Retro tech Hydrogen fuel cells
Toyota’s readying its Mk2 Mirai hydrogen fuel-cell car. The car and the tech look promising, as they should by now… By Ben Miller
1838 Welsh lawyer does good
It’s the middle of the 19th century. Everything’s in black and white. Facial hair is o the scale. A Welsh-born lawyer, William Groves (sideburns like snoozing mammoths) does a bit of science on the side, his interest piqued by a honeymoon roaming Europe’s great cities. Groves casually invents the fuel cell, a device capable of producing electricity from hydrogen and oxygen.
1969 Fuel cell to the moon
On 20 July a couple of American chaps bob down a ladder onto the surface of the moon. (No cheese, no aliens, no wi-fi.) Key to the mission’s success is a fiendishly clever device too good to be true: three fuel cells in Apollo’s service module that sit there quietly making drinking water and precious electricity from hydrogen and oxygen.
2000s The first coming
In the first decade of the 20th century, car makers the world over get extraordinarily excited about hydrogen fuel cells in cars. Honda, Ford, Nissan, Mercedes and Chevrolet all create prototypes, with Honda’s FCX the first fuel-cell car approved for use on US roads. Clean-air California loves the thing, even as most of the state’s population still rips around in trucks and muscle cars.
2020 Mirai: the second coming
The first one looked like a hungover Prius but drove nicely. Wacky, sure, but – like Honda’s original NSX – the fuelcell Toyota felt like a highly polished labour of love. The new one’s normalised – longer, lower, more handsome – and promises to be infinitely more successful as a result. 1966
What to call it? Electrovan!
In its infinite wisdom, General Motors creates the Electrovan. If you were to learn that, from a huge pile of cash and an equally big van, it created a two-seater that cost the Earth, what would you conclude about the power density and cost of fuel cells in the mid ’60s? Yep, not great. But still, zero emissions, a 120-mile range and a 70mph top speed? Winning.
1998 Green October
Acknowledging perhaps that being beneath the waves is a little like being among the stars, German submarine builders HDW come up with the Type 212 non-nuclear sub. Diesel-powered in regular use, the 212 also boasts fuel cells for tactical running – oxygen and hydrogen stored between the sub’s hulls feed the silent, smooth and stealthy fuel cells.
2019 Audi gets fuel cell serious (again)
At last! A grown-up acknowledges that recharging times for even the best battery-electric technology remains sub-optimal, and that the mass production of batteries for said vehicles is challenging. Chairman Bram Schot flicks the lights back on in Audi’s h-Tron research and development bunker, adding that, when it comes to hydrogen fuel-cell development, he ‘really wants to speed things up’. You and us both, Bram, you and us both.