Report: Lexus Fully Committed to Fuel Cell Vehicles

[krew]

Lexus is fully committed to offering fuel cell vehicles, according to a Motoring Australia interview with the brand’s executive vice-president Mark Templin

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[JOSH SAGAN]

What is the push for fuel cells? I thought electric vehicles was the future? Ive heard theories that instead of being able to supply your own electricity and charge it yourself, they want people to be dependent on hydrogen from stations. thoughts?

 

[mikeavelli]

What is the push for fuel cells? I thought electric vehicles was the future? Ive heard theories that instead of being able to supply your own electricity and charge it yourself, they want people to be dependent on hydrogen from stations. thoughts?

Fuel Cells from my understanding are truly clean air. Electric cars create a clean car but it still causes pollution from the source. Toyota must be willing to invest heavily to support fuel cell refueling infrastructure, the same dilemma Electric cars face. Fuel Cell cars will also help the fleet make tightening emission requirements from governments around the world.

 

[LexusSteve]

What is the push for fuel cells? I thought electric vehicles was the future? Ive heard theories that instead of being able to supply your own electricity and charge it yourself, they want people to be dependent on hydrogen from stations. thoughts?

Electric vehicles are the future, and Fuel Cells are Electric Vehicles, they just generate the electricity in a different way. I will provide you a simple, yet chemistry-rooted answer. Hydrogen is universally understood as a proton (Has a positive charge) and Oxygen is considered an "electronegative" atom in relation to Hydrogen, which in short means that Oxygen really likes Hydrogen and wants to be bound to it. Well when Hydrogen and Oxygen are bound to one another, they create water. (Chemical formula: H2O) The water created is essentially the exhaust of the Fuel Cell Vehicle. The main principle is that there is a converter in the car, which uses the process of the water making to essentially generate electricity to power the car. So when you go to fill up your FCEV, you are filling up on Hydrogen Gas, and by gas I mean vapor. Hydrogen gas is VERY easy to create in a lab.
The other type of electric vehicle is the rechargeable battery (Battery Cell) powered vehicles. (I.E. Tesla). These kinds of cars are much like your cell phone, just plug them in and recharge when the battery life is low. They have 0 emissions, but the drawbacks encountered are much higher than the FCEV. Battery powered vehicles can only go a certain number of miles, before the battery needs to be charged, and they also get less miles in places that are very cold, compared to places that are warm. And as your phone ages, it's battery life continues to decrease as does the capacity to hold a charge; this holds true for these vehicles as well. The battery itself is not very eco-friendly.
That is mainly the simplest logistics of the comparison of the two types of electric vehicles, and why the FCEV is superior. You generate water! I am pretty sure Toyota will skip the Battery Cell EV and stick with the superior Fuel Cell EV. I remember listening to the Lexus Enthusiast PodCast with Mark Templin, and he said that we will see many types of Halo cars in the Lexus line-up. I thought about it some and I guess that latest LF-FC concept previews the Fuel Cell Halo, and not the LS, which makes sense in hindsight, because the Toyota Mirai is it's own stand alone FCEV in the Toyota line-up. The Mirai's exterior design isn't just bold, it is heavily based on functionality for the fuel cell setup. The LF-LC carries the same cues, just with Lexus design language.

 

[JOSH SAGAN]

Thank you so much @LexusSteve that was a great post, very informative.
I just find it difficult to believe that there will be enough hydrogen "vapor" stations in place to be able to supply vehicles. Especially when Electric vehicles are becoming more and more popular I can see the public pushing for electric vehicles over fuel cell elected vehicles. But then again, I'm not following the transportation infrastructure of the world so what do I really know.

 

[Valkirk]

I just can't get behind fuel cell at the moment, there are just some things that don't make sense:

Infrastructure - electricity is everywhere, you can charge at home, fast chargers on longer routes, of course is means a lack of control for the people wanting to maintain fuel stations and tax
Efficiency - it takes a lot of electricity to generate the hydrogen when you could just use the electricity straight into recharging batteries
Dependancy - someone with solar panels etc. At home could run their car for pollution free, that couldn't be done with fuel cell

The decay in range on the batteries has already been proven to be very small, by the time the batteries would need to be replaced the car would be very old, the batteries would then also be very suitable for other tasks so not like it's the end of their life.

 

[Valkirk]

This helps explain the issues imo: http://evobsession.com/hydrogen-cars-vs-electric-cars-detailed-comparison-efficiency/

And: http://evobsession.com/hydrogen-fuel-cell-cars-fail-in-depth/

It's a real shame as I would SO love a Lexus equiv of a Tesla.

 

[LexusSteve]

I just can't get behind fuel cell at the moment, there are just some things that don't make sense:

Infrastructure - electricity is everywhere, you can charge at home, fast chargers on longer routes, of course is means a lack of control for the people wanting to maintain fuel stations and tax
Efficiency - it takes a lot of electricity to generate the hydrogen when you could just use the electricity straight into recharging batteries
Dependancy - someone with solar panels etc. At home could run their car for pollution free, that couldn't be done with fuel cell

The decay in range on the batteries has already been proven to be very small, by the time the batteries would need to be replaced the car would be very old, the batteries would then also be very suitable for other tasks so not like it's the end of their life.

SpaceX.

 

[meth.ix]

Lexus must release a fuel cell car before mercedes!

 

[Pedro Roldão]

And why not EV's like Tesla?

 

[Adrian de Leon]

If fuel cell stations became just as popular as EV charging stations then people wouldn't be worrying about fuel cell. But since in today's terms, you rarely see a fuel cell station, that will cause problems for anyone making fuel cells. Until they are just as populated as EV charging stations, fuel cell won't be the alternative to petrol

 

[Valkirk]

I just can't get behind fuel cell at the moment, there are just some things that don't make sense:

Infrastructure - electricity is everywhere, you can charge at home, fast chargers on longer routes, of course is means a lack of control for the people wanting to maintain fuel stations and tax
Efficiency - it takes a lot of electricity to generate the hydrogen when you could just use the electricity straight into recharging batteries
Dependancy - someone with solar panels etc. At home could run their car for pollution free, that couldn't be done with fuel cell

The decay in range on the batteries has already been proven to be very small, by the time the batteries would need to be replaced the car would be very old, the batteries would then also be very suitable for other tasks so not like it's the end of their life.

SpaceX.

I can get behind fuel cells for space travel

 

[Andyl]

I am not surprised that Lexus would push hydrogen cell (FC) vehicles judging from the Tokyo Motorshow. Or at least in Japan where hydrogen refill stations already exist for commercial cars. In the show, Honda, Toyota, Nissan all talked about FCVs and showed their upcoming production FCVs (Toyota Mirai, Honda Clarity, etc). The Japanese government also pushed this.

 

[mikeavelli]

And why not EV's like Tesla?

I assume part of it is Lexus wants to be seen as the innovator here and Tesla has the EV luxury market on lock right now.

 

[mikeavelli]

Electric vehicles are the future, and Fuel Cells are Electric Vehicles, they just generate the electricity in a different way. I will provide you a simple, yet chemistry-rooted answer. Hydrogen is universally understood as a proton (Has a positive charge) and Oxygen is considered an "electronegative" atom in relation to Hydrogen, which in short means that Oxygen really likes Hydrogen and wants to be bound to it. Well when Hydrogen and Oxygen are bound to one another, they create water. (Chemical formula: H2O) The water created is essentially the exhaust of the Fuel Cell Vehicle. The main principle is that there is a converter in the car, which uses the process of the water making to essentially generate electricity to power the car. So when you go to fill up your FCEV, you are filling up on Hydrogen Gas, and by gas I mean vapor. Hydrogen gas is VERY easy to create in a lab.
The other type of electric vehicle is the rechargeable battery (Battery Cell) powered vehicles. (I.E. Tesla). These kinds of cars are much like your cell phone, just plug them in and recharge when the battery life is low. They have 0 emissions, but the drawbacks encountered are much higher than the FCEV. Battery powered vehicles can only go a certain number of miles, before the battery needs to be charged, and they also get less miles in places that are very cold, compared to places that are warm. And as your phone ages, it's battery life continues to decrease as does the capacity to hold a charge; this holds true for these vehicles as well. The battery itself is not very eco-friendly.
That is mainly the simplest logistics of the comparison of the two types of electric vehicles, and why the FCEV is superior. You generate water! I am pretty sure Toyota will skip the Battery Cell EV and stick with the superior Fuel Cell EV. I remember listening to the Lexus Enthusiast PodCast with Mark Templin, and he said that we will see many types of Halo cars in the Lexus line-up. I thought about it some and I guess that latest LF-FC concept previews the Fuel Cell Halo, and not the LS, which makes sense in hindsight, because the Toyota Mirai is it's own stand alone FCEV in the Toyota line-up. The Mirai's exterior design isn't just bold, it is heavily based on functionality for the fuel cell setup. The LF-LC carries the same cues, just with Lexus design language.

Steve that was a fantastic post!

 

[Carmaker1]

Electric vehicles are the future, and Fuel Cells are Electric Vehicles, they just generate the electricity in a different way. I will provide you a simple, yet chemistry-rooted answer. Hydrogen is universally understood as a proton (Has a positive charge) and Oxygen is considered an "electronegative" atom in relation to Hydrogen, which in short means that Oxygen really likes Hydrogen and wants to be bound to it. Well when Hydrogen and Oxygen are bound to one another, they create water. (Chemical formula: H2O) The water created is essentially the exhaust of the Fuel Cell Vehicle. The main principle is that there is a converter in the car, which uses the process of the water making to essentially generate electricity to power the car. So when you go to fill up your FCEV, you are filling up on Hydrogen Gas, and by gas I mean vapor. Hydrogen gas is VERY easy to create in a lab.
The other type of electric vehicle is the rechargeable battery (Battery Cell) powered vehicles. (I.E. Tesla). These kinds of cars are much like your cell phone, just plug them in and recharge when the battery life is low. They have 0 emissions, but the drawbacks encountered are much higher than the FCEV. Battery powered vehicles can only go a certain number of miles, before the battery needs to be charged, and they also get less miles in places that are very cold, compared to places that are warm. And as your phone ages, it's battery life continues to decrease as does the capacity to hold a charge; this holds true for these vehicles as well. The battery itself is not very eco-friendly.
That is mainly the simplest logistics of the comparison of the two types of electric vehicles, and why the FCEV is superior. You generate water! I am pretty sure Toyota will skip the Battery Cell EV and stick with the superior Fuel Cell EV. I remember listening to the Lexus Enthusiast PodCast with Mark Templin, and he said that we will see many types of Halo cars in the Lexus line-up. I thought about it some and I guess that latest LF-FC concept previews the Fuel Cell Halo, and not the LS, which makes sense in hindsight, because the Toyota Mirai is it's own stand alone FCEV in the Toyota line-up. The Mirai's exterior design isn't just bold, it is heavily based on functionality for the fuel cell setup. The LF-LC carries the same cues, just with Lexus design language.

I do not see how the LF-LC carries the same cues as the Mirai, as that would moreover be the recent LF-FC. There's a wide gap between the former and the Mirai.

 

[LexusSteve]

I do not see how the LF-LC carries the same cues as the Mirai, as that would moreover be the recent LF-FC. There's a wide gap between the former and the Mirai.

I meant LF-FC!