Will GM Have a Hydrogen Car By 2010?
July 14, 2005 – 11:52 amWired Magazine interviewed Larry Burns, GM’s vice president of R&D and strategic planning, to ask about GM’s recent investments into an initiative to have a hydrogen fuel cell car on the road by 2010.
The article mentions GM’s failed one billion dollar investment in the EV1, another eco-friendly design, and notes that GM is putting another billion into the development of the hydrogen fuel cell cars. A lot of infrastructural issues remain, seemingly outside the scope of GM’s research and development, that will go a long way towards determining the eventual success or failure of this particular investment. One of the more obvious questions is, “where would I fill up my car with more hydrogen?” A less obvious question is, “how is the hydrogen going to be produced without causing as much or more environmental damage as today’s technologies?”
It’s exciting that corporations see enough profit potential to invest this heavily into the R&D of such environmentally safe technologies, but as the EV1 shows, it’s absolutely no guarantee of success.
4 Responses to “Will GM Have a Hydrogen Car By 2010?”
Jeff, good point. I think the reason they’re investing in this is cause the governments giving them money to. Plus they’re so far behind the Japanese on the hybrids they don’t want to do the same thing here so its probably worth the risk for them.
By Griztown on Jul 14, 2005 at 4:36 pm
I definitely got the impression from the interview that GM would like to have some sort of offering in the hybrid area, but you’re right, they’ve lost that race, and it appears as though they’re trying to win the race to the generation beyond the hybrid car.
I would like to think there’s some economic pressure being exerted in the form of the continuing rise in oil prices that is forcing these big time companies (previously BP, now GM) to look more and more seriously at renewable and alternative sources of energy for all types of applications. It appears as though transportation may be one of the first sectors to use such technologies “widely”, but hopefully some sort of dominoe effect would usher in their use in other areas as well.
By jjk on Jul 14, 2005 at 4:56 pm
Did you hear about the new energy bill passed by the Senate? I think it has to get approval in the House before it goes to the president but basically it gives tons of subsidies to the energy (oil) companies. Why do they need subsidies? They’re making a killing on oil right now! If anything there is less motivation to come up with alternatives for them since they’re making so much money off the oil. If they find a replacement then the price of oil will drop. Why would they want to do that? Oil isn’t going to run out anytime soon but it could stay really expensive so long as there’s no replacement.
But back to hydrogen fuel cells. Seems like they are giving us a placebo for the gas price sickness. “Don’t worry about the high price of gas, we’ll have hydrogen cars in a few years and everything will be wonderful!” Everything I’ve read about hydrogen seems to refute that theory though. Unless we develop nuclear fusion, I’m not sure where we’re going to get all this magic hydrogen without using the very stuff that is so expensive right now.
By Griztown on Jul 15, 2005 at 10:36 am
An article “Hybrid Cars: How the Battery System Works” can be read at http://www.sohoindex.com/hybrid-car/
By Terry on Feb 8, 2007 at 6:32 pm