Technology:
Toyota will put its fuel cell
vehicle (FCV) on the Japanese market on December 15. It is priced at 7,236,000
yen, but you can buy one for about 5,200,000 yen
because you can get a government subsidy. Named Mirai (the future), it can
travel up to about 650 km with a tankful hydrogen. It takes only 3 minutes to fill the
tank. In a sense, fuel cell vehicle can be dubbed as the ultimate eco-car as
shown by the following table.
 |
| Toyota's FCV Mirai |
Fuel cell vehicle
|
Electric vehicle
|
Hybrid vehicle
|
|
Fuel
|
Hydrogen
and oxygen
|
Electricity
|
Gasoline
and oxygen
|
Station
|
Hydrogen
station
(About 40
stations are scheduled)
|
Charge
station
(About
6,000 stations)
|
Gas station
(34,700
stations)
|
Time to
fill it up
|
3 minutes
|
30 minutes (quick charge)
|
3 minutes
|
Cost to
travel 1 km
|
10 yen
|
2 yen
|
5 yen
|
Travel
distance
|
650 km
|
230 km
|
1,370 km
|
Price
|
7,236,000
yen
|
2,872,800
yen
|
2,232,000
yen
|
What is
discharged
|
Water
|
None
|
Carbon dioxide
|
As the
above table indicates, the problem with FCV is the number of stations to fill
hydrogen. Toyota Tsusho, one of Toyota’s group companies, will establish a new
company to operate mobile hydrogen stations in alliance with Iwatani and Taiyo Nippon Sanso. It takes 500-600 million yen to construct a fixed station, but
the construction cost of a mobile station is about a half of this amount. In
addition to subsidizing the construction cost, the government will soon formulate
a system to make hydrogen available as low in price as gasoline in alliance
with Toyota and Honda. Various companies involved in building FCVs have started
to do business with Toyota. A consulting firm in Tokyo predicts that the
Japanese domestic market of FCVs will be 400,000 units in 2030. The Tokyo
Metropolitan Government plans to introduce FVCS for its official vehicles and metropolitan
buses.
Introduction to Toyota's Mirai (the future)
No comments:
Post a Comment