Nothing is impossible, but even Toyota is failing with the hydrogen car

Toyota has been trying to make a breakthrough in its fuel cell technology since 2014 with the Mirai. But the hydrogen sedan hardly finds customers. The first generation of the Mirai never sold more than 2,000 units per year worldwide. To put it in perspective, Toyota sells about 10 million cars annually.

The Japanese have been making a second attempt since 2020, but the new edition has also failed to generate significant turnover. Now the world’s largest automaker is admitting failure: “We tried the Mirai, but it was not successful,” Toyota’s Chief Technology Officer Hiroki Nakajima told British car magazine Autocar.

There are simply not enough hydrogen filling stations to achieve high sales figures with the Mirai and setting up a new filling station network is complex.

A look at the statistics speaks volumes: at the beginning of 2023, there were twelve hydrogen filling stations in Switzerland. These were compared with 4,300 public charging points (e-charging stations) with more than 9,000 charging stations for electric cars. In addition, e-cars can be charged easily and relatively cheaply at home or at work, which means that many e-motorists only sporadically depend on public e-charging stations.

Toyota’s problem: Almost no one is investing in another gas station network for fuel cell cars, while the triumph of electric cars has been clear for a long time. The EU wants to have a hydrogen filling station every 200 kilometers along the main highways by 2030, but we are miles away from a comprehensive network.

Without accessible refueling options, interest in hydrogen cars, essentially electric vehicles with a fuel cell and a hydrogen tank, will evaporate.

Only 72 hydrogen passenger cars were sold in Switzerland in 2022, and very few of these are likely to be private buyers. In the same period, 40,173 battery-electric e-cars were newly registered, which corresponded to a market share of 18 percent.

Too expensive and inefficient

The lack of hydrogen filling stations is only part of the problem: even if a dense network were ever created, refueling costs for private individuals would most likely be far too high, because the production, distribution and conversion of (green) hydrogen into electricity costs a lot of energy and energy intensive is expensive. Because: Firstly, the hydrogen is produced with a lot of energy, from which electricity is generated in the car. There are high efficiency losses in each of these steps. There is therefore a lot to be said for using the scarce renewable electricity for electric cars, which drive much more efficiently.

The other problem: The hydrogen car is currently failing because of the price. The Mirai costs about 70,000 francs. Toyota wants to reduce costs and Nakajima reiterated that it will not give up fuel cells in passenger cars. But things won’t get any easier in the future: the competition will soon bring affordable electric cars to the market for around 25,000 francs.

New, cheaper battery generations with faster charging times are likely to be the next nail in the coffin for hydrogen propulsion in passenger cars.

Toyota remains dependent on hydrogen

The electric car is increasingly gaining ground in Europe, North America and especially in China. The Japanese still want to stick to the fuel cell drive that has been developed for years and uses hydrogen as an energy source.

It is said that there is a good opportunity for fuel cells in commercial vehicles. Toyota therefore wants to produce more and more hydrogen-powered trucks. «For medium-sized trucks it is easy [ein Betankungsnetz] “Because the journeys mainly go from A to B,” says Nakajima. Commercial vehicles are therefore the main area where progress with hydrogen will be attempted.

There’s another reason why Toyota is increasingly reliant on commercial vehicles for fuel cells: Heavy-duty batteries are a hurdle for pure-electric commercial vehicles, as the vehicles can carry fewer goods due to legal weight restrictions. Switzerland has therefore increased the permitted weight for large commercial vehicles with alternative propulsion to promote more climate-friendly trucks. Since then, battery-electric vans and trucks have increased dramatically, albeit at very low levels. From early to mid-2023, 1,564 electric vans will be newly registered – and 1 hydrogen-powered van.

Toyota’s fuel cell is also unlikely to be a great success in commercial vehicles and large trucks. According to business magazine Forbes, by 2022, of the 25 providers of zero-emission trucks, 20 relied primarily on batteries for energy storage and five relied on hydrogen. The license plate figures illustrate this trend: Last year, in addition to 159 electric trucks, only 27 with natural gas and three with hydrogen were registered.

Science looks bleak for hydrogen vehicles

A new study from ETH Zurich also gives Toyota’s hydrogen strategy little credit. The researchers write: “If you take into account all costs over the entire life cycle, small vans and medium-duty battery-powered trucks are already cheaper than diesel trucks in many European countries.” However, things look different for heavy trucks. According to ETH calculations, diesel and liquefied natural gas remain the cheapest fuels worldwide, while hydrogen is the most expensive option.

Switzerland is an exception. Because journeys with diesel trucks become more expensive due to the heavy-duty vehicle performance tax (LSVA), trucks that run on batteries or hydrogen are already competitive. However, hydrogen trucks require about three times as much renewable electricity as battery-powered trucks. Operating costs are significantly higher because a lot of energy is lost in the production, distribution and conversion of green hydrogen into electricity.

As early as 2021, researchers from Switzerland, Germany and Austria, specialized in life cycle assessments, concluded that hydrogen and fuels based on it for cars or building heating were too inefficient, too expensive and their availability too uncertain. Hydrogen fuels should therefore be limited to applications that can hardly be electrified, such as long-haul flights.

Toyota’s Plan B

Toyota’s loyalty to the hydrogen car may be difficult for us to understand. In Japan, the government, car manufacturers and the energy industry have been convinced for years that hydrogen is the future. With government subsidies, Toyota’s strategy could still work, at least in its home market.

We have a plan B for the international market: Toyota wants to launch thirty electric car models by 2030. So far there is little to see and the previous models are only partially convincing. Like European carmakers, the group is entering into partnerships with Chinese electric car manufacturers in the hope of benefiting from China’s electric car boom. On Tuesday, Toyota also announced it would invest $8 billion in a new battery factory in the United States.

Toyota is currently far behind in electric car sales. That is why it is often forgotten that the Japanese have more than 25 years of experience with electric drives and battery technology.

It cannot therefore be completely ruled out that Toyota will break through the gap in the field of purely electric cars in a few years. The Japanese want to produce solid-state batteries for electric cars in series by 2028. They should enable a range of up to 1,200 kilometers and halve the charging time.

But even if Toyota succeeds, these batteries will be far too expensive for the mass market for many years to come. Nakajima also made it clear that the batteries will initially only be used in luxury cars.

The Japanese therefore continue to work hard on their hybrid and hydrogen cars and on combustion engines powered by synthetic fuels. Sticking with hybrid powertrains has paid off economically so far. Toyota raised its profit forecast to a record level on Wednesday after strong corporate figures. Its return on sales is now higher than Tesla’s and its stock price is close to all-time highs. Shareholders believe in Toyota’s multi-drive strategy – Mirai flop or not.