[zizee]

As another top level comment stated, in a lot of circumstances you can make do with charging an EV from a normal outlet.

The post was mostly about the challenges with regulations/codes. For the most part it was a plea for governments to smooth over the jankiness they introduce to the whole process. Hardly an insurmountable challenge.

Hydrogen is dead. Upgrading the existing electrical network gradually over time (EV adoption will be gradual) is going to be significantly easier than building a distribution network from (almost) scratch as would be required for hydrogen. To think the reverse is bonkers.

[bhhaskin]

Why is hydrogen dead? There are a few hydrogen hybrids coming to market like the BMW i3. It has a 300 mile range and can refill in 5 minutes.

Converting to hydrogen makes wayyy more sense than EV infrastructure. All of the gas station can be easily converted to hydrogen stations with different pumps and tanks. A lot cheaper than running MW of power for a EV station or upgrading neighborhoods.

Then there are people that live in apartments. It isn't feasible to have a charger for every apartment at a complex. So not everyone is going to be able to charge. Even if it is a normal outlet.

There is also the fire danger. I can't even imagine the amount of damage a fire cause by an EV could do to an apartment complex.

Then there is the vandalism issue and mantaince problems involved.

Only if you are rich dose EVs make sense. But on a mass scale they make close to zero sense.

[zizee]

> Why is hydrogen dead?

Car manufacturers are all releasing EVs. How many are really mass producing hydrogen vehicles?

It's a scale and chicken/egg (or two sides market) problem.

Gas stations won't convert until there is a decent number of hydrogen cars on the road (in the area the station is in), and people won't buy hydrogen vehicles if there are no stations to refill at. Manufacturers won't be able to scale production to make the investment worthwhile. EVs do not suffer from this problem as there are many people already in a position to easily charge at home (yes, I know it is not everyone, but it's a large enough market to be self sufficient).

For scale, I'll posit that there isn't room for three different types of power systems. Car companies won't want to invest in hydrogen because it's clear that there will be a significant percentage of people wanting EVs. The market for hydrogen cars will always be shrinking, because EV adoption will always be growing.

Gas station business models are finely tuned, with most of their revenue from convenience goods, petrol sales are just the mechanism to get people into the store to impulse buy. EVs will play havoc with this model. Less people will go to the stations as they will charge at home, causing a feedback loop of stations closing, and ICE vehicles becoming less convenient. It will also result in less money to invest in things like hydrogen tanks and pumps.

The number of EVs is only going to continue to grow, the window for hydrogen gets smaller and smaller (and I think already closed).

> Then there is the vandalism issue and mantaince problems involved.

Not really sure what this means. Presumably you are not talking about the EVs themselves as they require a lot less maintenance than ICE vehicles.

> Only if you are rich dose EVs make sense. But on a mass scale they make close to zero sense.

EVs continue to get cheaper and cheaper. Eventually it just won't make buy new ICE vehicles, even if you have to spend thousands to put in charging infrastructure.

Perhaps it will be only the "rich" who can adopt EVs at the start, but when the majority of new cars are EV, eventually the pool of 2nd hand ICE vehicles will become mostly EVs as well. It's inevitable.

[bhhaskin]

Both BMW and Toyota have hydrogen cars.

We are talking about the infrastructure of EVs not EVs them selfs. The price is dropping on EVs, but that won't matter if most people can't charge them. Which is the problem.

Vandalism is becoming more and more of a problem with EV charging stations. People are stealing the Copper wires. That will be a major issue at apartment complexes if they install charging stations.

The US. department of energy is pushing to have $1 per kilogram by 2030. ($2 per kilogram by 2025). The Toyota Mirai can go 402 miles on 16.8kg of hydrogen. And it takes 5 minutes to fill up.

[zizee]

> BMW and Toyota have hydrogen cars.

How many have shipped? How many gas stations are pumping hydrogen?

> most people can't charge them

And yet there are millions of them on the road, with numbers always increasing.

The strength of EVs, and why they will win over hydrogen is that they can be adopted regardless of what the majority are doing, incremental instead of big bang. There is a sizable market of people who can charge EVs. This number is only going to grow as more and more apartments/carpark are being fitted with chargers (which people have already said are not a necessity). It's not a small task, but it can be done gradually, unlike hydrogen. Unless you get some massive coordinated effort between multiple car companies and gas stations to roll out hydrogen refil stations across an entire country in preparation for hoped for sales, people just won't buy them. EV naysayers love to talk about range anxiety for EVs. Imagine the range anxiety if you had a hydrogen vehicle today.

[fomine3]

Gas is too convenient and cheap for now and foreseeable future, compared to hydrogen. Hydrogen isn't matter unless existing gas is banned. At that time (2045?), BEV will cover most personal use cases.

[cycrutchfield]

> Converting to hydrogen makes wayyy more sense than EV infrastructure. All of the gas station can be easily converted to hydrogen stations with different pumps and tanks. A lot cheaper than running MW of power for a EV station or upgrading neighborhoods.

Care to cite any sources?

[mwint]

> different pumps and tanks

This sounds suspiciously like “rip out the gas station and build a new hydrogen station”

[bhhaskin]

We are literally commenting on a post about how upgrading to EV charging was cost prohibited.

[fomine3]

Source for hydrogen conversion cost