Hyundai Tucson Fuel Cell

My Nissan Leaf Forum

Help Support My Nissan Leaf Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

lorenfb

Well-known member
Joined
Dec 17, 2013
Messages
2,683
Location
SoCal
Drove next to a Hyundai FC SUV (Tucson) in the South Bay of SoCal tonight.
Must have been coming from one of the SoCal dealers mentioned here:

"The first four Hyundai dealers to offer the Tucson Fuel Cell to Southern California customers are Hardin Hyundai in Anaheim, Win Hyundai in Carson, Keyes Hyundai in Van Nuys and Tustin Hyundai, with additional Hyundai dealers to follow. Availability of the Tucson Fuel Cell will expand to other regions of the country consistent with the accelerating deployment of hydrogen refueling stations, the automaker said in a statement."

New York Times - 11/18/14 (below)

HyundaFC_zps02ec4c75.jpg


"Ed Heydorn with a hydrogen-powered Hyundai Tucson at a station in front of a
wastewater-treatment plant in Fountain Valley, Calif. Hydrogen is generated
there from human waste."

Same Michigan type of license plate seen in the South Bay.
 
lorenfb said:
Drove next to a Hyundai FC SUV (Tucson) in the South Bay of SoCal tonight.
Must have been coming from one of the SoCal dealers mentioned here:

"The first four Hyundai dealers to offer the Tucson Fuel Cell to Southern California customers are Hardin Hyundai in Anaheim, Win Hyundai in Carson, Keyes Hyundai in Van Nuys and Tustin Hyundai, with additional Hyundai dealers to follow. Availability of the Tucson Fuel Cell will expand to other regions of the country consistent with the accelerating deployment of hydrogen refueling stations, the automaker said in a statement."

New York Times - 11/18/14 (below)

HyundaFC_zps02ec4c75.jpg


"Ed Heydorn with a hydrogen-powered Hyundai Tucson at a station in front of a
wastewater-treatment plant in Fountain Valley, Calif. Hydrogen is generated
there from human waste."

Same Michigan type of license plate seen in the South Bay.

I was at my dentist today. His wife works for Hyundai and he was approved for a lease. He eventually decided against it since there was no way he could drive to San Francisco. The 2 whole OC fueling stations are convenient for him. I think he said the lease was $579 maint and fuel included. Insurance extra.
 
Moderator: please move to Official Hyundai Tucson FCEV thread:

http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=17003" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
 
smkettner said:
lorenfb said:
smkettner said:
Anyone have a sales number yet?
Obviously quickly forgot, or chose to ignore them, the key points made by AndyH here:
http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=14744
AndyH posted sales numbers within those 144 pages?.... :roll:
Sorry I must have missed it :|

His implication is that FCs will take a few years at most to be fairly competitive to BEVs.
The range and re-fill time will be big factors in FC's favor with the increasing recharge
time for the BEV as its range increases. Additionally, the majority of potential BEV buyers
don't have the financial resources to install high capacity charging systems needed for ranges
similar to the Tesla nor have the desire to have their electrical systems modified, which
basically eliminates home charging. The inner city QCs like Tesla SCs will not be as acceptable
for inner city travel because of the inconvenience of the charging times which are more
tolerable on a long trip. The present BEV with its limited range is an easy sell from the
standpoint of a very simple home overnight plug-in with one's existing electrical system.

The transition to FCs will be most 'transparent' to the present ICE owners just as the transition
to the hybrid, e.g. Prius, has been. Most people dislike changes to the present life style.
 
smkettner said:
Anyone have a sales number yet?
GCR said Hyundai expects to lease about 60 in the U.S. by the end of the year. Given the currently limited number of stations, a slow roll out is wise. The major station expansion is scheduled for next year.
 
GlennD said:
I was at my dentist today. His wife works for Hyundai and he was approved for a lease. He eventually decided against it since there was no way he could drive to San Francisco. The 2 whole OC fueling stations are convenient for him. I think he said the lease was $579 maint and fuel included. Insurance extra.
By next year driving to SF won't be a problem, as a station is planned for Harris Ranch:

During an October interview at FirstElement's house-turned-headquarters in Orange County, maps and blueprints were splayed on the coffee table. Ewanick, taking sips from a Starbucks cup, gestured excitedly at the sites where FirstElement plans to build stations.

The important thing, he said, was to have "clusters" of stations in places where people live and work: Los Angeles, Orange County and Silicon Valley. But FirstElement also plans to build a station in remote Truckee, Calif., near Lake Tahoe, and another in Harris Ranch, Calif., halfway between Los Angeles and San Francisco.

Shane Stephens-Romero, one of Ewanick's business partners, said usage at these outposts will be low, and delivery trucks will need to drive an hour or two just to keep them stocked with hydrogen fuel. They are a money-losing proposition -- the price of sustaining a statewide network.

"You have to have that station for someone to go from one end of the state to the other. People want to do that," Stephens-Romero said. "We put that there so they could use the car just like they would the internal-combustion engine. But we will not make money on that station -- probably ever."
 
hearsay

Hyundai Fuel Cell leased 6 in its first month
then it dropped down to 1 per month


thats it for the demand for a $499/month hydrogen vehicle, similar demand as the honda fuel cell vehicle


'We cannot verify this with Hyundai because it refuses to give the info directly and it lumps the FCV in with other Tucsons. However, Autodata reports 6 units in September, 1 FCV in October. Sounds really low, but those are the numbers we were given.'

comment from hybridcars.com commenter JeffCobb
 
Via GCR:
Hyundai Tucson Fuel Cell: Early Drivers Discuss Experiences Traveling On Hydrogen
http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1098233_hyundai-tucson-fuel-cell-early-drivers-discuss-experiences-traveling-on-hydrogen" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
 
Via ABG:
Hyundai leased 70 Tucson fuel-cell vehicles in first year
http://www.autoblog.com/2015/05/22/hyundai-70-leases-tucson-fuel-cell-vehicles/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Part:
"Of course, everybody asks 'Why 70?' and it's basically tied to the number of fuel stations that are available," he said. "We were the first to actually pass over ownership of the vehicle, it's not a test program. It helps people put their money on the table, and they lease the car from us and it's their car. The customers that we've leased the vehicle to are ones that live close to a fuel station.

"Right now there is less than 10 in the state of California. By the end of this calendar year, there should be in the mid-20s. And then, of course, under Gov. Jerry Brown's $200 million towards construction, I believe about 100 stations [will come online] through the end of the next couple of years. As those stations get built out, we're taking more and more applications for vehicle sales." In January 2014, O'Brien told AutoblogGreen that 88,000 people had expressed an interest in owning a fuel-cell Tucson.

O'Brien said that Hyundai needs the customers to be close to a hydrogen station so that driving the car feels similar to what they're used to doing. "We just want to make sure there is a satisfying experience of ownership, and that's the most important thing, to make that their ownership experience matches what they've experienced with a gasoline car," he said.
 
"O'Brien said that Hyundai needs the customers to be close to a hydrogen station so that driving the car feels similar to what they're used to doing. "We just want to make sure there is a satisfying experience of ownership, and that's the most important thing, to make that their ownership experience matches what they've experienced with a gasoline car," he said."

This is just so sad. Really? When an EV is better in every way? The fool-cell washing is sad.

And yes I know the "re-fuel speed" argument. Just sad that these hydrogen companies are stuck in the gasoline past. See? it's the same as gas! yay for all!! complete BS.
 
finman100 said:
"O'Brien said that Hyundai needs the customers to be close to a hydrogen station so that driving the car feels similar to what they're used to doing. "We just want to make sure there is a satisfying experience of ownership, and that's the most important thing, to make that their ownership experience matches what they've experienced with a gasoline car," he said."

This is just so sad. Really? When an EV is better in every way? The fool-cell washing is sad.

And yes I know the "re-fuel speed" argument. Just sad that these hydrogen companies are stuck in the gasoline past. See? it's the same as gas! yay for all!! complete BS.
I agree that an EV is better is most ways, but then an FCEV is an EV*. I also happen to believe that it's far easier to get people to change fuels if it requires no change in their own routine, and unlike the case with BEVs, you don't need to be a homeowner with a dedicated parking space and electrical hookup to benefit from lower costs and more convenience.

Most of the world's urban population, including in the developing countries where the majority of auto sales growth will occur, does not live in detached single-family homes, so the centralized fueling model is the only one that can be deployed without taking decades to serve more than a small % of the population. The U.S. isn't the world, and even here 44% of the population can't charge at home. Maybe someday there will be charging stations for all, but 4+ years down the road there have only been about 24k public charging stations installed in the U.S., whereas the city of San Francisco alone has "441,541 [publicly-accessible parking spaces]. Of the total, over 280,000 are on-street spaces, 25,000 of which are metered." New York City and San Francisco are the two U.S. cities whose population density and high proportion of people living in multi-unit housing make them most similar to world cities in Europe, Asia, Africa and South America.

*"An electric vehicle (EV), also referred to as an electric drive vehicle, uses one or more electric motors or traction motors for propulsion. An electric vehicle may be powered through a collector system by electricity from off-vehicle sources, or may be self-contained with a battery or generator to convert fuel to electricity.[1] EVs include road and rail vehicles, surface and underwater vessels, electric aircraft and electrically powered space vehicles."

Exotica such as MagLevs would also qualify.
 
GRA said:
The U.S. isn't the world, and even here 44% of the population can't charge at home.
I don't live in a single family detached home, and I can charge my EV at home.
"Not single family home" does not equal "cannot charge under any circumstance."

I've lived in apartments since I got my leaf. It's not impossible to charge when you have an apartment, but it does require some knowledge of home wiring (spotting where the panel and meter are when apartment shopping at the very least) and a willing landlord (owned and managed by the same person helps a lot). It's not plug and play, and it isn't something that I'd generally recommend, but it's not the impossibility that you make it seem.

I imagine apartment charging will be similar to the way cable TV evolved. Some pioneering apartments will lead with charging facilities, and eventually it will be a perk that some will seek out, like pools, gyms, and other apartment amenities. Eventually, it will become incredibly common, and probably run by the local utility.
 
Denser urban settings also have a higher percentage of people using mass transit.
In Minneapolis/St. Paul there are a number of apartments and condos that do offer EV charging. I expect this number to grow faster than the nationwide rollout of hydrogen refueling stations.

True, this is in the U.S.. Hydrogen makes sense for some uses, private cars aren't one of them.
Maybe in 30 years.
 
Hydrogen cars only exist so the oil companies can still sell you something. Protecting their profits and interests. (it's shell and BP)

And no matter WHAT "they" say (aka salesman in the seat next to you, the car reps, etc) those tanks may be tested, crash proven, beaten up by the Hulk and still don't leak with 10,000psi in them.... but one thing you DON'T hear them say and you usually ALWAYS see in a ICE accident is the lines leaking :eek: :shock:

All these Toyota, Hyundai, MB, Honda reps say "ohh yea.. 10k psi tanks are bullet proof and have no problems in an collision or accident"

But what about in a front end or side impact/tbone situation when the car and frame gets severed or massively bent? And all those lines, hoses and couplings get all wonky??

10,000psi will like to escape.

I've seen and looked around one of these things.... would not look pretty in a front end collision...

70dd23c7f440136e606e02d5c825c793.jpg

ca20001d649e74f3dca18f1fc4e0bc8d.jpg

a88302837f21b36fea9ff5d422a8e116.jpg


Nissan but still
e2d5f39bf3ba1a600a07532bd413fb2a.jpg
 
JeremyW said:
GRA said:
The U.S. isn't the world, and even here 44% of the population can't charge at home.
I don't live in a single family detached home, and I can charge my EV at home.
"Not single family home" does not equal "cannot charge under any circumstance."

I've lived in apartments since I got my leaf. It's not impossible to charge when you have an apartment, but it does require some knowledge of home wiring (spotting where the panel and meter are when apartment shopping at the very least) and a willing landlord (owned and managed by the same person helps a lot). It's not plug and play, and it isn't something that I'd generally recommend, but it's not the impossibility that you make it seem.

I imagine apartment charging will be similar to the way cable TV evolved. Some pioneering apartments will lead with charging facilities, and eventually it will be a perk that some will seek out, like pools, gyms, and other apartment amenities. Eventually, it will become incredibly common, and probably run by the local utility.
Of course it's not impossible, and I've never said that it was everywhere, or that you had to live in (and own) a detached, single family home to be able to charge there. Only that the hassle and cost factors for most people who don't meet that criteria is too high to make it viable. I _could_ charge at home on L1, provided that I was willing to run a 50 foot extension cord out a door or window, and pay the inevitable increase in my rent (utilities are included, but I'm on the main house's meter). I don't consider leaving a door or window open at night for the 6 months of the year where it's cold and/or raining to be practical or efficient (I mean, I've got to heat the place), even if I and my landlord were willing to accept the tripping hazard to pedestrians. As I indicated above, it will take decades for most apartment dwellers to have viable at home charging (even most house renters will probably be limited to L1), even if every government jurisdiction were to require that starting today all new construction were provided with charging infrastructure, or at least the necessary circuits with receptacles in the appropriate places. A very few cities have imposed such requirements, but most haven't.
 
JasonA said:
Hydrogen cars only exist so the oil companies can still sell you something. Protecting their profits and interests. (it's shell and BP)

And no matter WHAT "they" say (aka salesman in the seat next to you, the car reps, etc) those tanks may be tested, crash proven, beaten up by the Hulk and still don't leak with 10,000psi in them.... but one thing you DON'T hear them say and you usually ALWAYS see in a ICE accident is the lines leaking :eek: :shock:

All these Toyota, Hyundai, MB, Honda reps say "ohh yea.. 10k psi tanks are bullet proof and have no problems in an collision or accident"

But what about in a front end or side impact/tbone situation when the car and frame gets severed or massively bent? And all those lines, hoses and couplings get all wonky??

10,000psi will like to escape.

I've seen and looked around one of these things.... would not look pretty in a front end collision...
By all means, then, you should avoid purchasing, driving/riding in or colliding with one, and you should pass your concerns along to the NTSB, NHTSA and Homeland Security, along with supporting data on the risks. They would presumably need to be considerably greater than vehicle fires involving fossil fuels: "Ninety-three percent of reported vehicle fires and 92% of vehicle fire deaths involved highway-type vehicles such as cars, trucks, buses, recreational vehicles, and motorcycles. The term “highway vehicle fires” is used to describe the type of vehicle, not the location of the fire. During 2003-2007, the 267,600 highway vehicles reported per year caused an average of 441 civilian deaths, 1,326 civilian fire injuries, and $1.0 billion in direct property damage. On average, 31 highway vehicle fires were reported per hour. These fires killed one person a day. Overall, highway vehicles fires were involved in 17% of reported U.S. fires, 12% of U.S. fire deaths, 8% of U.S. civilian fire injuries, and 9% of the direct property damage from reported fires." From http://www.nfpa.org/research/reports-and-statistics/vehicle-fires/vehicle-fire-trends-and-patterns
 
Back
Top