Some interesting posts here regarding EVs and Hydrogen fueled...

Some interesting posts here regarding EVs and Hydrogen fueled vehicles.

The death knell seems to be sounding for the internal combustion engine. China, the largest global automotive market, is throttling back on its ICE production while at the same time raising the bar on fuel performance. Hybrids are a popular and sensible choice – especially given the incomplete charging network. But the Chinese have been clever in terms of their rebate focus on “pure electric” vehicles, mandating that conventional vehicle manufacturers must produce a set (and rising) percentage of production to BEVs (all battery vehicles). At the same time manufacturers of BEVs must meet rising mileage performance figures in order to qualify for rebates. As the incentives are very substantial the government is keeping a vice-like grip while advancing the technology.

This has rather thrown a spoke in Toyota's wheel, as they were intending to hold off marketing an EV in China til around 2020 at which time I believe they were going to leapfrog a hydrogen fuel celled vehicle into the market.  So they have been forced to have some of their Chinese joint venture partners badge engineer locally produced EV’s - solely to meet the stringent government quotas.

At the same time there are very strong rebates in China for Fuel Cell vehicles. These are going to follow the predictable pattern of buses and logistics vehicles, which are on fixed routes and being fleets lend themselves to “broad brush” government control. Personally, I don’t think we are likely to see a repeat of the "LPG fueling an internal combustion engine" thing. It is most likely to be a combination of batteries and Fuel Cells.

While the charging network is still being addressed ( a new  ((for China)) mode of  battery pack replacement mode is being promoted by #2 maker BYD.  The deal is, you buy the BEV at full price and then sell off the battery rights to a 3rd party battery management company - then you lease them back monthly. The upshot is your vehicle purchase price winds back to about 15% lower than a petrol vehicle, and with the monthly management fees, your running costs are 50% lower than the same petrol model. Three minutes gets you an optimally charged power pack and those batteries will always be in peak condition – if they ain’t you can be sure they will hive off to the secondary market – the home solar powerwall.

China is definitely interested in Fuel Cells and will follow Japan’s showcase lead with FCEV’s at the next Winter Olympics.

A couple of recent articles gleaned from the Chinese automotive press for your consideration:

China is light on Fuel Cell development

China Association for Science and Technology (CAST) president Wan Gang said in the latest hydrogen energy industry innovation and development forum that China has not yet made marked progress in key fuel cell technology, and is still lagging far behind the international level.  For more info, please see below.

	Column 1	Column 2	Column 3
0		Current level in China​	Advanced international level ​
1	Galvanic pile power density	Around 2kW/L​	Around 3kW/L​
2	Catalyst efficiency	0.3g/KW​	Below 0.06/KW​
3	Membrane electrode durability (experimental life on dynamic working condition)	Around 3,000 hours ​	9,000 hours ​
4	Air compressor	Low pressure blower ​	Air compressor ​

Mr. Wan said there are only a small number of automakers who have entered the field of fuel cell-powered passenger vehicles.  Most mainstream automotive manufacturers have not listed FCEV’s as their major products.  There is an obvious gap between Chinese automakers and international auto manufacturers, such as Toyota, Honda, GM and Mercedes-Benz.

At present, FCEVs that are in pilot operation in China are mainly commercial vehicles. Yutong, Youth Bus, Foton, Dongfeng and SAIC Maxus have a total of not more than 1,000 FCEVs in operation, 78% of which are special vehicles and the remaining 22% buses.

Now, China has 12 hydrogen refueling stations in operation and nearly ten under construction.  These hydrogen refueling stations are unable to refuel hydrogen within three-five minutes, the international standard, and hence are not yet up to the commercial operation standard.

Great Wall to develop fuel cell tech

Great Wall stated on June 28 that the company has set up a hydrogen technology center that is capable of testing and the trial production of core parts of FCEVs, as well as complete vehicle integration and testing.

The company will work with its partners to develop core parts of FCEVs, such as fuel cell piles, membrane electrodes, air compressors, hydrogen tanks, hydrogen storage valves and pressure regulators.

The company predicts that FCEVs will become as important as pure EVs or PHEVs by 2025.  It plans to display its first fuel cell model made on a special platform, and launch the first fleet of FCEVs at the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics and then mature hydrogen FCEV models by 2025.

The company holds the view that hydrogen refueling stations are easier to be integrated with the existing gas stations.  By 2025, Great Wall will build a liquid hydrogen refueling station with deep cooling compression technology that will be used for hydrogenation technology development and testing.


Autohome website/ 12365auto website, July 2, 2018

Haima puts the freeze on ICE vehicles

Haima announced that it will apply hybrid power technology to all its products by 2019.  A plug-in hybrid version of the Haima S5 will be launched in the same year, which will be equipped with a 1.2T engine, a 85kw motor, a 6-speed dual clutch transmission.  It will run 80km at a full charge.

In addition, the company plans to launch a new energy modularization platform by 2020 and at the same time, NEV sales will make up 30% of the total.  By 2025, Haima will eliminate all conventionally fuelled (Internal Combustion Engined) vehicles.

Currently, a good number of automakers have announced that they will stop selling ICE vehicles.  Changan plans to completely stop selling ICE vehicles by 2025 and will make and market only NEVs; by 2020, 90% of Geely vehicles will be NEVs; BAIC will entirely stop production and marketing of independent-brand ICE passenger vehicles by 2025; Chery also said it will cease marketing of ICE vehicles by 2020.

Autohome website/ zhev website, July 2, 2018