An Olympian effort to put hydrogen cars back on the map

4 months ago 10

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In what has been described as the “greenest games in history”, the organisers of the 2024 Paris Olympics have committed to half emissions compared to the 2010s. Key to this effort will be “a fleet of clean vehicles to transport the Olympic and Paralympic family”.

The fleet will be provided by Toyota and include 500 hydrogen-powered vehicles. But the choice of a hydrogen car as an official car of the 2024 Olympic Games has triggered a backlash.

In a letter sent to the organisation of the Paris Olympics, 120 scientists, engineers and academics called for the replacement of Toyota’s Mirai as the official vehicle of the games with a battery electric vehicle (BEV).

The signatories expressed “concern that Toyota’s promotion of a hydrogen car is scientifically misaligned with net-zero and will damage the reputation of the 2024 Games”.

They noted that a green hydrogen-powered car requires three times more renewable energy than an equivalent battery car, and pointed out the current reliance on fossil fuels to create hydrogen.

Responding to the letter, Toyota told Euractiv in written comments that it is also bringing 1,150 battery electric vehicles (BEVs) to Paris, and that “Toyota believes that (hydrogen mobility) will have a key role as one of the multi-path decarbonisation technologies”.

Toyota explained that it will demonstrate hydrogen-powered “passenger cars and heavy commercial vehicles, trucks and buses, as fuel-cell technology enables extended range and rapid refuelling”.

Toyota also noted that the “hydrogen supplied for Paris 2024 is of renewable origin, meaning that it will be produced from water electrolysis or biomethane with guarantees of origin“.

For Hydrogen Europe, BEVs and hydrogen cars are solutions that should work together to reduce emissions.

“We wholeheartedly reject the claim that the hydrogen car is “scientifically misaligned” with Net Zero” Jorgo Chatzimarkakis, CEO of Hydrogen Europe, told Euractiv in written comments.

He said that “for certain use cases, hydrogen is simply a more desirable option, and it will mitigate the inevitable constraints on the grid that an all-electric strategy would cause” and that taxis could be one such use case as they “spend a much higher average time on the road than private vehicles and thus benefit from longer range and shorter refuelling times.”

Chatzimarkakis noted that the hydrogen cars planned for Paris will shuttle people at the games – much like taxis.

The Olympic games have long brought together the world’s most promising athletes, to compete in a spirit of peace and international cooperation. So perhaps it is fitting that Paris 2024 is the venue for hydrogen cars and BEVs to square off against each other, in the same spirt.

Hopefully, the competing believers in hydrogen and electric-mobility will also preserve some of that Olympian spirit of goodwill once the games come to a close.

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[Edited by Donagh Cagney/Zoran Radosavljevic]