Toyota continues to work on hydrogen combustion engines, but why?
Toyota unveiled another car with a hydrogen combustion engine today. This time a Toyota GR Yaris, typically a car where it would be a shame if it disappeared. By the way, the GR Yaris H2 will not go into production, but is a study model to show what is possible.
But why does Toyota keep coming up with hydrogen engines? As nice as the idea of combustion engines in the future may be, on paper hydrogen in a combustion engine is currently a hopeless proposition, and not even very green. When producing hydrogen, energy is lost and CO2 is released. When burning hydrogen in an internal combustion engine, even more energy is lost.
Aren’t combustion engines the modern horse-drawn carriages?
“I know what some of you are thinking: this must be an exercise by Toyota trying to find a new role for old combustion technology, like the makers of horse-drawn carriages did when cars started to displace horses. I can assure you that we understand how vehicle technology is changing,” said Matthew Harrison, Toyota’s European chief executive.
‘And I know that some of you think that because hydrogen has twice the power loss as lithium batteries and combustion engines are less efficient than fuel cells, a hydrogen engine makes no sense. I can assure you that we understand this trade-off,” Harrison said.
Hydrogen combustion engines are cheap and light
Still, he sees a future for a hydrogen combustion engine. “Even with the lower efficiency of an engine compared to a fuel cell, there may be applications for hydrogen combustion engines where low weight, low cost, quick refueling and high robustness are very important. Developing large hydrogen combustion engines for large vehicles takes a lot of time, but we can learn a lot by first trying smaller engines in smaller vehicles.’
Cheap hydrogen-powered vehicles
Hydrogen combustion engines are therefore not efficient, but they are cheap and light. Certainly if hydrogen can be produced green in the future, it could be an option for countries where, for example, there is a poor charging infrastructure. At Toyota, they also see hydrogen as a way to store energy. By converting electricity into hydrogen, you can store it locally in tanks. Then you don’t have to produce large and expensive batteries to put them somewhere. For now there are no concrete production plans, but a lot of testing is being done.
Hydrogen combustion engines do not play the leading role
You probably already understood it, but Toyota is not focusing on hydrogen as the future of the car. The stuff gets a supporting role. Toyota will soon introduce its first full SUV on a new electric platform. In addition, they are working on another new platform called E3. On this platform, Toyota and Lexus can build both electric cars and plug-in hybrids. In addition, Lexus will launch the RZ next year – a fully electric car on its own platform.
