Re:Tim O'Reilly: Stop throwing sheep, do something worthy
by DaniFong on Saturday September 20, 2008 @02:10PM
(#309992)
We'd scale from 300 to 700 bar as the market allows. In the Asian market, for example, range and bulk is less of an issue than cost.
We're actually aiming at creating a scooter first, and other vehicles later.
The hydrogen tanks are much more sophisticated than we need. In particular they require a plastic liner (because hydrogen is so damned small). We just need carbon fiber wound tanks. These are manufactured to a higher precision but are not fundamentally different from 300 bar tanks which are fairly cheap (ie: you can buy single quantities of 9 L tanks for $500 - $600).
It's only a guess, but we think we can keep the tank price for a scooter below $1000, and for a car, below $3000. This is dependent on carbon fiber prices, and how efficient we can make the engine and drivetrain.
The important thing is that we can expect prices to improve handsomely while t goes to infinity, whereas batteries have had a lot of the manufacturing improvements that they're going to get.
We're actually aiming at creating a scooter first, and other vehicles later.
The hydrogen tanks are much more sophisticated than we need. In particular they require a plastic liner (because hydrogen is so damned small). We just need carbon fiber wound tanks. These are manufactured to a higher precision but are not fundamentally different from 300 bar tanks which are fairly cheap (ie: you can buy single quantities of 9 L tanks for $500 - $600).
It's only a guess, but we think we can keep the tank price for a scooter below $1000, and for a car, below $3000. This is dependent on carbon fiber prices, and how efficient we can make the engine and drivetrain.
The important thing is that we can expect prices to improve handsomely while t goes to infinity, whereas batteries have had a lot of the manufacturing improvements that they're going to get.