http://automobiles.honda.com/fcx-clarity/ $600 a month WITH insurance. (Not to mention the money you save from not using gasoline.) I hope they bring the cars to more cities because I am very interested.
As Devilsolsi said, the car looks a lot like a Prius. In addition if I wanted a daily driver I would get something fun, the extra money would be worth it.
Interesting that they refer to a 30% CO2 reduction with the home refuling station vs a gas car and normal electricity usage. I assume therefore that they are calculating th electricity input from the home refuling station as an ofset. In any event for a much simpler setup one could just run a converted piston engine car on CNG. Hydrogen is an energy store not an energy source. From what BMW says the effciency of fuel cells is such that one is better off just burning hydrogen in an internal combustion engine. In any event the hydrogen needs to come from somewhere, whch means wee need energy to split the hydrogen from oxygen, since over 50% of electricity come from coal, what is the net gain if any. Of course you could build some serious nuke plants, use the elctricity for hydrogen to use in a fuel cell or combstion engine. There would therfore be no more smog and the air would be cleaner. But we would run the risk of poisoning ourselvs and future genrations with radionuclei for 100,000 years. Or we could build some of those serious solar plants out in the dessert. The type using parabolic mirors to heat oil and drive steam turbines. This power could be used for hydrogen production. Voila the pollution free future. Problem is the cost of power from such a plant is 3X coal. But perhaps this is a price worth paying, and 100sqmi of dessert would do the trick. With the 100"s of billions spent on securing the oil supply used as a supplemt the economics look even better. All that is lacking is the political will and an ability to ignore the nuclear and oil lobbies. Yes we can run cars any number of ways on hydrogen, the question is how we produce the hydrogen in an ecologicaly sound manner with reasonable economics. Oil is still the cheapest energy source, although if one adds the pollution and military costs the price might not seem so cheap. A hydrogen infrastructure is just a matter of will too.
For that much you can have an EVO or STi and get a great performer, above average economy, reliability and seat 5 to boot...
Screw the world of the future and enjoy it now like this guy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwnXA55UPg8 Notice the cherry red brakes of a car being used in a purely artistic way!
+1 Every new technology is expensive at the beginning. Couple of trillions have been pumped in nuclear research, no one mentions that nowadays, it's only the oh-so expensive renewable energies.. Anyway @ topic: The Honda FCX will be very limited, Honda loses loads of money with that project. It's more a marketing thing, the 600$ are rather a symbolic amount... Honda's actual cost is MUCH higher
