But the key advantage of hydrogen over battery electric is its fast refueling times. For a long time, drivers have been conditioned to expect to be able to refuel in five minutes or less, and the longer recharging times for BEVs continue to be a stumbling block for the EV-incurious and those who don’t like change. Rath called out towing as particularly benefitting here—no one complains about how poor an ICE truck’s fuel efficiency gets when towing, because of the plentiful refueling infrastructure and the rapid refueling times.
Just where are you going to fill that thing?
Of course, like BEVs and chargers, infrastructure will be key to any FCEV success. After all, there’s no point in selling someone a hydrogen-powered car if there’s nowhere for them to fill up with hydrogen. Europe “will require the deployment of a hydrogen refurbing station every 200 kilometers along the trans-European transport network, corresponding to more than 400 stations by 2030,” Rath said, pointing to similar programs in Japan, South Korea, and China.
With series production of any FCEV still four years away, it’s too soon for BMW to get specific about which models will get a hydrogen version, or where. “First, we have a really close look on how the region develops toward hydrogen infrastructure. And also, what is the market demand? What its customers need in each region,” Rath said. But we can expect hydrogen versions of existing models rather than anything entirely new just for the FCEV powertrain.
Here in the US, the Department of Energy has billions of dollars in funding for green hydrogen, including a series of regional green hydrogen production hubs. But at the same time, California, the one state in the country that had any kind of existing retail hydrogen infrastructure, is seeing most of those retail stations close.
Consequently, it seems unlikely that BMW will bring these future FCEVs to North America, at least not as part of the initial 2028 rollout, absent a reversal of that trend.
