What killed the electric car? A 7 year tie to the oil companies & a bad bet on hydrogen fuel cells

[FarCenter]

http://www.gm.com/experience/technology/fuel_cells/fc_milestones.jsp

Note that early on, some key milestones are:

1996: GM/Exxon/Arco R&D Agreement signed.

1998: Signed agreement with ExxonMobil to conduct collaborative research on hardware and fuel options for advanced vehicles.

2000: August: Announced development of highly-efficient gasoline fuel processor for fuel cell vehicles with ExxonMobil.

2000: November: Announced breakthrough catalyst system with current generation gasoline fuel processor at more than 80 percent efficiency.

2001: January: Announced with Toyota progress on multi-year technology agreement and combining research on fuels for fuel cells and fuel infrastructure with ExxonMobil.

2001: March: Released comprehensive Well-to-Wheel study by GM, Argonne National Laboratory, BP, ExxonMobil, and Shell showing that hydrogen-powered fuel cell vehicles offer the cleanest and most efficient combination of fuel and propulsion system in long-term.

It goes on and on..., and of course the military gets involved....

2003: January: Revealed, with the U.S. Army, a diesel hybrid military pickup truck equipped with a fuel cell auxiliary power unit that could become the model for the Army’s new fleet of 30,000 light tactical vehicles by the end of the decade.

And the chemical companies get involved....

2003 May: Announced reaching an understanding with Dow Chemical Co. on the world’s largest fuel cell transaction to date. The intent is for GM to commercialize its hydrogen fuel cell technology to generate electricity from hydrogen created as a co-product at Dow’s Freeport, Texas operations. Dow could eventually use up to 35 megawatts of power generated by 500 fuel cell units.

And the DOE National Labs get involved....

January 6, 2005: GM joined with Sandia National Lab in a partnership to design and test an advanced method for storing hydrogen. The 4-year, $10 million program is intended to develop and test tanks that store hydrogen in sodium aluminum hydride. The goal is to be able to store more hydrogen onboard that other hydrogen storage methods currently in use.

And Hillary gets involved....

April 1, 2005: Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton joined GM and the U.S. military for the unveiling and ceremonial delivery of a GM fuel cell-powered pickup truck built for the U.S. military. Developing partnerships with customers like the U.S. military, whose goals match GM’s, will advance a hydrogen economy, help gain real-world experience with hydrogen and fuel cells and create the potential for additional future joint transportation ventures with the military.

The Honeoye Falls, NY lab was away from Detroit's oversight, but it was being supported by top GM R&D management....

February 23, 2006: Department of Energy Secretary Samuel W. Bodman visited GM's Fuel Cell Activities Research Center in Honeoye Falls, NY, Thursday, February 23, 2006. Bodman's visit highlighted President Bush's $1.2 billion, five-year commitment to the Hydrogen Fuel Initiative. As part of President Bush's Advanced Energy Initiative, the Fiscal Year 2007 budget request for the Hydrogen Fuel Initiative was increased by $53 million to $289.5 million.

And Senator Levin gets involved.. again with the military... Larry Burns is the big supporter of this doomed program.... http://www.gm.com/corporate/investor_information/corp_gov/bios/burns_larry.jsp

September 21, 2006: The U.S. Army became the first customer of General Motors Corp.'s latest fuel cell technology as the automaker deployed the first vehicle of its next generation Chevrolet Equinox Fuel Cell vehicle fleet.

U.S. Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee and a champion of fuel cell technology, and Larry Burns, GM vice president of research and development and strategic planning, gave the Equinox Fuel Cell keys to Army Maj. Gen. Roger A. Nadeau, commander of the U.S. Army's Research, Development and Engineering Command.

The last entry is in 2007.

See also Forbes article from 2002 http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2002/1223/312.html

[The_Casual_Observer]

1. It's no surprise that all those idiots would fall for the hydrogen cell

hoax. It had to be that way.