I am one of the hydrogen "naysayers" so I am eager to follow the FCX production version stories as it is leased to customers.

CR-Z does look great...I hope it has more headroom than a CRX though. I always had to have my friend open the sunroof so I could be comfortable in her CRX even though I'm just under 6' tall.

If Hydrogen is the wave of the future (I'm also skeptical) then lets power our electric powerplants with it. Batteries, capacitors, and hydralics are more easily understood and can be applied to automobiles using today's technology.
LiFEPO4 (A123, and others) Firefly, EESTOR (maybe), etc..

Looks great! And to be entering the market so soon is also encouraging. Presumably the leases will be limited to areas where there is refueling available. It'll be interesting to hear the consumer reports on this vehicle.

Love the Aptera. It was featured in Rolling Stone, by the way.

As for Honda - way to let me down. Hydrogen is anything but environmentally friendly. The better solution is to take the electricity used in generating the hydrogen and pump it directly into the car, or electric cars.

And if they're producing the CRZ is being produced in 2009, why not just make it a plugin hybrid?

Hydrogen is produced by reforming natural gas (a fossil fuel) or from electricity (50% of which comes from coal). It is possible in theory however to produce hydrogen reasonably cleanly, some day.

Charles,

Even if you improved the road performance of the Insight with the same fuel mileage and price I doubt the sales would be much different.

Most major auto-manufacturers are not setup to create many different models to address ever single market. They go with the "one-size fits all" mantra because it is more economical (take a small hit on relative sales here and there but overall the economy of scale and absolute sales make it worthwhile).

Personally, I would never buy a 2-seater unless it were strictly a recreational vehicle. I need to be able to pick up 2 children at a moment's notice at any given time [if I had a long commute I'd have to go home and change from the 2-seater vehicle to the 3+ seater vehicle which is impractical]. The cost of one vehicle at $25,000 plus insurance & maintenance versus the cost of two $15,000 vehicles plus insurance & maintenance on both vehicles? No thanks, I'll stick to one vehicle.

Hydrogen is produced by reforming natural gas (a fossil fuel) or from electricity (50% of which comes from coal).

The former probably is less carbon intensive than the average Wh of US electricity.

I fully understand that a four-seater, like the Prius, is more versatile, and thus it will sell well. However, just as there are plenty of owners of Corvettes (two-seater) and sports cars (with virtual rear seats), the Insight should also be an option for people who never had anyone sat in the backseat more than twice a year.

FYI, my wife and I own a 2002 MINI and an 2001 Insight. We have pets but no kids, and for the last five years, the Insight was driven MORE than the MINI. The Insight is more than adequate for daily grinds, but also pack plenty for our trips away from home. We still have the MINI when we have to pick up friends, but otherwise, the backseats are used about five times since I bought the car.

I understand it's a matter of lifestyle, but I don't see a need to have a vehicle that can do EVERYTHING, especially for families that have more than one car. I think the Prius is great, and when I have kids, I will get one. But I'd like to have the option to buy a fuel-efficient car, and if it's a two-seater, that's just fine by me.

Lastly, I am on the Aptera mailing list. I don't know if anyone else know this, but unless you live in San Diego area, you'd not be eligible for the first models. The plan is to only serve the California customers first, so I am out of luck.

Max Reid asked: "So why use convert to Hydrogen and lose some energy in the process, still we dont know the answer."

Max, no need to convert NG to H2. H2-Vehicle demonstration is an excercise in adapting to the future when we must rely nearly 100% on solar and wind energy.
Please realize that even when the world is relying 100% on solar and wind energy, you cannot depend on these intermittent sources to charge your BEV's, but must have ways to store these energy as chemical fuels to be used to generate electricity to charge your BEV's later when wind or solar output is insufficient or absent.

Thus, any attempt to say that BEV that can be charged directly from solar or wind energy hence would be more efficient than H2V is not reflecting deep consideration of the whole renewable energy paradigm.
For the BEV that is mostly charged at night, when there is no solar energy output whatsoever, or when the wind is not blowing, your must rely on a power plant consuming H2 to generate your electricity, hence your overall BEV's efficiency will not be any better than H2V even when only renewable energy sources are considered.

Good point, Elliot.
Lead-acid battery is often used as electricity storage for solar PV system that is not grid-connected. Lead-acid is not expensive to buy but must be maintained often, and required frequent replacement every few years, or even less if you deep-cycle the battery in order to wring sufficient capacity (utility) out of it.

But, no battery can be used for massive quantitity of energy storage nor for long-term energy storage (seasonal), due to the large volume and cost, and due to the self-discharge tendency of battery. In 3-6 months, most of the stored energy would be gone.
Recently, the utility companies have started using sodium-sulfur battery for temporary storage to meet peak demand, but these are still very expensive, at $500 USD/kwh. See this link:

http://www.technologyreview.com/printer_friendly_article.aspx?id=19584

Interesting. I wouldn't mind having a small version of that to go with a good solar setup. Maybe someday.

Having the battery at home allows you to store excess solar or wind electricity for later use, including charging your PHEV later in the night. Your PHEV is at work during the day, so the battery in the car is useless to soak up the solar electricity, unless there is a charging socket at work for you to charge your PHEV while at work, while you can sell to the grid your solar PV output.