? Pure electric cars don't smell good anymore? BMW, Guangzhou Automobile and Great Wall are all ramping up hydrogen-fueled cars

New energy vehicles are the trend of the future, and have become the main focus of many automakers. However, in the new energy vehicle type, many people believe that pure electric vehicles are only transitional products, and the ultimate destination of new energy vehicles is hydrogen fuel cell vehicles.

To this, buy a car gentleman dare not agree, but it is certain that today more and more car companies in the field of hydrogen fuel cell vehicle layout, in July there are three car companies have announced the hydrogen fuel cell passenger car planning, and put forward a detailed time node, which inevitably makes people have questions, hydrogen fuel cell car wind mouth to come?

BMW/GAC/Great Wall are adding to the hydrogen fuel field

The three car companies are BMW, GAC New Energy and Great Wall Motor.

In late July, BMW announced that it will begin small-scale production of the i?Hydrogen?NEXT hydrogen fuel cell vehicle in 2022. It is reported that the car is based on the BMW X5, equipped with a hydrogen fuel cell powertrain developed in cooperation with Toyota, with a total **** capacity of 6 kg of hydrogen, while the time to fill up with hydrogen is only 3-4 minutes, with a range of more than 500km under comprehensive conditions.

And in the 2020 Guangqi Science and Technology Day earlier in the year, Guangqi New Energy's first hydrogen fuel cell vehicle, Aion?LX?Fuel ?Cell made its debut and is scheduled to be put into demonstration operation this year. The car's fuel cell system is rated at over 68kW, with a maximum efficiency of 62.2%, and a full hydrogen NEDC working range of over 650km, while refueling takes less than 5 minutes.

As for Great Wall Motor, although it didn't bring a hydrogen fuel cell model, it made it clear when it unveiled its Lemon Technologies brand on July 20 that models built on the Lemon platform, matched with a second-generation hydrogen fuel cell powertrain, will have a range of up to 1,100 kilometers, with acceleration of up to 4.56 seconds for 100 kilometers.

Where does the motivation to develop hydrogen fuel vehicles come from?

First, let's popularize the working principle of hydrogen fuel cell cars, which are cars that use hydrogen as an energy source, and work on a principle similar to that of current supercharged hybrid cars, which in simpler terms replaces the gasoline engine that serves as a range extender with a hydrogen fuel cell. The hydrogen fuel cell uses a chemical reaction between hydrogen and oxygen to generate electricity, which is stored in a lithium-ion battery, and finally outputs power through an electric motor.

This shows that the emissions from hydrogen fuel cell vehicles are as environmentally friendly as pure electric vehicles. In addition, hydrogen fuel cell vehicles also have many advantages over pure electric vehicles in terms of convenience.

Through the features of i?Hydrogen?NEXT, Aion?LX?Fuel?Cell and Lemon platform, we can see that the refueling time and range of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles are almost the same as that of the traditional fuel vehicles, and there is no need to change the vehicle habits of the users of the traditional fuel vehicles, which is incomparable to that of the pure electric vehicles, and therefore many people believe that hydrogen fuel cell vehicles are the ultimate development direction of new energy vehicles. This is why many people believe that hydrogen fuel cell vehicles are the ultimate development direction for new energy vehicles.

What's more, in the past two years, the relevant departments are vigorously promoting the development of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles, for example, in last year's new energy vehicle subsidies in the policy mentioned that no longer give new energy vehicles to the purchase of subsidies to be used to support the construction of hydrogen refueling infrastructure. Subsequently, Shanghai, Chongqing, Jiangsu, Hubei, Guangdong and other provinces and cities have actively responded to the policy and have built hydrogen refueling stations, thus addressing the convenience of hydrogen-fueled vehicles in terms of car use. According to statistics, by the end of 2019, China has 46 hydrogen refueling stations and 38 under construction, and it is expected that by the end of 2030, China will have built 1,500 hydrogen refueling stations.

Not only domestic, foreign countries are also committed to the development of hydrogen energy vehicles, there is news that Japan and South Korea intend to use hydrogen fuel vehicles to completely change the energy structure, to create a hydrogen energy country, in which the Japanese government is still their own money to maintain the cost of hydrogen refueling station overhead. With all the favorable factors, it promotes the enthusiasm of car companies to develop hydrogen fuel cell vehicles.

The advantages are obvious, hydrogen fuel car wind mouth will come?

Compared with traditional fuel vehicles and pure electric vehicles, hydrogen fuel cell vehicles do have great product advantages, but it is unrealistic to carry out large-scale popularization in a short period of time because the cost is too high, which includes the manufacturing cost of the vehicle and the operating cost of the hydrogen charging station. This is also an important reason why hydrogen fuel cell vehicles have not been popularized for a long time.

In fact, many car companies have already launched hydrogen fuel cell models, such as Toyota Mirai, Hyundai NEXO, and independent brands of SAIC Datsun G20FC, Hongqi H5?FCEV, etc., however, their market share is quite small, and even the independent brands of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles have not yet been mass-produced, the price of the vehicle is too high, and the charging equipment is imperfect is an important influence factor. The price of the vehicles is too high, and the lack of hydrogen charging equipment is a very important factor.

It is important to know that the catalyst of hydrogen fuel cell is platinum, and the production of platinum in the world is very low, and the price is very expensive, which also directly leads to the high cost of hydrogen energy vehicles. According to incomplete statistics, a set of hydrogen fuel cell car powertrain, the price has been close to 200,000 dollars. Of course, through technological breakthroughs, the cost of hydrogen fuel cells there is room to decline, but it will take a longer time, do not rule out that it will take about 10 years.

Not only that, the construction of hydrogen charging facilities also need more money, the cost is usually around 15 million yuan, 2-3 times more than the gas station and charging station, and hydrogen charging station safety standards are much higher than the gas station and charging station, the maintenance cost is higher, the promotion of the difficulty can be imagined.

Hydrogen refueling stations are not perfect, the cost of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles is too high, hydrogen fuel cell vehicles in the short term will not be widespread popularity, but in the long run, perhaps the hydrogen fuel cell will be the ultimate form of new energy vehicles, after all, this kind of models can bring us a more environmentally friendly, quieter and more efficient car life.

This article was written by the author of Automotive Home, and does not represent the views of Automotive Home.