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Report: Japan to ease regulations on H2 fueling stations to cut setup and operating costs in half

The Nikkei reports that the Japanese government will ease regulations on hydrogen refueling stations, with the goal of making the refueling points less costly to set up and to operate in the hope of spurring the adoption of fuel cell vehicles.

Setting up a hydrogen station costs 400 million yen to 500 million yen ($3.5 million to $4.4 million), and operating one costs 40 million yen to 50 million yen per year, according to METI. The body aims to have both setup and operating costs slashed in half by 2020 through development of lower-cost facilities and loosened regulations.

According to the report, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry will revise about 20 points in rules governing the facilities by 2018.

As of the end of August, Japan had 91 hydrogen stations in operation. The government aims to have 160 up and running by fiscal 2020 and to have 320 by fiscal 2025.

One step in the regulatory easing will be lowering operating costs by loosening the requirements for station supervisors. Those supervisors currently must have experience at a facility that handles hydrogen, but in the future, experience with natural gas and other high-pressure gases will suffice, according to the report.

Stations will also no longer be required to have an employee who takes down cars’ license plates and keeps track of who buys hydrogen, a change that should cut labor costs.

METI will also reevaluate safety standards by fiscal 2019, incorporating the latest technology and knowledge to avoid overly strict rules.

Comments

Davemart

The roll out which detractors said would never happen is now well underway in several countries.
Ludicrously the most vehement are those who purport to support the electrification of transport, but refuse to engage with the fact that the overwhelming majority of the world's motorists have nowhere at all to conveniently plug in, and that in many places in the world seasonal variation means that batteries cannot conceivably provide year round renewable power for BEVs.

China is looking to 100 fuel cell stations by 2020 also:


https://fuelcellsworks.com/news/shanghai-releases-its-development-plan-for-fuel-cell-vehicles/

HarveyD

Good move by Japan to lower inititial and ongoing operation cost of H2 and H2 stations.

H2 stations supervision-monitoring could be done remotely to further reduce operation cost?

Installation of H2 stations must be accelerated.

In factory mass production of electrolyzers-compressor & high pressure tanks, housed in transportable containers, could reduce cost much further.

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