One of the more interesting discussions I had over the holidays was with a couple friends of mine who work at Ford. As usual (to my wife’s good-natured annoyance) the topic eventually turned to cars. What I’ve been really curious about these days is figuring out what our long-term replacement for traditional gasoline engines will be. There seems to be little doubt even among the average citizen that we can’t depend on oil forever, and that some day we’re going to have to get off the teat of the middle east. Of course, no one knows for sure what exactly our savior will be, but there’s plenty of speculation to go around.

Currently the two main candidates are pure electric cars and hydrogen fuel-cell cars. Both of these types of automobiles actually exist and can be bought (sort of) right now; if you’ve got about $100,000 you can grab a blisteringly fast all-electric Tesla Roadster, and for $600 a month and a lot of luck you can get on Honda’s list to lease the family-friendly hydrogen powered FCX Clarity — provided you live in southern California where they’ve installed some hydrogen filling stations, that is. (No, you can’t buy the FCX Clarity — some estimates value the vehicles at $10 million each, given the R&D costs Honda has put into them.) Neither of these vehicles emits anything harmful; the Tesla just gives off a little heat, and the only thing that comes out of the FCX Clarity’s tailpipe is pure water vapor.

2008 Tesla Roadster

First let’s take a look at the Tesla as the poster boy for all-electric vehicles. It simply plugs in to charge, just like a cell phone or laptop, and then can drive a couple hundred miles (unless you’re really flogging the hell out of it). Most owners, I understand, get a high-voltage plug installed in their garage so it can fully charge in about 3.5 hours; if you’re somewhere else though and you have to plug it into a standard wall outlet, it’s going to take the better part of a day. Total charge cost is only a few bucks. The electric engine is quite torquey — typical of electric motors — resulting in impressive performance. It only seats two, but a sedan is coming next year. Some argue that with electric vehicles you’re just shifting pollution from your tailpipe to the power plant that produces the electricity you use to charge the thing; to some extent that’s true, but it’s still more efficient and less polluting than every individual producing their own power (i.e., combustion engines).

The FCX Clarity is the latest in a long line of prototype hydrogen vehicles, and is the first one to ever be made available to the public. It’s also one of the only purpose-built hydrogen fuel cell cars; it wasn’t hacked together from an existing model, such as BMW, GM, and Ford have done previously. This gives Honda a huge advantage; while prototypes from other companies usually wind up being ridiculously heavy (and sometimes with cramped interiors, due to shoehorning hydrogen components in places not designer for them), the FCX Clarity is roughly the size and weight of a 2008 Honda Accord, and has generous interior room to boot. Consequently, it drives like a normal car. As mentioned, the only thing that comes out of the tailpipe is water, but the biggest advantage vehicles like the FCX Clarity have over their electric counterparts is the refueling time: it only takes a couple minutes to fill it up, unlike the several hours minimum on the Tesla, and you do it just like you fill up your gas-powered car now.

Honda FCX Clarity

The primary downside for hydrogen fuel cell cars is that, well, they’re carrying hydrogen. Based on my research, though, it appears that this is going to be more of a public perception problem than an actual safety problem. The predominate stigma, naturally, is that some people believe hydrogen is too dangerous to be used in every road-going vehicle. While gasoline is indeed flammable, it’s not under pressure like the hydrogen in a car would be. That said, the latest-generation hydrogen tanks have never been shown to rupture when subjected to any number of intense crash tests. I’ve never seen people who express such fears about hydrogen ever point to a specific incident that validates the claim — it appears at this time to just be a stigma founded on, I’m guessing, that spectacular disaster from way back in 1937. If a hydrogen tank did rupture, it burns very differently from gas — gasoline pools, hydrogen jets. This set of comparison photos showing the difference is a little rigged — they punctured the hydrogen tank in the back but cut the fuel line more toward the front of the car — but you get the idea of how they burn differently. The fact that the NTSB — the strict government agency responsible for mandating all that safety equipment on our cars — approved the FCX Clarity’s tank design is another vote of confidence.

Both of these vehicles, while no longer dependent on gasoline, still need to get their power from somewhere. Electrics will charge from the power grid (the miserable status of which is a whole ‘nother issue, mkay?), an existing infrastructure more or less, but hydrogen will have to be produced somehow. The good news is that a number of hydrogen production facilities are already underway, and costs are dropping. Currently, producing hydrogen to run a vehicle like the FCX Clarity emits about 60% of the pollutants as an equivalent gasoline car. So we’re already ahead in that sense, but newer and more efficient methods are being developed. There’s a ton of funny math and estimates if you’re interested (that site was sent to me via Twitter by Greg Blencoe, Hydrogen Discoveries CEO) but the long and short of it is that hydrogen should be significantly cheaper than gas for us — the retail consumer — in the long run. Poke around that Hydrogen Discoveries site with a grain of salt; it’s obviously a pro-hydrogen site, but there’s some interesting info on there.

Of course, the big challenge for either of these powertrains for widespread adoption is the infrastructure. For the electric car to be viable, we’d need high-speed chargers everywhere. Even though the power grid already exists, those charging stations do not. And even if you’ve got one of those quick charging stations, it’s still going to take hours to fully charge your car. What happens when you take a long road trip? Do you want to stop for an hour or two every few hundred miles? Probably not.

While I like the merits of both, it’s for that reason alone that I personally would pick the hydrogen system. Shell gas stations in southern California have installed hydrogen pumps to support the FCX Clarity, and it looks and feels just like filling up your current car — and it can be done in just a few minutes. For a society used to being on-the-go, a quick fill-up is a must. Moreover, you’ll one day have the option of at-home hydrogen production stations as well, so you can fill up right in your garage. The electric car is great, and the Tesla is an amazing achievement, but the FCX Clarity is, I think, an epic milestone in the history of the car. It’s proof that a gasoline-free, pollutant-free vehicle that looks like a car, drives like a car, and most importantly fits our lifestyle like a car is entirely possible. Companies that spend heavily in R&D — Toyota, Honda, and Ford — while having electric hybrids in the short term are also betting that hydrogen is the long-term future.

As my friend that works at Ford pointed out, one important final piece of this puzzle would be the government. The government may need to, some time relatively soon, come out in favor of one technology or the other. The last thing we need is a BetaMAX vs VHS or HD-DVD vs Blu-Ray battle on a much larger, much more expensive scale. I personally hope that support of gasoline-free cars, one type or another, fits into President Obama’s plans for energy independence.

If you’ve got opinions, let’s hear it in the comments! Be nice — I know this is a hot topic for some people.

And finally, I love watching Top Gear, so check out these videos of them testing the Tesla and FCX Clarity. They’re not fair and balanced reviews, but they’re amusing and give you a good look at the cars.