Why hydrogen fuel cell cars are not competitive — from a hydrogen fuel cell expert

Hydrogen fuel cell cars
are a "bad idea". 

The widespread introduction of hydrogen fuel cell cars is a bad idea, writes Zachary Shahan, editor of Cleantechnica.com. According to Shahan, hydrogen fuel cell cars will never be able to compete with battery-electric cars. Policymakers should focus on stimulating electric transportation. Courtesy Cleantechnica.com.

One of Cleantechnica’s regular commenters recently dropped a very interesting link into the comments of an article about Hyundai’s apparent shift in focus to battery-electric cars. As he prefaced it: There’s actually a long list of problems with fuel cell cars. From someone who actually built fuel cell cars: http://ssj3gohan.tweakblogs.net/blog/11470/why-fuel-cell-cars-dont-work-part-1.

It is a long piece, and it’s in three parts. Admittedly, it would be nice if the author updated it to match the current market — it was published in February 2015 and is dated in a couple of parts.

Read Zachary Shahan’s story on EnergyPost - "Why hydrogen fuel cell cars are not competitive —from a hydrogen fuel cell expert.”

Second wind farm approved in Scotland

S

cotland approved the construction of a new 64.6 MW wind farm in the country’s south, while at the same time refusing the construction of another.

Scotland’s Energy Minister, Fergus Ewing, announced on Monday that consent had been given to PNE WIND UK Limited to construct a wind farm of 19 turbines with an installed capacity of 64.6 MW, to be located on land in Kennoxhead, south of Glespin in South Lanarkshire.

According to the press release provided by the Scottish Government, PNE’s community energy commitment is likely to benefit the Glespin community by £8 million over the 25 year operating period.

Read the CleanTechnica story - “Scotland Approves New Wind Farm”.

'Staggering news' - solar prices plunge, again

N

V Energy, a Berkshire Hathaway-owned utility company, has signed a PPA to purchase electricity from the 100 MW Playa Solar 2 power plant at a stunningly low price of $0.0387/kWh!

CleanTechnica just reported on “the world’s cheapest solar” landing in Austin, Texas, with bids under 4 cents/kWh (and the assumed unsubsidized price of solar thus being below 5.71 cents/kWh), and that was incredible news, but it looks like that staggering news wasn’t even the highlight of the month!

Note that 3.87 cents/kWh is approximately 68% cheaper than the national average electricity price. I’s also well below the low levelized cost of electricity of coal, natural gas, or nuclear, according to Lazard. The only electricity generation option that can compete with that is wind energy. Furthermore, it’s much lower than the low of 6 cents/kWh that Lazard was predicting for solar in 2017, even if you add in the expected federal subsidy boost (which brings the price up to 5.53 cents/kWh).

Read the CleanTechnica story - “Price of Solar Hits Record Low Again!”

'The future is now!'

“

The future is now,” by Zachary Shahan.

That’s a phrase I love on so many levels. I’ve got another presentation in my repertoire more tailored to that phrase, but for my PechaKucha presentation on the opening night of the Renewable Cities Global Learning Forum, I realized at the last minute (or maybe a little sooner) that “the future is now” was again more or less the focus of my presentation, so that’s the opening line I led with.

Read the CleanTechnica story - “The Future Is Now! (My Renewable Cities Opening Night Prez)”.