Honda Fuel Cell Cars Released in limited Quantity
Just like in my previous post back in February, Honda is releasing their first Fuel Cell Vehicle in the L.A. area for lease. They are only letting 100 Honda FCX Clarities go free for now to be leased at $600 a month. Pretty pricey, but the only by-product of the vehicle is water vapor. In a hydrog
en fuel-cell vehicle, hydrogen combines with oxygen in the vehicle's fuel-cell stack, and energy from the reaction is converted into electricity to power the vehicle. Pretty neat ha?
The only thing is where are these people who are going to lease the new Fuel Cell Vehicles going to get hydrogen for their new hydrogen vehicles? Honda has an answer for that too! Now if you're an environmentalist you may not be very happy with the source, because Honda has developed a home fueling station that would convert natural gas(methane) into hydrogen. So essentially your you have the convenience 
of having your own fueling station at home, but you have to have existing natural gas lines in your home for it to work. Furthermore, it seems a bit ironic that the new Fuel Cell Vehicle developed is suppose to use Hydrogen as a fuel source which is very abundant...but converts it from a depleting resource...natural gas. Natural gas is just as much in jeopardy as is oil. And the United States imports a lot of natural gas from Canada as it is.
Eventually the next stages of the Honda Fuel Cell project will be released in the Washington DC area and New York that will begin next year. Hydrogen based Fuel Cell Vehicles is a step in the right direction and very futuristic, but we need to develop a better technology to extract hydrogen in a cheap and reliable method that doesn't consume an already depleting resource.
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6 COMMENTS, ADD YOURS HERE:
I suggest that rental car companies be required to convert 50% of their rental fleets to "green energy" hybrid or hydrogen vehicles by 2010. Currently, 1.5 to 2.0 million rental cars in the US. Turnover/replacement of these vehicles in very high and can be transitioned quickly. Most are rented by business people and thereby the intial cost would be transferred to big business. Also, this would rapidly increase the demand for hybrid vehicles and would drive the independent consumer prices down.
I wish to see fewer articles about new technologies that do not attack the problem (=too many people on this planet would like to continue or begin driving personal vehicles) but instead more about how to avoid driving, how to make public transportation more attractive, how to use less car and more everything else that pollutes less without new technology (walking,biking, etc.)
We really have to get away from this thinking that inconvenient solutions are not acceptable solutions.
Karsten
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http://www.polluteless.com
Practical Advice to Pollute Less
I like the idea of a hydrogen based car with its only bi product being water but then there is that whole natural gas issue. Electricity can also be used to create hydrogen but its a lot more expensive than the natural gas method. I think they should be working on a way to create hydrogen without using natural gas and in a more cost effective manor. Lets hope something like that is in the works.
i thik honda has done a great job in making a fuel cell car, although there have got to be more ways to get hydrogen than from gas. im nno scientist but im sure some one somewhere could make this car solely on water.
You can make hydrogen from electricity true, but currently most of the electricity in the country comes from burning coal. Natural gas to make hydrogen is not the final answer but it is a whole lot closer than the electric (coal powered) car.
There are a few very Eco sustainable ways of producing hydrogen, known for a long time, out there, but it is up to the government to say THIS and THAT.
Research institutions had done a lot of job about this topic, already, and there are literally hundreds of practical and working patents and 'technologies in waiting'...
There are also very practical engines on compressed atmospheric air...which could be used in vehicles.
And there were a few working solutions for water as fuel, but than again, there is oil industry, which runs the economy.
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