Appendix D. Operational Hydrogen FCVs

The first United States hydrogen FCV, a GM Electrovan, was introduced in 1966. Since that time, more than 150 different models and well over 300 total hydrogen-fueled LDVs have been demonstrated on United States roads. Most of these early vehicles were concept cars, and many have since been removed from service. However, as of May 2008, there are 93 FCVs currently operating in the Department of Energy demonstration programs and about 100 additional FCVs have been placed into private service.¹¹² The auto manufacturers also have an undisclosed number of unreleased FCVs at their R&D facilities. California leads the Nation in terms of hydrogen vehicle demonstrations with 224 different vehicle deployments as of 2006 (Table D.1).

Hydrogen Transit Buses

Transit vehicles currently make up less than two percent of the total number of vehicles in the Nation. Nevertheless, they have several characteristics that make them well suited for early hydrogen adoption:

• They typically operate in heavily populated areas where pollution is a problem.

• They are centrally located, maintained and fueled.

• They are usually government-subsidized and professionally operated and maintained.

• They operate on well-known routes and fixed schedules.

• They have high public visibility.

• They can accommodate the added weight and volume of hydrogen storage tanks.

As a result, some of the earliest hydrogen vehicle demonstrations have involved transit buses. In 1994, for example, the Georgetown Fuel Cell Bus Program demonstrated the Nation’s first 30-foot fuel cell transit bus.¹¹³ This was followed by three additional hydrogen fuel cell buses in Chicago in 1997. Later, in 2000, the Department of Transportation began testing a fuel cell bus in California, and DOE’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory also began a program involving 12 fuel cell bus evaluations. The past transit bus evaluations can be seen in Table D.2.

Not all hydrogen transit buses have been based on fuel cells. In 2002, the world’s first commercial transit bus using a Hybrid Hydrogen Internal Combustion Engine (HHICE) was introduced, and four additional transit buses were later tested in California using a mixture of hydrogen and methane fuel, i.e., hythane. To date, a total of 20 HICE and hydrogen fuel cell buses have been demonstrated in the United States. Ten of them are currently in service. An additional 15 hydrogen buses are in the planning and development stages for deployment over the next 4 years.¹¹⁴

At the current stage of the technology, a fuel cell bus is still an order of magnitude more costly than a standard diesel bus (Table D.3). California’s last seven fuel cell buses have ranged in cost from $3.1 to $3.5 million per vehicle. The HHICE buses offer a lower cost, but a lower-efficiency pathway to low emissions than fuel cell buses, but are still 46 percent more fuel efficient than a conventional bus using compressed natural gas.¹¹⁵ A HICE bus cost is currently about 2 to 3 times that of a conventional transit bus, but United States transit operators are usually eligible to receive a Federal subsidy of up to 90 percent of the cost difference. Whereas FCV transit buses are currently limited by their high costs, the chief constraint to wide scale deployment of HICE buses appears to be the lack of refueling and maintenance facility infrastructure, coupled with unresolved issues at the local and State level over safety codes and standards.

Notes