BMW’s hydrogen-powered limousine is nothing more than “fantasy technology,” according to the car buyer’s Dog & Lemon Guide (BMW’s release is below).
Dog & Lemon Guide editor Clive Matthew-Wilson said today:
“BMW’s hydrogen-powered car looks great on a video clip, but it’s basically a cynical public relations stunt using a discredited alternative fuel.”
“The problem is simple: making hydrogen takes more energy than you get back, it’s difficult to store and highly dangerous. Worse, even where hydrogen is actually available, it’s often made by burning fossil fuels.”
Ralph J. Cicerone, president of American National Academy of Sciences, told the U.S. Senate that there were: “substantial technological and economic barriers in all phases of the hydrogen fuel cycle.”
Joseph Romm, a physicist who led a study into alternative fuels for former U.S. president Jimmy Carter, was even more blunt:
"A hydrogen car is one of the least efficient, most expensive ways to reduce greenhouse gases. If you want to slow down global warming, you're not going to do it with a hydrogen car…not in our lifetime, and very possibly never."
Matthew-Wilson added:
“The energy shortage & global warming are real problems, but the hype surrounding these problems is not real. It disturbs me to see car companies promoting fantasy technology and justifying it using fantasy economics.”
“There’s no quick fix to either the energy shortage or global warming. In the longer term, we’re all going to have to use less energy, and that means smaller houses, less plastic junk that we don’t really need and less wasted trips in our cars.”
