South Korea’s Hyundai Motor announced on July 6 that it has begun exporting commercial hydrogen fuel cell vehicles (FCVs) to Europe. The company shipped 10 trucks to Switzerland, and it plans to export 1,600 units by 2025 using a long-term lease contract system.
Hyundai has set up a joint venture company to build a hydrogen infrastructure in Switzerland; it also plans to develop hydrogen stations and other infrastructure in cooperation with a local company. They plan to use Switzerland as a base for expanding their exports throughout Europe.
The South Korean government is also focusing on the spread of the hydrogen-based society and will appeal to the governments of other countries. The trucks exported this time will be used by the food distribution industry. The route for these trucks is fixed, making it easy to set up the infrastructure for refueling.
While EVs take a long time to recharge, FCVs are said to be more suitable for transportation trucks because of their shorter refueling time, according to the customer company. In addition to commercial vehicles, Hyundai Motor sells FCVs under the passenger car brand Nexo.
Source: Nikkei Business (The original article was partially revised by the author.)
PSR Analysis: There is a risk that the development of next generation batteries will not progress as expected for EVs. Hyundai is also believed to be considering the risk of being too heavily weighted towards EVs. The Hyundai Motor Group’s current FCV production capacity is at the 3,000-unit-a-year level, but it has announced that it aims to increase this to 11,000 units by 2020 and to sell 110,000 FCVs by 2025. It will be a big challenge. The target number would be hard to achieve without eating into the demand for EVs.
They are trying to gain a foothold in the CV market in Europe. The first stepping-stone for FCVs to spread to cars will be medium – heavy trucks. It is in this segment that the disadvantages of EVs will have the strongest impact and the benefits of FCVs will be best matched.
Toyota and Hyundai have already released FCVs in the passenger car market, but their sales are extremely limited, hovering around 100 units per year. There is almost no benefit to FCV passenger cars now that the hydrogen infrastructure is not in place. Only when the cost advantages of converting CVs to FCVs become apparent will we be able to move into the popularization phase. The first step is to develop FCV trucks that are practical and durable. PSR
Akihiro Komuro is Research Analyst, Far East and Southeast Asia, for Power Systems Research
