Live data from Hacker News

Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

carbuzz.com

351–360 of 520 posts

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#351
post #318
post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

EVs take forever to charge, rendering long trips unrealistic. They are not cheaper long term, for they rely upon thousands of pounds of heavy batteries. If they go further now, that is not a given down the road. Were you to employ this logic when electric cars first came out, there wouldn't be a single one on the road. It's only through trillions of research dollars, that current battery tech is where it is. But sure…

> EVs take forever to charge, rendering long trips unrealistic. You'll find EVs that will go 700km+ with just one, 15min stop, as they charge at over 350kW in this day and age: https://ev-database.org/#group=vehicle-group&av-1=1&rs-pr=10... You'd want to make that 15min stop at least once on such a trip. Or fly instead. > It's only through trillions of research dollars, that current battery tech is where it is. Probl…

There is only one car in that database that has even close to a 700km range on long trips, and that is only under perfect conditions.

As with any car, you don't wait until out of fuel to recharge. Instead, you seek to do so well before. These pages at least understand a little of that, and cite a real-world range under perfect conditions of 450km before recharging, with a range of 300km afterwards.

Yet these figures are with no heat or AC, with it not below -10C, and with an incredibly slow speed of 110km/hr, which is illegal on some freeways in the US and Canada (yes, too slow on a freeway is illegal). At least, according to this page.

And yes, this is a "long trip" after all. I often have circumstances where I drive 1600km a day.

For current situations, although the future can be different, if you click on the details, it's actually 22 minutes to get an 80% charge, and of course with 400kw thrown at it. You have to get to the charger, hope one is free, then start this business. Just the on/off plus charging would realistically be 30 minutes, and taking 1 1/2 hours off to charge is ridiculous.

The current real world problems are, you'll never find that level of charging anywhere along the route of your long trip. Not with assurances it actually works, and that you don't have to redirect 100s of kms out of the path you wish to take. I cite current, because the future is just that. However, you'll literally have to spend trillions on infra just to do anything more than that, because if you're having literal parking lots full of cars charging at turn-offs on interstates, that's going to require massive, new long-haul electricity infra.

Which is really the point. Very slow to charge, hard to get charged, and once the infra is in place, there's still issues. Like recycling. And weight of car. And peak demand vs storage (such as with h2). And more.

Each tech stands poorly against gas cars, in terms of usability, reliability, range, fueling issues, and so on. That's to be expected though, with over 100 years of relentless development of carbon beasts, in planes, ships, cars, engines of all sorts.

It will take decades at the very least to get as good with electric in any form.

Yet what do I hear and see?

What madness do I see relentlessly spouted?

That one tech is the only answer, that R&D will change nothing, that even though range is an issue, the person is the problem, not the range, and so on.

Like the crass "use an airplane" comment.

Ah well.

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#352
post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This makes it a little more expensive than diesel, considerably more expensive than petrol, and roughly the same price as electric Is electric charging more expensive in the UK than petrol? That's nuts.

It is if you use a rapid charger. If you're fortunate enough to be able to do what you need with a car within 50 miles or so of your house and leave it overnight to charge, it's cheaper. At present, EVs do not solve any problem I have.

Very few people would use 100% rapid charging. Even on a long journey, they can arrive home with, say, 5-10% remaining, and recharge at home. (The car calculates this automatically.)

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Synthetic fuels (including hydrogen) do still make a lot of sense for heavy stuff like trucks, buses or trains, and aircraft where the energy density is a big plus. Those are where you'd expect to see hydrogen take off first, not passenger cars. Same as how diesel started in trucks - expensive engines but economical when amortized and worth it for heavy usage applications. If they couldn't crack those areas, no chanc…

Trucks and busses would be better off with battery swaps at depo like electric forklifts do. More mileage more towing weight for trucks, just stack more batteries. Overweight? Use a diesel. Trains is an easy one, over head lines. Aircraft, I think short distance trips <1hr maybe otherwise biofuel. Likely we’ll see biofuels widely used by 2040. Electric motors on a 777, I’m not sure.

With the upcoming MCS charging standard you won't need battery swaps for trucks or busses. Even today you have trucks that can charge with up to 400 kW, which is good enough for charging during mandatory pauses or downtimes.

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#354
post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, it's not the new oil, it's the same oil in "green" packaging. Plus some comforting lies about carbon capture.

Even if it was fully green, you can’t run an electrolysis system from home. So you have to buy it, so there’s a market and an expensive solution. Electricity comes out the wall.

> Electricity comes out the wall.

Which unless you have solar, you are paying for. Even if you have solar, you are paying off the panels, batteries and inverter/chargers over a period of time.

Nothing is free.

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the place hydrogen might work is airplanes where the energy density of batteries doesn't work. How is that going to work? Cryogenic liquid hydrogen? High pressure tanks? Those don't seem practical for an airplane. What does work for airplanes is to use carbon atoms that hydrogen atoms can attach to. Then, it becomes a liquid that can easily be stored at room temperature in lightweight tanks. Very high energy densit…

What if you just, like, put the hydrogen in a big balloon?

Dude so like, one time some guy did that and like the entire thing just blew up bro. Seriously knockered.

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#356
post #73

When comparing EVs to hydrogen cars it is very obvious that one is the superior solution. An EV is a clear simplification of an ICE. Add a Battery and replace the mechanical complexity of a combustion engine with a relatively simple electric motor. So many components are now unnecessary and so many problems just go away. EVs also make charging simpler. Hydrogen cars on the other hand are very complex and also quite i…

> An EV is a clear simplification of an ICE. Add a Battery and replace the mechanical complexity of a combustion engine with a relatively simple electric motor. So many components are now unnecessary and so many problems just go away. EVs also make charging simpler. Is it? Then why isn't it cheaper to produce and cheaper to own? > Hydrogen cars on the other hand are very complex and also quite inefficient, requiring…

>Is it? Then why isn't it cheaper to produce and cheaper to own?

Because batteries are very expensive. But they aren't particularly complex.

This argument just does not make any sense at all. Of course simple components can be more expensive. The cost of ownership is even less relevant, since it depends almost entirely on outside factors, which vary by region and government.

>It's a standard combustion engine, nothing special.

This is totally false. The hydrogen storage alone is enormously complicated. Hydrogen, especially at the pressures needed for a car to be viable is far more complex to store safely then fuel storage for a regular diesel/gasoline car.

Pretending this is not the case is just delusional.

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With diminishing results. Turbofans and supercritical airfoils are done to the point of engine manufacturers looking to propfans and alternative materials (carbon fibre) to eke out further efficiencies. Although carbon fibre has significant down sides.

I have patented the idea of replacing the nitrogen in the cabin air with helium. I'm waiting for the money to roll in!

Looks like I picked the wrong week to quit sniffing glue.

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#358
post #347

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is suspect large trucks may eventually move to hydrogen, but smaller passenger vehicles will stay on batteries. The nature of hydrogen containment favors larger capacity, on account of better volume to surface area ratios.

>Is suspect large trucks may eventually move to hydrogen [...] They won't, why would they? The number of hydrogen gas stations is going down and the price is going up. Batteries are good enough already - the Mercedes eActros 600 with its 600 kWh battery has a range of 500 km.

Lol yes lets just casually plug into a 1.2MW charger and not take down the electricity of the nearby town while I charge my truck.

Nuclear trucks and boats are what I envision so maybe I'm the one who needs a reality check.

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#359
post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Round trip efficiency of hydrogen is at best 50% In fact, even this level of efficiency may be sufficient. Solar panels are so cheap that if we had affordable, long-term energy storage options, even with such efficiency, we would have completely abandoned fossil fuels. But, unfortunately, storing hydrogen is difficult and dangerous. It is not like natural gas. > It's not nearly as stupid as making ethanol from corn…

> Ethanol is produced from corn not for energy purposes, but for food security Source? First time I read this, might make sense. Although I don't see how this corn should be unaffected by crop failure if all other corn harvests failed.

> Although I don't see how this corn should be unaffected by crop failure if all other corn harvests failed.

I believe the argument being made here is "we need to overproduce corn in order to get food security; what can we do with the spare capacity in the good years given we're already eating too much?"

I don't know if this argument is correct, but I believe that's what's being claimed.

Re: Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

#360
post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People looked at how the cost of wind and solar went down and made a assumption that green hydrogen would follow. The reasoning was that the cost of green hydrogen was energy, and thus at some point green hydrogen would be too cheap to meter. The whole energy plan of central/northen Europe, especially Germany, was built for the last several decades on the idea that they would combine wind, solar and cheap natural gas…

I had to Google what is green hydrogen. It is hydrogen produced by electrolysis. If you've already got the electricity for electrolysis, would it not be more efficient and mechanically simpler to store it in a battery and power an electric motor?

> If you've already got the electricity for electrolysis, would it not be more efficient and mechanically simpler to store it in a battery and power an electric motor?

Yes, if you actually have the batteries.

Between around 2014-2024, the common talking point was "we're not making enough batteries", and the way the discussions went it felt like the internal models of people saying this had the same future projections of batteries as the IEA has infamously produced for what they think future PV will be: https://maartensteinbuch.com/2017/06/12/photovoltaic-growth-...

I've not noticed people making this claim recently. Presumably the scale of battery production has become sufficient to change the mood music on this meme.

Post reply on HN