Misinformation About FCEVs

Many of us are working hard to get us away from the traditional transportation fuels i.e. Gasoline and Diesel. Clean Cities is interested in all such technologies that hold that promise. FCEVs (Fuel Cell Electric Vehicles) are one. Normally we focus on CNG/LNG because we're the D.O.E's Clean Cities Coalition for the Coachella Valley and have the best infrastructure in place from one end of the valley to the other. In the City of Coachella there will soon be another public CNG fueling station. The kind of misinformation described below hurts all of us in the field and these untruths must be exposed.

You can read the letter from Julian Cox that contains misinformation here.

Here is the response from the California Hydrogen Business Council:

From: Emanuel Wagner [mailto:ewagner@californiahydrogen.org]
Sent: Wednesday, June 04, 2014 1:19 PM
Subject: Recent Attack on FCEVs - CEC Letter and Cleantechnica Article / Sandy Thomas Response

Dear CHBC Board Members,

I wanted to inform you about a recent lengthy and misleading article on a clean energy blog that was also sent to CEC's Grant and Loans Officer, Rachel Kiley, raising "severe issues with fuel cell vehicle GHG emissions and CEC's funding of h2 infrastructure." http://cleantechnica.com/2014/05/20/fuel-cell-vehicle-ghg-emissions/

In case you haven't heard about it, and since you will not have time to actually read the 14+ page article, in short, it claims the following:

• Fuel Cell Vehicle technology does not reduce GHG emissions over an existing equivalent gasoline vehicle
• EVs are inherently a more efficient and economical per mile usage of natural gas than FCEVs
• There are far better and easier ways to make natural gas powered vehicles than FCEVs
• There are much more effective ways for $200M USD to deliver emissions reductions
• There are deep concerns of false marketing surrounding FCEVs
• Funding FCEV fueling infrastructure is a reversal from supporting renewables to supporting fossil fuel
• Supporting "pre-commercial" FCEVs conflicts with interest of California taxpayers
• There are allegations of "bad science" on the part of the CaFCP from NREL data, and it calls the CaFCP a lobbying group
• There are allegations of a conflict of interest of the prime awardee of the grants, FirstElement Fuel

While articles like this are not new, this article tries to directly influence the CEC and is being used by the EV supporters to discredit FCEVs. The CaFCP has released a short statement about the GHG efficiency of FCEVs, while we're told NREL/DOE will not respond.

Sandy Thomas, a hydrogen analyst and longtime friend to the NHA, has developed a response to the article and sent it to the CEC (read the response here).

Staff does not see a role for the CHBC to play in this. However, because the letter may have an effect on the CEC and their award funding, I wanted to inform you about this issue and the response that followed.

Best,

Emanuel Wagner
Assistant Director | California Hydrogen Business Council
Tel.310-455-6095 x360 | Fax 202-223-5537 | ewagner@californiahydrogen.org