There are two separate questions here. (1) Does hydrogen make sense as a store of energy? (2) Will the various companies pushing hydrogen be financially succe

There are two separate questions here. (1) Does hydrogen make sense as a store of energy? (2) Will the various companies pushing hydrogen be financially successful in the medium term? I think the answer to (1) is pretty clearly "no". But That doesn't strongly imply that the answer to (2) will also be "no". I can picture a world where hydrogen companies use hype to get funding, then use funding the get subsidies, then use subsidies to get more hype and install more infrastructure and generally push the concept to adoption. When big subsidies or externalities are on the table, it's very easy for the social/info/misinfo side of things to win and for the whole economy to do something stupid for 50 years. See, e.g., smoking, leaded petrol, nuclear power, etc. As for why it doesn't make sense: hydrogen has essentially the same performance as batteries in terms of the car itself, but lower overall efficiency. So it costs you more energy, and it is less convenient because hydrogen requires a gas station whereas electricity doesn't.