They are nothing if not determined.

I wonder what GM would say about an electric vehicle with a 50,000 mile lifespan.

Is there any info on pricing?

It will be fascinating to compare this with the Tesla. Both started with initial manufacturing runs of about 100 vehicles, though it seems Tesla will manufacture several hundred next year.

The Tesla has longer range, greater life, better fueling infrastructure and much, much better acceleration.

So, the only thing left is price. Any info out there?

Remember this isnt like the tesla this is more like the original elctric car tests done awhile back. The cells are enginnered to last at least 50k miles but they dont realy know for sure. As it only has a 4.2 kg tank cap and is a suv /car crossover im not shocked at the 200 mile range.

I suspect the 5th gen fuel cell will have a much beter set of specs. And that by gen 6 the gen they realy expect to start going general sales with it should be well over 200k mile lifetime and prolly a 350 mile range.

What a load of crap! Will GM be solvent in 2007?

You can count on these not being sold. If they see the light of day, they will be leased (ala EV-1).

Correct me if I am wrong but a 35kw NiMh in a plug in Prius would give a range of 140 miles before the engine would come on.

Yup from what I can gleen it is an suv running at the equive of just under 50 mpg. Not bad for this stage of the game. And as some know the last gen fuel cell had only about a 10-20k range so we can expect some leaps with the next 2-3 gens.

The biggest issue with this is the infrastructure required produce and distribute h2. Unless you are reforming h2 from some kind of fossil fuel it isn't very efficient. Any kind of hydrolysis would place major additional demands on fresh water supplies. If you think you can generate enough h2 at home with solar panels, think again, it will never produce enough.

Who is going to buy a car you can't guarantee to fill up and will only last 50,000 miles? An all EV vehicle is more practical or just go for a plug in hybrid.

"The biggest issue with this is the infrastructure required infrastructure...."

with that attitude, i'm shocked we even have cars...we would all still be riding horses...

I think it all comes down to finding a way to fuel transportation without an unacceptable environmental impact or adding to our over-reliance on fossil fuels.

Hydrogen from fossil fuels is a non-starter--it shifts transportation energy consumption so it competes with other uses for fuels. That leaves electrolysis for hydrogen production.

Electricity from wind and solar is highly desirable, but if you want to rely on wind and solar, you have to use it as efficiently as possible because of the still small amount of installed capacity from those sources. And making hydrogen via electrolysis and then consuming it in a fuel cell is far less efficient, in terms of BTU's/mile driven, than is using that electricity to recharge a battery pack in an EV.

Frankly, I wish the US gov't would funnel a lot more money into EV's and a lot less into HFC's, as that's where I think we're headed anyway for personal transportation.

(See the Car Technologies Comparison spreadsheet on the downloads page of my site (click on my name below) for some specific numbers on hydrogen, EV's, etc.)

"with that attitude, i'm shocked we even have cars...we would all still be riding horses..."

Not at all, I just don't think fuel cells are the way forward for automotive applications. The former head of ABB fuel cell research and the european fuel cell council has publicly stated that they don't think hydrogen fuel cells have anything but a niche future. In fact, they have stopped active research into hydrogen cells and will concentrate on solid oxide cells for local power generation. The problem is the overhead of creating and storing hydrogen just doesn't make it worth the effort. Better to use the energy directly in a EV or plug-in type application.

I was a big fan of hydrogen fuel cells, last year, but now, they just seem like an unreasonable fairy tale. With the rapid technological improvements in nano-tech batteries, celulosic ethanol combined in plug-in hybrids, we can be building and driving PHEV's in the next year. We aleady have ethanol and biodiesel stations poping up everywhere and electrical outlets--everywhere. I drive on ethanol in Eugene, Oregon and have an extension cord in my garage, just waiting for the flex fuel plug-in hybrids to show up on the car lots so I can put one in my garage. Much simpler technology, supporting local farmers and using already available, renwable electricity. Win, win, all around.