»Turning electricity into hydrogen and then into motive power for a car is dramatically less efficient than using a battery, and car commutes in Japan are on the short side, so huge batteries wouldn’t be as necessary.«

Which is why Japan is favoring high-temperature hydrolysis here using high-temperature nuclear reactors.

See: https://www.jaea.go.jp/04/o-arai/en/research/research_03.htm...