It appears that BMW have finally admitted what many have been suspecting all along - that the hydrogen economy is not sustainable and efforts to promote use of hydrogen as an energy source, especially for transport is going to meet with a dead end. Early this month, BMW's R&D development officer and board member Klaus Draeger said in an interview with German business newspaper Handelsblatt that BMW will not be building any new hydrogen powered test fleets.
Back in 2007, BMW built 100 units of its Hydrogen 7, estimated to be valued at almost a million dollars each, to be leased to celebrities and high profile individuals in Europe and USA. Among the famous owners who were presented with the cars were Jay Leno, Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt, Edward Norton, Cate Blanchett, Hale Berry, Richard Gere, Prince Albert II of Monaco.
The Hydrogen 7 was only leased to selected individuals and is not available for purchase. Klaus however did not say that BMW will cancel all development work on hydrogen powered vehicles. BMW is not the first car maker to switch their stance on alternative powertrains, VW have also previously admitted that hydrogen powered (and fuel cells) are not yet ready for large scale operations.
BMW's rationale in adopting hydrogen power is that hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe. Burning of hydrogen will only emit clear water, a major plus point in the quest for an ultimate eco-car. But more importantly, the the characteristics of hydrogen combustion best matches BMW's character of being a driver oriented vehicle, and it can still be adapted to operate using existing internal combustion engines. The drawback? Who is going to invest in building hydrogen filling stations throughout the country? While hydrogen is abundant, they do not exist on their own, thus requiring a very complex chemical processes to recover hydrogen either from water or other hydrocarbons. Transport and storage of hydrogen is a far more costly affair compared to transmission and storage of electric power. At the moment, it takes more energy to extract hydrogen from water or any other sources (i.e. petroleum) than the energy that is carried by hydrogen.
But like any innovation, there will be risks involved. BMW first started researching into hydrogen power way back in the 1970s, with the E12 5-series as a demonstration vehicle. Back then, electronics, battery and computing technology were not advanced enough to clearly point that EVs and hybrids are the way forward.
Now however, it appears that EV has the most support from governments and energy companies. After all, most of the electric power transmission network is already laid. And electricity can be generated from a multitude of primary sources - solar, wind, biomass, hydro, even existing dirty sources of coal and petroleum. The problem now is more on the end user (charging infrastructure) and administrative (billing processes and rates). BMW is already running fleet trials of electric powered MINIs, called MINI E in London, LA, NY and Berlin.
With the new revelation, it is now left to Honda (FCX Clarity), Daimler (F-cell) and Mazda (Hydrogen RE) to continue development work on hydrogen powered powertrains.
Having said all that, nobody is certain what will be the dominant alternative powertrain of the future. And not all car companies have pockets deep enough to sustain multiple research programmes on alternative powertrains, each research programme running in parallel. They have to decide on one that they wish to back, as well as which to drop. Toyota is one of the few companies that are rich enough to run multiple research programmes in parallel, under its so-called "ultimate eco-car" umbrella.
Going to miss BMW's Clean Energy promo video though. One of the better ones I have seen. Must have cost a bomb to shoot.
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