[magic_haze]

What happened to the Hydrogen option? A few years ago, everybody was talking about how it would be the best possible fuel and how much better than batteries it is, but I haven't heard much about it after.

From a distribution point of view, it seems like both batteries and hydrogen are pretty much equally bad. Is there something holding back the powertrain technology with hydrogen?

[danparsonson]

Hydrogen is difficult to store and transport safely, as it has to be highly compressed to get a useful amount into a fuel tank, and is obviously highly flammable. It also requires a lot of energy to extract (via electrolysis), which I imagine makes it, at best, of comparable energy efficiency to battery power.

ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_vehicle#Storage

[thedrbrian]

It's energy density is pathetic. And there might be a problem marketing the idea of driving about with hundreds of litres of hydrogen in the boot.

[russell]

Safer than gasoline. It just burns with a pretty blue flame.