongress]