[suction]

Hydrogen was mainly Toyota, no German maker for instance made any serious commitments into that technology.

I suppose you mean that Tesla was the dragging force in the EV sector and all others were reluctant until they saw Tesla become successful?

If you look at the timeline of global auto makers putting EVs on the market, that claim is unsubstantiated, they would have been years later if that was true.

I get it though, Tesla is the first product of the American auto sector that is somewhat innovative, after decades of being behind all others. So it’s natural that many Americans are proud of Tesla’s success and will basically defend that pride with their lives. It’s a cult because they and facts the contrary will be seen as an attack.

[rkangel]

I think you mean Honda rather than Toyota for hydrogen and fuel cells.

Edit: or at least that was my perception. Doing some Googling it appears that they both have done things.

[shagie]

Hydrogen makes a bit of sense on in Japan.

You've got an island - people aren't driving their cars to other countries from Japan so you can build out the entirety of the refuting system with a smaller area (the long axis of Japan is comparable in distance from San Diego to Seattle - https://acme.com/same_scale/#41.30257,-121.06934,38.07404,13... ).

The second thing about being on an island is that importing oil is expensive.

So, the problem of energy storage for vehicles... plugins are one option. Hydrogen is another.

Hydrogen is still something that they're looking at for Japan and it makes sense in that environment.

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/05/18/toyota-ramps-up-efforts-to-l...

I'll also point out in that article:

> Toyota started working on the development of fuel-cell vehicles — where hydrogen from a tank mixes with oxygen, producing electricity — back in 1992. In 2014, it launched the Mirai, a hydrogen fuel cell sedan. The business says its fuel cell vehicles emit “nothing but water from the tailpipe.”

Consider where the high capacity battery technology in '92 was.

For cars the Galapagos effect on cars gives us a hydrogen fuel cell focus. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galápagos_syndrome

I don't believe the research into fuel cell designs for Japanese car makers was a mistake and it likely is still a good idea for Japan and other island countries to have a hydrogen refueling system.