According to the 2012 Motor Vehicle Census, there are 16.7 million motor vehicles in Australia. Also as of December 2012, there are no operational hydrogen fueling stations in the Land Down Under.
There WAS an operational hydrogen refilling station on the Western side in Perth. This station serviced, from 2004 to 2007, three fuel cell DaimlerChrysler Citaro buses and was part of the STEP, CUTE and HyFLEET:CUTE projects. The station has been non-operational ever since.
Now, comes the good part. Toyota has decided that they are going to start manufacturing hydrogen fuel cell cars in Melbourne. About 2 hours away a hydrogen capturing plant will be constructed in Gippsland which will take advantage of the area’s vast supply of brown coal.
According to news.com.au, “Toyota wants to make hydrogen cars in Melbourne fuelled by brown coal from the Latrobe Valley in a move that could save the struggling local car industry. The hi-tech switch would also require a new hydrogen-capturing plant to be built in Gippsland, providing hundreds of jobs and millions of dollars worth of investment for the region, which has one of the state’s highest unemployment rates. Toyota Australia president Max Yasuda said Victoria was ideally placed to take advantage of the new technology, which would roll out in Japan and the US in 2015.”
If you would like to read a technical 401-page primer regarding hydrogen and brown coal in Australia, then check this out. Otherwise, just know that brown coal is considered one of the lowest grades of coal with the highest water content. As with other grades of coal, pollution is a problem.
If the hydrogen capturing plant in Gippsland is to be of any value environmentally-speaking, then it will need some sort of carbon capture and sequestration system.
And if all goes as planned, by 2015 and beyond, the Land Down Under will be flying high with Toyota fuel cell vehicles. And that will be a very g’day my friends.
Exciting stuff, but your headline seems to imply that its a done deal, but the text seems to indicate that it is only under consideration at this time.
OTOH – Mr. Yasuda seems to have some promising inside information on Toyota’s catalyst work.
“Mr Yasuda said hydrogen-fuelled cars were the next potential upgrade to the plant, if he could win approval from his company bosses in Japan……
Dr Tanksale said fuel-cell technology had existed for 100 years, but the cost was prohibitive because it used expensive metals such as platinum as a catalyst.
But new nano-technologies could spread platinum to one billionth of a metre, reducing the amount of the expensive metal required in the fuel cell.”
Read more: http://www.news.com.au/top-stories/toyota-plan-to-make-hydrogen-cars-in-melbourne-providing-hundreds-of-jobs/story-e6frfkp9-1226530739692#ixzz2EmiH7T7u
You’re right of course, that this may not be a done deal. I think the proposition has merit, though and my hopes are that Toyota Australia president Max Yasuda will take the steps to make it happen.
good news, and the capture, plant can be new state of the art, to test such concepts,advancing this technology.i quess 80% capture. plus is good news and other methods comparible in future.but this is a plus considering it to be done with hydrogen double wammy. the other twenty % or less can use carbon trees, when 30 dollars per ton is reached,over a period, and algea jet fuel and sequation. living tissue in salt water, and not makes carbon neutral, to carbon negative negated,,,as 40% verhicals over all emissions, to planet. 60 percent other, we need to bump this up to 60% over all.going in the other direrction thus more spent now more needed. negated. and markets.new…
a $1.50 a gallon hydrogen,if 3 dollars as petrol there usa there is a huge savings in usa.i dont know the price but i guess so.over time…if hydrogen carrier is micro plastic beads hydrogen as a liquid behaviour, the at room temperature,and improved obsortion then…oh and the other liquid carrier using exiting infrastructure.equals 25 billion.hydronol. plus less.and permanent, infrastructure 10, 20 years, push product, in small and large system pems computers etc. no platium…got to work over periods…