Nation's Nascent Hydrogen Highway Gets Station No. 46 As Shell Inaugurates New Pump In West L.A. Today

By John O'Dell, Senior Editor

The U.S. gets another hydrogen fuel station this morning – the 46th according to the latest count available – as Shell Oil opens a hydrogen pump at a conventional gas station in Los Angeles.

Part of a national hydrogen demonstration project jointly sponsored by the federal Energy Department,  Shell Hydrogen and General Motors Corp., the pump will be open to any hydrogen fuel-cell vehicle.

Fuel cells are electro-chemical systems carried on-board vehicles and used to convert hydrogen and oxygen to electricity that is used to power the  vehicle's electric drive system.

Because Southern California is a major center for fuel-cell vehicle testing, it has more than half the nation's hydrogen pumps to serve the more than 200 hydrogen-using vehicles in the area.

The number of vehicles could nearly double over the next few years as Honda Motor Co. begins leasing its FCX Clarity fuel cell vehicle next month.

For now, though, the primary users of the station's single, blue-labeled hydrogen pump will be drivers of the nearly 80 Chevrolet Equinox fuel-cell vehicles GM has placed on the region's roads as part of its Project Driveway fuel cell program.

Fuel cell cars placed in municipal fleets around the Los Angeles area for research purposes also could use the station.

Pricing wasn't available in advance of the station opening, but Shell has said it would price hydrogen fuel on par with premium gasoline -- a kilogram (2.2 pounds) of  hydrogen contains approximately the same energy as a gallon of gasoline, and the GM and Honda cars can carry about 4 kilograms in their tanks. That should come out to around  $25 a tank.

The vehicles are far more efficient than internal combustion gasoline cars, though, and can travel between 150 (Equinox) and 250 miles (Clarity) on a single fill-up.

The station will provide hydrogen gas compressed at 5,000 pounds of pressure per square inch, or 350 bars – a form usable by most of the present crop of fuel cell vehicles.

That's important because one of the chief purposes of the station, and others like it, is to help accustom motorists to the presence of the oil-free fuel

The third of five such operations planned for the DOE hydrogen project, the Shell pump – located on busy Santa Monica Boulevard a few miles from the UCLA campus in Westwood -- will be fed from a storage tank mounted atop the pump island canopy. The tank will be filled with hydrogen gas produced at the station in an electrolysis unit that strips the hydrogen molecules from water.

Critics maintain that the process uses more energy than the hydrogen fuel saves. Backers of the project say that it is a first step in building a hydrogen infrastructure and that some day the fuel could be produced with clean energy from solar or wind generators.

GM has been at the forefront of a campaign by automakers developing fuel cell vehicles to pressure the fuel and energy industries to develop hydrogen stations so there is a reason to build the cars for the retail market.

The company has estimated that a network of 12,000 hydrogen stations strategically located in the 100 largest metropolitan markets would serve the needs of 70 percent of the motoring public at an investment cost of $10 billion to $15 billion.

A market the size of the Los Angeles metropolitan area initially could be well served by as few as 40 properly located stations, according to GM"s strategic plan.

Right now, while it is possible to drive a fuel-cell car from Los Angeles to San Diego and back, there aren't enough pumps in the right places to make a drive from L.A. to San Francisco or Las Vegas possible.

The new Shell station in West Los Angeles is the 26th in California and the 20th in Southern California. But few others are public. Most are open only to the city, public utility and private fleets that operate most of the fuel cell vehicles in the region.

A few more are on the way, however.

Natural gas fuel supplier Clean Energy Corp. earlier this month announced plans to add a public hydrogen station to its compressed natural gas station near Los Angeles International Airport, about 10 miles south of the Shell location.

And the California Air Resorces Board is expected to announce almost $8 million in grants next month to help establish three new hydrogen stations.

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John O'Dell June 26, 2008, 3:06 AM

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Emissions, Fuel Cell, Fuel Economy, General Motors, Honda, Hydrogen