The Levin AE86 BEV concept sports Tundra HEV’s electric motor and Prius PHEV’s power battery set as its main power, along with manual transmission to empower the drivers with full control over the EV. Additionally, the AE86 H2 Concept with Sprinter Trueno’s flipping headlights further utilizes Toyota’s heavily-invested hydrogen engine! Modified from GR Yaris’s 1.6L turbocharged straight-three engine, the hydrogen fuel engine tech enables AE86 H2 Concept to directly burn hydrogen fuel and produce water vapor in its ICE. Additionally, AE86 H2 Concept installs two sets of compressed hydrogen tanks from Toyota Mirai in its luggage compartment to achieve optimal balance and carbon neutrality while having minimal impact on Sprinter Trueno’s original body and weight distribution.
Since May 2021, Toyota utilized the hydrogen Corolla Sport to participate in Fuji Super TEC 24 Hours’ Super Taikyu Series Round 3 and the following Autopolis Round 4. In mid-September, the race team shortened the hydrogen refueling time from five to two minutes, with Toyota President Akio Toyoda sitting behind the wheel and netting second place in Round 5’s Suzuka. Now, Corolla Sport’s hydrogen engine with a maximum horsepower of 270 will go on stage with the iconic AE86.
Toyota’s recent emphasis on hydrogen engines coincided with Akio Toyoda’s EV strategy in a global press conference in Tokyo in December 2021. During the conference, Toyota disclosed its plans to launch thirty BEVs under the subsidiary bZ (beyond zero). However, Toyota’s reluctance to put all eggs in the BEV basket was more than apparent.
Coincidentally, after BEV’s exceptional sales performance, BMW also announced iX5 Hydrogen FCEV’s small batch production in December last year. The automaker praised fuel cells’ long-term potential on its official platform for their independence from cobalt, lithium, and nickel. With Mercedes and Volvo Trucks’ fuel cell truck announcements in last year’s September and June, respectively, we can see that there is still doubt to solely manufacture BEVs before the post-ICE age. Among all the hesitation to go all in for BEVs, the Hyundai-Kia Group is one of them, with its decent-selling FCEV production tracing all back to 2018.
According to South Korean research company SNE Research’s data on 5th December 2022, the global FCEV performed 18,457 sales from Jan. to Nov. 2022, while Hyundai Nexo came in at 10,700, beating Toyota Mirai’s 3,238 units and 17.5% market share with a whopping 58%. As it stands, Korea’s Hyundai-Kia is an extremely competitive and ambitious automaker in developing FCEVs.
When Hyundai Nexo launched in Korea in 2018, it cost only 33.9 million KRW with government incentives (about 928k TWD). Moreover, the Korean government’s Hydrogen Economy Promotion And Hydrogen Safety Management Act (Hydrogen Act) came into effect on 5th Feb 2021, allowing direct subsidies and support for Hyundai’s hydrogen equipment and business investments. As a result, Nexo’s sales figure surged from 727 in 2018, since its March release, to 4,194 in 2019, 5,786 in 2020, 8,502 in 2021, and over 10,000 in 2022. We can also identify another option beyond lithium BEVs from Nexo’s SK sales performance, especially hydrogen energy’s renewability and the potential to utilize green energy (wind, solar, geothermal, etc.) to generate green hydrogen fuel.
As for other successful global FCEV power system developers, Canadian Ballard Power Systems Inc. mainly produces FCEV power systems for buses and trucks and boasts over 13 million public buses worldwide. The company has also maintained close partnerships with Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz, Ford, Honda, etc., even providing the power module for China’s first fuel cell train. Additionally, the US energy company Plug Power Inc. mainly provides fuel cell power systems for trucks and cargo vehicles, while the up-and-coming US EV truck company Nikola purchases 125 tonnes of green hydrogen from the company to supply its TRE FCEV products.
From these real-life examples, we can see that although fuel cell energy isn’t mainstream within the zero-emission global trend if government policies have continuous FCEV support, manufacturers contribute to the commercialization of hydrogen-related equipment production, and hydrogen energy’s inherent advantage (such as its near identical weight as current ICE models (while lithium EVs generally weight 40-50% more than their ICE counterparts), car owners and the government not having to invest in charging posts, 5-minute refueling (same as current ICE models, while lithium EVs require forty minutes to one hour for a full charge), and traveling more than 1,000 km for every refuel, more than double than current ICE cars and lithium EVs), consumers will have no reason not to purchase FCEVs or the emerging hydrogen engine vehicles, should their terminal pricing remain the same as lithium EVs today. As for where the auto industry’s development is heading, I’m looking forward to better, more comprehensive auto products for the consumers, just as you are.
About the author - Kenny Liu
Graduated from Dept. of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Cheng Kung University in 1988, started his auto industry career since July 1990 after two year military service. Starting as a service engineer and a temp technician, product marketing specialist in Peugeot/ Daihatsu, marketing and dealer channel specialist in VW LCV from March 1992, then field manager in GM Taiwan from Feb. 1994, sales and service / parts head in Ford Lio-Ho from Sep. 1998 till retirement in May 2019. Kenny then started to work for JLR Taiwan as sales/service head and consultant/ lecturer. After that, he was invited to work at a Suzuki dealer of Taipei as the general manager until April 2022.