My map of hydrogen stations shows one 5000psi 24-hour option within 50 miles, a city-run multifuel rig in Riverside. Never been there. I enter its address into the Equinox’s nav system. 34 miles. At about 30 degrees off-course from where I’m headed. Okay, so now I’ve got to drive 20-odd miles out of my way to get to a station with only enough H2 pressure for a half tank of fuel (it prefers 10,000 psi)? To gain maybe 90 more miles? The good news is that the boxy Equinox is managing 43 miles per kilogram of hydrogen, pretty much equal to 43 miles per gasoline gallon. Astounding when you consider that it’s 46 percent heavier than the slippery Prius that does about the same numbers.
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All the same, what kind of mileage are you actually getting if you have to drive 20 or 30 percent farther to actually make it home? Where the heck is Governor Schwarzenegger’s ballyhooed hydrogen highway anyway? Hasta la vista, hydrogen, apparently. Five and a half years after President Bush declared in his State of the Union speech: “Tonight I am proposing $1.2 billion in research funding so that America can lead the world in developing clean, hydrogen-powered automobiles,” it’s Honda’s FCX Clarity that’s leading this game. And all I’ve seen along this freeway are twinkling Arco signs, smiling Chevron logos, and glistening Exxon invitations. Gas, gas, and more gas. For me and Mr. Hydrogen car here, they might as well be a bunch of multicolored middle fingers. How many newspaper headlines have announced yet another big-dollar round of funding for hydrogen infrastructure programs? Pictures of beaming politicians, ribbons being cut? Where’s the money gone, folks?
“This touchpad doesn’t seem to work right, but I think I can get it.” I say to myself as much as him, though I suspect “getting it” is 50/50 at best. “You know, you’re the first regular public-type person I’ve ever seen here,” he says, watching my fingers tire. Not reassuring, this guy. Eventually, I get the code in, but when I attach the electronic communication cable to the Equinox’s stern, a communication error appears on the dispenser screen. I try it again. Error. And again. Error. It’s midnight. I wonder if there’s a decent motel around here.
The bodybuilder finishes first and slowly drives over. “Is that really a hydrogen car?” “Yep,” I say. “Who makes it?” “GM. It’s a modified Equinox.” “Let me write this down,” he says picking a loose piece of paper from an assortment on the floor. “E. Q. U.” He tells me how much he loves his car and will never ever sell it…except for maybe this hydrogen car here. Turns out, he’s a nice guy, but he talks really fast and I feel better when he finally drives away with a furious wave. Another 50 miles later, I finally pull into my driveway. It’s 1:30 a.m. now. I lean my head against the steering wheel. Welcome to the world of hydrogen transportation, circa 2008.
Smart they put that “could” in there. In 10 and a half years, that kid’ll have a driver’s license-not much time to build a gazillion hydrogen versions of all those Arcos and Exxon stations I was passing. Until you’ve stared at a map of Southern California’s sparse grid of hydrogen oases and gone to them, found some non-operable, some demanding individual training sessions before using them, discover at the U.C. Irvine station (best of the bunch) that you’re required to wear a fire-resistant lab coat and goggles despite 90-degree weather, learn that some stations take about seven minutes for a refill (UCI) and others 25 minutes (depending on station sophistication), only then will you start to appreciate how unbelievably far hydrogen has to go to be even remotely practical. Right now, in every house along my modest, couldn’t-be-more-ordinary street, there are circuit-breaker boxes humming away with 240 volts of electricity. If Chevy’s plug-in Volt works half as well as GM’s ballyhooing in 2011 or whenever, these hydrogen cars are going to go poof faster than you can say “Hindenburg.”
EQUINOX PARADOX
We hear it all the time: So if both diesel engines and hybrid gasoline engines offer efficiency improvements, why not combine them? Recently, we had the opportunity to drive and test just such a combination built by students from Mississippi State University, winner of the now completed Challenge X competition. Their car is basically a push-me/pull-you affair: Driving the front wheels is a GM-Europe-derived 1.9-liter, 148-horse turbodiesel coupled to a six-speed manual transmission, while the rears are rotated by a 60-horse electric motor. Sounds odd, but the integration works well. Is it a better alternative than Chevy’s fuel-cell approach? MSU’s car can manage a combined 35 miles per diesel gallon compared with the FCV’s 38 gas-equivalent mileage (and potentially zero CO2 footprint). On the other hand, diesel is amply available right now-something you can’t exactly say for hydrogen.
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