Hyundai brings fuel-cell-powered Tucson FCEV to Canadian market

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      A few weeks ago, Hyundai announced it would be putting forward the first fuel-cell-powered vehicle to be offered in Canada. People will actually be able to lease one of the few models available to the public, and Hyundai has put up a dedicated (if sparse) website so that those interested can step up and—maybe—get the chance to drive one of the specially equipped Tucsons.

      Says the company: “To introduce the new Tucson FCEV to the Canadian market, a select group of lucky Canadians will have the exclusive opportunity to lease the vehicle at $599 per month over a three year term. The lease includes maintenance and unlimited hydrogen refueling.”

      That last bit is the intriguing part of this program. Among the many obstacles—production costs, dependability, power content—to widespread fuel-cell usage has been the lack of an infrastructure to keep them fuelled and serviced.

      Hyundai seems to have found a way around this. But first, a bit of background on fuel-cell vehicles.

      In a nutshell, an electrochemical process of combining oxygen and hydrogen in a fuel-cell “stack” creates electricity to power a vehicle’s electric motor and charge an onboard battery—in this case, lithium-ion—which in turn propels the vehicle. The stack is fuelled by hydrogen, and an inflow of air to the fuel-cell stack completes the energy-creation process. There’s no combustion and no moving parts.

      The only byproduct of the process is pure water vapour, resulting in zero greenhouse-gas emissions. Back in the halcyon days of fuel-cell research, a favourite stunt of proponents of this technology was to take a sip of the water that came out of the vehicle’s tailpipe to demonstrate its harmlessness. I actually did this myself at an event a few years ago. I didn’t die, but the water tasted like shit.

      Hyundai isn’t the first company to dabble in fuel-cell technology. Long before this, most of the major players in the automobile industry had—still have—a fuel-cell model of one type or another, and Burnaby-based Ballard Power Systems has been messing around with fuel cells for several decades. At one point, companies such as Mercedes, Ford, Mazda, General Motors, and so on all had interests in the company, but despite the fact that vast amounts of money have been poured into fuel-cell research, the technology has never really blossomed. A mass-produced, accessible, affordable, and most importantly reliable fuel-cell vehicle remains a kind of automotive Holy Grail. Many seek it, none have found it, and to this point, stationary power plants and public-transit vehicles seem to be the most fertile ground for fuel-cell applications.

      Hyundai hopes to change this. The Tucson FCEV has a purported driving range of some 426 kilometres and will take a scant five minutes to refuel. This is the intriguing part: when your Tucson FCEV starts to run dry, you simply phone Hyundai and a service rep will drop off a hybrid vehicle of one type or another for you to use while your FCEV is taken away and refuelled at one of the company’s facilities. Hyundai has been using a similar program with its top-of-the-line Equus sedan.

      On paper at least, this should work well enough. According to Hyundai Canada president and CEO Don Romano, “the major problem with fuel cell vehicles in the past has been that there has never been an infrastructure to support the technology.” You can’t exactly pull up to a Petro-Canada and fill up with hydrogen, and the gas itself—in compressed form—is extremely volatile. You don’t want to mess around with compressed hydrogen.

      Not to mention, the process of creating hydrogen in the first place often involves other hydrocarbons, such as natural gas. So while the FCEV may be as clean as the driven snow, creating the hydrogen that feeds it still involves emissions of one type or another. There’s also a small issue of power—or the lack of it. I’ve driven fuel-cell vehicles of various types, and they’ve all been gutless and insipid behind the wheel. Clean? Certainly. But really boring.

      But for fleet use or for those who just care about getting from A to B as cleanly as possible, fuel-cell technology may be the answer. Despite its drawbacks, it is a step in the right direction—I guess. For more information, you can visit www.hyundaihydrogen.ca/.

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