14 ms·

Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai has experienced rapid depreciation

173 points by iancmceachern 8mo ago

sremani 8mo ago
I once did some research on Mirai and found at that time Plano, TX where Toyota NA is Headquartered did not have a Hydrogen station. Not sure if they have one now. It is such a limited car and because of the infrastructure stuck to LA and San Diego, I guess. Pure range is 500+ miles but not many Hydrogen stations.
giancarlostoro 8mo ago
This is one of those cars that's interesting to me, but I don't know that we'll ever go this route in a significant amount. Problem is how complex it is to create hydrogen, although 'green hydrogen' is a thing, it would take quite a bit regardless. Interesting to note that if we could extract only 2% of the hydrogen burried under the earth, we could power the entire world for over 200 years. Which is crazy to think about. The other interesting thing about these cars is the output is water out of the tailpipe.
- pjc50 8mo ago
  It's very easy to create hydrogen from fossil natural gas. Which is the real motivation behind 99% of H2 projects; continue to emit CO2, just hidden from the end user. Battery electric is now pretty much inevitable.
  - pfdietz 8mo ago
    In fairness, hydrogen from gas would enable the CO2 to be sequestered. If the vehicle itself burned the natural gas that would require recapturing the CO2 from the atmosphere itself, which is much more challenging. None of this is to detract from the attractiveness of battery vehicles.
    - pjc50 8mo ago
      Carbon sequestration is another of those "if we did this, it might solve the problem, but there's no serious move to do it and pay for it on the scale required, plus it's prone to cheating".
  - 2muchcoffeeman 8mo ago
    How do you solve aeronautical and maritime applications?
    - danhor 8mo ago
      Certainly not with hydrogen directly. It might be involved in the production chain, but it's such a pain. If it's at all possible to electrify, that'll very likely win. For flights, a combination of batteries for smaller, regional planes starting with "islands hoppers" now and SAF from either Biofuel or produced from Electricity (with Hydrogen as an intermediate step). Although I think that we might first see moves to reduce the 2x non CO2 Climate Impacts which can be much cheaper to tackle (such as Contrails). For maritime applications, batteries when regularly near ports, probably hybrids with methanol for cross-ocean passage far away from coasts.
    - fsh 8mo ago
      Hydrogen is not great for airplanes since the extremely low density makes the tanks too large. The best solution would be synthetic hydrocarbons (synthesized using hydrogen) which can outperform fossil jet fuel.
    - pjc50 8mo ago
      The Toyota Mirai neither flies nor floats. There's a bit of a movement for battery electric ships, but currently limited to short haul ferries. I have a suspicion this simply won't be "solved" for quite some time after car and heating electrification.
- mono442 8mo ago
  It's possible to create hydrogen from coal and carbon capture is supposed to be feasible. Though I don't know how commercially viable this is.
  - peterfirefly 8mo ago
    Carbon doesn't really contain all that much hydrogen. Feasibility is key. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1GSV2kVkO1w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1GSV2kVkO1w
    - pfdietz 8mo ago
      > Carbon doesn't really contain all that much hydrogen. The hydrogen also comes from water reacted (mildly endothermically) with carbon, and by further reaction of carbon monoxide with water. C + H2O --> CO + H2 CO + H2O --> CO2 + H2
- Rohansi 8mo ago
  Creating hydrogen isn't the only problem. Storage and transportation is a big one since it is an actual gas instead of a liquid. Needs to be compressed, causes embrittlement, highly flammable, etc...
helterskelter 8mo ago
I've seen exactly one of these in person while in San Diego for a month or so. I never did see a fueling station for it though.
- kotaKat 8mo ago
  There's only... well, 51 of them. If you're lucky, you're near one of the 42 that are actually online and available for fueling (as of this comment). Stations running out of fuel and stations going offline for hardware failures runs rampant. Oh, and some stations might not be able to provide the highest pressure H2, so you might be stuck taking an 85% tank fill... and at nearly $30/kg and a 5.6kg (full) tank, that's an expensive fill. https://h2-ca.com/ https://h2-ca.com/
  - peterfirefly 8mo ago
    And they are not even supposed to explode anymore!
wlesieutre 8mo ago
It’s not really fair to compare depreciation against MSRP when they were being sold new at massive discounts. You could’ve gotten one of these for $40,000 off. https://www.carscoops.com/2024/02/toyota-offers-crazy-40k-discount-on-67k-mirai-fcv-but-can-you-live-with-a-hydrogen-car/ https://www.carscoops.com/2024/02/toyota-offers-crazy-40k-di...
- appcustodian2 8mo ago
  It's extremely fair to compare depreciation against MSRP. What's not fair is to say that they were being "sold new at massive discounts" when in reality it's an asterisk-ridden rebate process that applied to one model year under specific circumstances. That article was spam when it was written, can you provide a first party source for these massive discounts?
  - Aurornis 8mo ago
    Depreciation is measured against the price someone actually paid. The MSRP doesn’t matter. The S stands for suggested.
- stetrain 8mo ago
  This is a source of a lot of similar press around EV depreciation. They compare the MSRP of an EV 3 years ago with the current used market price, ignoring that the actual price paid is often significantly less due a combination of discounts, tax credits, and rebates.
  - cosmic_cheese 8mo ago
    The part that's interesting to me is how much the depreciation is posed as negative rather than positive. The long term value of a car is only really relevant if one is constantly cycling through cars and needs the trade-in/resale value. If a car isn't viewed as an investment and/or the intention is to drive it into the ground, depreciation is purely positive because it means that there's insanely good deals on some great cars right now. Of course everybody's needs are different, but for a lot of people there's nothing that comes remotely close of the value of a gently driven, practically new 1-3 year old lease return EV.
themafia 8mo ago
In the US. How does their value fare in Japan?
- decimalenough 8mo ago
  Given the complete collapse in sales last year (-83% to 432 units, in a market of over 4M cars sold), I'd venture to guess they're faring pretty badly. https://www.automotiveworld.com/news/fcev-sales-in-japan-fall-83-as-refuelling-stations-close/ https://www.automotiveworld.com/news/fcev-sales-in-japan-fal...
- numpad0 8mo ago
  https://www.carsensor.net/usedcar/bTO/s235/index.html https://www.carsensor.net/usedcar/bTO/s235/index.html
LTL_FTC 8mo ago
Toyota restricted the sale of its hydrogen fuel cell vehicles to specific, qualified customers who lived or worked near existing, functional hydrogen refueling stations. I remember looking into them when first released but realized I wasn’t eligible and the fact that Toyota restricted the sale meant there was a huge risk in buying them. With all the recent outrage and lawsuits, I wonder how many buyers actually did their due diligence and weighed the risk before committing to them? Or maybe the huge fuel subsidy was seen as a win even if this event played out? Idk but I commend Toyota for taking the risk and going for it. Edit: typo
- decimalenough 8mo ago
  Approximately zero regular consumers purchased hydrogen cars. They were all fleet purchases designed primarily to publish burnish eco-friendly credentials, like this: "This new initiative reinforces Air Liquide's commitment to decarbonizing transportation and accelerating the shift toward sustainable and low-carbon mobility solutions." https://www.airliquide.com/group/press-releases-news/2025-11-17/air-liquide-integrates-first-hydrogen-powered-trucks-its-logistics-netherlands https://www.airliquide.com/group/press-releases-news/2025-11... Of course, Air Liquide would also profit massively from building hydrogen infra if it did become commonplace.
  - kotaKat 8mo ago
    Funny thing, Air Liquide. They were going to build a massive green hydrogen plant in upstate NY and backed out when the tax credits disappeared... https://www.airproducts.com/company/news-center/2025/02/0224-air-products-to-exit-three-us-based-projects https://www.airproducts.com/company/news-center/2025/02/0224...
    - Aurornis 8mo ago
      > and backed out when the tax credits disappeared... As they should. If the terms of the deal change, you need to start over with the business case and financials. If you want someone to be mad at, it’s the politicians making these bad tax credit decisions. Not the companies trying to respond to the tax credit incentives. Getting companies to build things they otherwise wouldn’t is the entire purpose of tax credits.
BadBadJellyBean 8mo ago
I don't think hydrogen will ever be a thing for personal cars. Apart from the abysmal "well to wheel" efficiency it's also just such a hassle to create a fuel network for it. Gasoline is bad enough but a gas that will just leak away whatever you do seems like a stretch. It is just so much simpler with electricity. Pretty much every gas station already has it. No driving it around with trucks. Just maybe once install a bigger cable or a battery/capacitor.
- bombcar 8mo ago
  My understanding is most hydrogen fueling stations produce the hydrogen onsite via electrolysis of water. EDIT: My understanding was wrong - it's produced locally onsite but via steam-methane reforming: https://www.energy.gov/eere/fuelcells/hydrogen-production-natural-gas-reforming https://www.energy.gov/eere/fuelcells/hydrogen-production-na...
  - hvb2 8mo ago
    If you can do that at a meaningful rate you might as well install ev charging and just not electrolyse when cars are charging
    - b112 8mo ago
      He didn't say it doesn't have local tanks. Only that it makes h2 local. You can still make h2 to replenish, and have storage. This is akin to how almost all power used to charge cars, is not-green. For example, there are still Ng, coal, and other types of power plants. If cars switched to gas, instead of electric charging, then some of those could be shut down. But the true point, is as we convert to more and more solar, we'll eventually shut down the last of the fossil fuel burner plants, and eventually the cars will all be green power sourced. Same with h2. Getting non-polling cars out the door and into people's hands, is key. Eventually, where the power comes from will be clean. And really, we're already having issues with power infra, even before AI, so re-purposing Ng pipelines for H2 would be a great thing.
      - 8mo ago
haunter 8mo ago
Beautiful car but for example I live in Hungary and there is a grand total of one charging station in the whole coutry in Budapest. Yes it's free to charge but probably only makes sense to get a Mirai if you are a Bolt or Uber driver. Nice tech demo though. Here is the european charging station map https://h2.live/en/ https://h2.live/en/ Benelux countries, Switzerland, and the Ruhr area are most likely the best places to own this car
joecool1029 8mo ago
Why was it made? I ask because GM’s EV-1 was discussed earlier and it basically existed due to California’s zero-emission requirement in the 90’s. Is this just Toyota doing some random R&D while fulfilling a state minimum requirement?
- testing22321 8mo ago
  To trick people into thinking hydrogen cars are the future so they don’t buy an EV now. I’ve driven my own vehicles through 65 countries on 5 continents, and even the most remote villages in Africa and South America had electricity of some form. I’ve never seen a hydrogen filling station in my life. The idea we can build out that infrastructure faster than bolster the electric grid is laughably stupid. Downright deceptive.
  - sieabahlpark 8mo ago
    [dead]
  - avidiax 8mo ago
    I think there's some truth to this. Toyota desperately needs the future to play to their strengths, something more complicated than EVs, which I think is behind their obsession with hybrids. Not sure that a fuel cell vehicle isn't just an EV with extra steps, however.
- numpad0 8mo ago
  I think that + it's an EV that Toyota don't have to source the battery cells. FCEVs are full EVs just like Tesla, that uses a different kind of battery than Li-ion.
  - beAbU 8mo ago
    The latest model comes with a li-ion battery pack. Previous model had Nimh cells I think.
    - 8mo ago
deleted 8mo ago
[deleted]
SilverElfin 8mo ago
I still feel hydrogen fuel cells are the better choice. The convenience of refilling quickly is great. Maybe that’ll matter less if PHEVs are allowed to exist but with some places banning gas cars entirely, I don’t have hope.
- elsonrodriguez 8mo ago
  The inefficiency of creating, transporting, and converting hydrogen into motion is way too much to bear for the purpose of eliminating a 45 minute charging stop.
- audunw 8mo ago
  The convenience of filling is only there if you have the fuel stations. Considering how expensive it is I’d argue that it’s far better to spend that money on EV charging infrastructure, you get a lot more bang for gour buck. And EVs are arguable significantly more convenient when you have the infrastructure. Would you buy a phone that lasted a week or two, but you had to go to a phone filling station to refill it? And yes, EVs can be more convenient also for street parking. It’s just an infrastructure problem and by now there are dozens of different solutions for every parking situation imaginable. It’s frankly absurd reading debates about this online from Norway. It’s over. Yeah Norway has money and cheap electricity, that’s what makes it possible to “speed run” the technology transition. But other than that it’s a worst case scenario for EVs. Lots of people with only street parking in Oslo. Winter that’s brutal on range. People who love to drive hours and hours to their cabin every weekend. With skis on the roof. Part of schengen so people drive all the way down to croatia in summer. We gave EVs and Hydrogen cars the same chance. Same benefits. EVs won. End of story. Though a hydrogen station near me blew up in a spectacularly loud explosion so maybe that makes me a bit biased.
- SideburnsOfDoom 8mo ago
  > The convenience of refilling quickly is great. Is it more convenient than plugging in an EV overnight at home, and having a full "tank" every morning? It is not. Electricity supply is everywhere. More so than Gasoline supply, and far far more so than hydrogen supply.
- 8mo ago
constantcrying 8mo ago
When comparing EVs to hydrogen cars it is very obvious that one is the superior solution. An EV is a clear simplification of an ICE. Add a Battery and replace the mechanical complexity of a combustion engine with a relatively simple electric motor. So many components are now unnecessary and so many problems just go away. EVs also make charging simpler. Hydrogen cars on the other hand are very complex and also quite inefficient, requiring many steps to go from hydrogen generation to motor movement. And they require a very sophisticated network of charging infrastructure, which has to deal with an explosive gas at high pressures. Something which is dangerous even in highly controlled industrial environments. I just do not see a single reason why hydrogen cars would catch on. EVs are good already and come with many benefits.
- glitchc 8mo ago
  > An EV is a clear simplification of an ICE. Add a Battery and replace the mechanical complexity of a combustion engine with a relatively simple electric motor. So many components are now unnecessary and so many problems just go away. EVs also make charging simpler. Is it? Then why isn't it cheaper to produce and cheaper to own? > Hydrogen cars on the other hand are very complex and also quite inefficient, requiring many steps to go from hydrogen generation to motor movement. And they require a very sophisticated network of charging infrastructure, which has to deal with an explosive gas at high pressures. Something which is dangerous even in highly controlled industrial environments. It's a standard combustion engine, nothing special.
  - mjamesaustin 8mo ago
    EVs are cheaper to own – the fuel savings are enormous. EVs aren't cheaper to produce yet, but battery costs are still falling and they will reach parity with ICE vehicles soon.
    - bdangubic 8mo ago
      EVs are so much more cheaper to own that it is difficult to explain to people who own ICE cars as they, in majority of cases, just cannot comprehend it
aunty_helen 8mo ago
Kinda glad this is the case. When people go out of their way to avoid common sense they should be punished. Hydrogen is such a terrible idea it was never getting off the ground. There seems to be some kind of psychosis around it being the next oil and therefore greedy people want to get in early on. But this blinds them to the basic chemistry and physics.
- marcosdumay 8mo ago
  > There seems to be some kind of psychosis around it being the next oil There's a very well financed propaganda campaign.
  - pjc50 8mo ago
    Yes, it's not the new oil, it's the same oil in "green" packaging. Plus some comforting lies about carbon capture.
    - aunty_helen 8mo ago
      Even if it was fully green, you can’t run an electrolysis system from home. So you have to buy it, so there’s a market and an expensive solution. Electricity comes out the wall.
      - thrownthatway 8mo ago
        What do you mean? You can run electrolysis from a cup.
        aunty_helen 8mo ago
        I know, I have one of those weird H shaped flasks with the plat electrodes. I also have a gas bbq, yet couldn't fill up a LNG car at my house. Maybe there's something more to it than just making small amounts of room temperature / pressure H2.
        8mo ago
alexose 8mo ago
I've always been fascinated with these things. Is there any way to make your own H2 to fuel them? I suspect the purity requirements are too high for at-home electrolysis...
retired 8mo ago
Cheapest second generation Mirai I could find is €9950 including VAT. It has scuffs all-round but no major or structural damage. Only 103k km. This was a €71,000 car four years ago. That is 86% of the value gone. And you were driving around on very expensive hydrogen (compared to diesel and BEV).
- vel0city 8mo ago
  > And you were driving around on very expensive hydrogen That original owner was probably doing all those miles on the free hydrogen given by Toyota.
  - retired 8mo ago
    That program was not available in my region
empathy_m 8mo ago
At one point recently the Mirai came with a fuel incentive program: when you buy the car, Toyota gives you a gift card worth $15,000 towards fuel at hydrogen stations. An interesting second part of the program was that if you live near a hydrogen station but it's broken, Toyota will instead reimburse a rental car and gas for the rental, one week at a time but presumably for as long the hydrogen fuel station remains broken.
- kccqzy 8mo ago
  $15,000 worth of fuel card sounds generous until you find that hydrogen stations have jacked up prices to $36/kg.
  - smcin 8mo ago
    Full tank capacity of a Mirai is ~5 kg / (120 liters in volume).
  - stbtrax 8mo ago
    still means nothing, what is the mileage or $/mi there?
    - ErroneousBosh 8mo ago
      Apparently 1kg of hydrogen is about 60 miles range, which seems like a lot, but apparently fuel cells are that good. Currently hydrogen fuel if you can get it is about 15 quid a kilo in the UK, giving a tank range of around 400 miles for £80. This makes it a little more expensive than diesel, considerably more expensive than petrol, and roughly the same price as electric. By comparison Autogas LPG is around 92p/litre (or about £1.80 per kilo) and in a very large heavy 4.6 litre Range Rover you get around 250-300 miles for your £80 tankful, depending on how heavy your right foot is.
      - foota 8mo ago
        > This makes it a little more expensive than diesel, considerably more expensive than petrol, and roughly the same price as electric Is electric charging more expensive in the UK than petrol? That's nuts.
whatever1 8mo ago
Not that much worse than an ev.
- vel0city 8mo ago
  Used models for my five year old EV are still selling for ~50% of what I paid for, so no, its far worse than most EVs.
  - whatever1 8mo ago
    Looking at Ford Mach-E. I don't see the number you are seeing. I can find 2024 Mach-E 50% off its MSRP.
    - vel0city 8mo ago
      Looking at 2021 Mach E Premiums around me in good shape and normal mileage, most are ~$22k. The car was originally $49k MSRP. So ~45% retained value, I rounded. Mea culpa. But when you factor in that the original owner really got it for $7,500+ in rebates that's more like 52% of retained value. So the truth is really somewhere in between. 2024's around me are listed around $34-36k. MSRP was $47k. Didn't qualify for federal rebates. 34/47 is 72% of retained value, a loss of 28%. Also a 2024 model year is two model years old not one. That's far from 65% lost value.
sksasi 8mo ago
A full tank would cost $200 for about 300-350 mile range.
oceanplexian 8mo ago
If you think depreciation on a few cars is bad wait until you find out how many hundreds of millions taxpayers spent to build hydrogen stations for cars that don’t exist. At least it’s not as blatant of a green energy scam as the high speed rail to nowhere. In this case they actually built a few stations that worked.
stevenhubertron 8mo ago
Cars are not investments.
- 1970-01-01 8mo ago
  Depends on the car. Some are so special they will have a better ROI than your retirement plan. https://www.myartbroker.com/investing/articles/top-10-most-investable-cars https://www.myartbroker.com/investing/articles/top-10-most-i...
dehrmann 8mo ago
It's got the EV problem, but 100x worse. No only do you have to worry about where to find a place to refuel, there are far fewer of them, and level 1 charging isn't a fallback. It also doesn't have the EV upsides.
some-guy 8mo ago
I lived a block away from a hydrogen fuel station in Oakland, and in the ten years I was there I maybe saw two different Mirais use it.
swifferfan 8mo ago
Obligatory paper - Does a Hydrogen Economy Make Sense? (2006) https://alpha.chem.umb.edu/chemistry/ch471/evans%20files/Proceedings%20of%20the%20IEEE%202006%20Bossel.pdf https://alpha.chem.umb.edu/chemistry/ch471/evans%20files/Pro... Nothing fundamental has changed in the last 2 decades to refute the arguments Bossel made in 2006.
dizhn 8mo ago
According to some youtube (doomer) videos I watched a lot of EVs and luxury cars also had this kind of depreciation lately.
GregDavidson 8mo ago
This technology is completely amazing - for large fleet vehicles like buses, trucks, ferries, etc. Also airplanes! Getting this so compact and refined is a technological miracle. Now put it where it fits!
- throwaway473825 8mo ago
  Buses are already largely electric (with the US as a notable exception), and trucks are quickly getting there: https://www.electrive.com/2026/01/23/year-end-surge-electric-trucks-outsell-diesel-for-the-first-time-in-china/ https://www.electrive.com/2026/01/23/year-end-surge-electric... Meanwhile, hydrogen trucks are nowhere to be found...
- dyauspitr 8mo ago
  A huge tank of hydrogen is a bomb. This isn’t like gasoline that takes a lot to ignite.
seltzered_ 8mo ago
Theres something clickbaity and missing from this article, I encourage watching youtubers like 'mirai club' for better info. What i recall from his videos is: - The Mirai made financial sense AS A LEASE for folks in Southern California back in 2022 (possibly 2023) because: - Car prices in general (including EVs) were fairly highly priced at the time due to demand, the chip shortage, etc. - There were clean vehicle incentives to get a Toyota Mirai, including things like a hydrogen fuel fill up card to cover expenses. - At the time there was some assumptions that hydrogen fuel costs would go down over time, but they actually went up. Again, I suspect most folks LEASED the Mirai due to it being a very niche car with limited usage outside of california due to the lack of hydrogen fuel stations. Youre now seeing some viral videos on the ultra low cost used Mirai's showing up in states that dont have hydrogen infrastructure due to some odd car dealer auction buys (Transport Evolved has a youtube video on this.) The article does talk about the lack of investment in hydrogen infrastructure, this is true and theres been a huge split between announced infrastructure investments and what has actually happened (see https://bsky.app/profile/janrosenow.bsky.social/post/3labfzivnoy2z https://bsky.app/profile/janrosenow.bsky.social/post/3labfzi... for a chart going through 2021-2024). The current US political situation and its impact on clean energy probably doesn't help either.
- jjtheblunt 8mo ago
  The Mirai was _only_ available as a lease, back in the 2018 timeframe anyway, in Southern California.
- haneul 8mo ago
  There were also really good financing deals during Covid. Net for me after all costs after resale was $1k for the years I owned the car (the 2nd gen). But I got in near the bottom and got out before the market for it dumped.
HoldOnAMinute 8mo ago
The last time I checked local ads, they were giving these cars away free, and you could get a tax deduction. They were paying you to take it.
pazimzadeh 8mo ago
This article is too long because it's written by a llm
jacquesm 8mo ago
You only see Mirais within spitting distance of the one place where they can tank. The network just isn't developed to the point that owning one of these makes any sense at all.
cryptoegorophy 8mo ago
Sorry. EVs won.
decryption 8mo ago
I'm surprised it's only 65%. There's hardly anywhere to fuel these things up and the price of hydrogen isn't exactly a bargain.
bitmasher9 8mo ago
Hydrogen fuel solves a long term strategic problem for Japan, which is why the Mirai got as far as it did. Japan imports energy. They have to be very careful about which type of energy they build infrastructure for, because they must pay to import that type of energy for decades or centuries. (LNG vs Coal use very different equipment) This is specifically a strategic problem for Japan compared to other energy importers because they both use a lot of energy, and don’t have a military option to secure a foreign supply. Hydrogen fuel could be created by almost any energy source and then used just like any other fuel source. Ideally Japan would like to pay energy exporters to convert their energy to Hydrogen so Japan has maximum flexibility when importing energy. Projects like the Mirai exist as proof of concepts for Hydrogen, and the United States was never going to be an early widespread adopter of this technology.
- alephnerd 8mo ago
  ^^^ This. But Japan has also been heavily investing in solid state batteries, whose supply chain Idemetsu Kosan and Toyota have begun to productionize [0]. The Japanese government made a decision in the early 2000s to make a dual-pronged bet on Hydrogen and solid-state battery chemistry because they lacked the supply chain and a legal method to access IP for lithium ion batteries. On the other hand, Samsung and LG got the license for Li-On back during the NMC days, and BYD was able to piggyback on Samsung and Berkshire's IP access when both took growth equity stakes in BYD decades ago. Another reason that a lot of people overlook is the Hydrogen supply chain overlaps heavily with the supply chain needed to domestically produce nitrogen-fixing fertilizers which is heavily concentrated in a handful of countries (especially Russia with whom Japan has had a border dispute with since the end of WW2) [1]. [0] - https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/idemitsu-build-pilot-solid-electrolyte-plant-toyotas-evs-2026-01-29/ https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/idemitsu-build-pi... [1] - https://www.fas.usda.gov/data/impacts-and-repercussions-price-increases-global-fertilizer-market https://www.fas.usda.gov/data/impacts-and-repercussions-pric...
- jillesvangurp 8mo ago
  Japan has a lot of potential for wind and geothermal power. And much of it isn't too bad for solar either. The madness with hydrogen in Japan is that they produce most of it from imported LNG. If they'd solve domestic clean energy, they'd have no need for hydrogen in transport. EVs are a lot more efficient than hydrogen vehicles. So they'd need a lot less clean energy to power those. Japan is slowly and belatedly figuring out that physics and economics just won't favor hydrogen, ever. The Mirai is an exercise in futility. It doesn't make any economic sense whatsoever. It never has. Toyota at this point is grudgingly producing more EVs per quarter than it ever produced hydrogen vehicles (in total). They only sell a few hundred per year at this point. The only reason they still make them at all is because they are being subsidized to do that.
killingtime74 8mo ago
I went to the Toyota museum where they actually have one of these cars as a cross section. I would never drive one. It's like driving around with a massive bomb under the rear seat. Forget thermal runway from batteries, I wonder how big the crater of the explosion from one these would be.
- sandworm101 8mo ago
  Safer than liquid fuel. There are videos out there of what a leak+fire looks like on a hydrogen and gasoline car. You would rather be trapped in the hydrogen car. https://youtu.be/OA8dNFiVaF0 https://youtu.be/OA8dNFiVaF0
m463 8mo ago
It's really simple. 1 Kg of hydrogen is SUPER EXPENSIVE (equivalent ~ 1 gallon of gas) $17/gallong when I looked at the pumps When the Mirai first came out, owners didn't care because the fuel was free. But after that ended, they had to buy it for themselves. who wants to pay that? (also, stations weren't plentiful like EV chargers, and even though you could fill up faster than an EV charge, who cares when you can't go very far (distance-wise from home).
ycui1986 8mo ago
the reality is no where to get the fuel. hydrogen stations are shutting down not building up.
m4rtink 8mo ago
It looks like Mirai has no future after all... I am sorry. ;-)
elzbardico 8mo ago
Toyota should have bought a page from pre-brain-damage Elon Musk's book and built a nationwide hydrogen-fueling infra-structure. Teslas may not be anymore the future of EVs, but we can't deny that by building the Power Charger infrastructure, Tesla gave consumers the confidence to buy an EV knowing that it wouldn't be basically a geofenced vehicle.
unixhero 8mo ago
Hydrogen gas-stations have blown up in the past https://www.nrk.no/norge/eksplosjon-ved-hydrogenstasjon-1.14582914 https://www.nrk.no/norge/eksplosjon-ved-hydrogenstasjon-1.14...

173 points by iancmceachern 8mo ago

I once did some research on Mirai and found at that time Plano, TX where Toyota NA is Headquartered did not have a Hydrogen station. Not sure if they have one now. It is such a limited car and because of the infrastructure stuck to LA and San Diego, I guess. Pure range is 500+ miles but not many Hydrogen stations.

giancarlostoro 8mo ago

This is one of those cars that's interesting to me, but I don't know that we'll ever go this route in a significant amount. Problem is how complex it is to create hydrogen, although 'green hydrogen' is a thing, it would take quite a bit regardless. Interesting to note that if we could extract only 2% of the hydrogen burried under the earth, we could power the entire world for over 200 years. Which is crazy to think about. The other interesting thing about these cars is the output is water out of the tailpipe.

pjc50 8mo ago
It's very easy to create hydrogen from fossil natural gas. Which is the real motivation behind 99% of H2 projects; continue to emit CO2, just hidden from the end user. Battery electric is now pretty much inevitable.
- pfdietz 8mo ago
  In fairness, hydrogen from gas would enable the CO2 to be sequestered. If the vehicle itself burned the natural gas that would require recapturing the CO2 from the atmosphere itself, which is much more challenging. None of this is to detract from the attractiveness of battery vehicles.
  - pjc50 8mo ago
    Carbon sequestration is another of those "if we did this, it might solve the problem, but there's no serious move to do it and pay for it on the scale required, plus it's prone to cheating".
- 2muchcoffeeman 8mo ago
  How do you solve aeronautical and maritime applications?
  - danhor 8mo ago
    Certainly not with hydrogen directly. It might be involved in the production chain, but it's such a pain. If it's at all possible to electrify, that'll very likely win. For flights, a combination of batteries for smaller, regional planes starting with "islands hoppers" now and SAF from either Biofuel or produced from Electricity (with Hydrogen as an intermediate step). Although I think that we might first see moves to reduce the 2x non CO2 Climate Impacts which can be much cheaper to tackle (such as Contrails). For maritime applications, batteries when regularly near ports, probably hybrids with methanol for cross-ocean passage far away from coasts.
  - fsh 8mo ago
    Hydrogen is not great for airplanes since the extremely low density makes the tanks too large. The best solution would be synthetic hydrocarbons (synthesized using hydrogen) which can outperform fossil jet fuel.
  - pjc50 8mo ago
    The Toyota Mirai neither flies nor floats. There's a bit of a movement for battery electric ships, but currently limited to short haul ferries. I have a suspicion this simply won't be "solved" for quite some time after car and heating electrification.
mono442 8mo ago
It's possible to create hydrogen from coal and carbon capture is supposed to be feasible. Though I don't know how commercially viable this is.
- peterfirefly 8mo ago
  Carbon doesn't really contain all that much hydrogen. Feasibility is key. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1GSV2kVkO1w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1GSV2kVkO1w
  - pfdietz 8mo ago
    > Carbon doesn't really contain all that much hydrogen. The hydrogen also comes from water reacted (mildly endothermically) with carbon, and by further reaction of carbon monoxide with water. C + H2O --> CO + H2 CO + H2O --> CO2 + H2
Rohansi 8mo ago
Creating hydrogen isn't the only problem. Storage and transportation is a big one since it is an actual gas instead of a liquid. Needs to be compressed, causes embrittlement, highly flammable, etc...

helterskelter 8mo ago

I've seen exactly one of these in person while in San Diego for a month or so. I never did see a fueling station for it though.

kotaKat 8mo ago
There's only... well, 51 of them. If you're lucky, you're near one of the 42 that are actually online and available for fueling (as of this comment). Stations running out of fuel and stations going offline for hardware failures runs rampant. Oh, and some stations might not be able to provide the highest pressure H2, so you might be stuck taking an 85% tank fill... and at nearly $30/kg and a 5.6kg (full) tank, that's an expensive fill. https://h2-ca.com/ https://h2-ca.com/
- peterfirefly 8mo ago
  And they are not even supposed to explode anymore!

wlesieutre 8mo ago

It’s not really fair to compare depreciation against MSRP when they were being sold new at massive discounts. You could’ve gotten one of these for $40,000 off. https://www.carscoops.com/2024/02/toyota-offers-crazy-40k-discount-on-67k-mirai-fcv-but-can-you-live-with-a-hydrogen-car/ https://www.carscoops.com/2024/02/toyota-offers-crazy-40k-di...

appcustodian2 8mo ago
It's extremely fair to compare depreciation against MSRP. What's not fair is to say that they were being "sold new at massive discounts" when in reality it's an asterisk-ridden rebate process that applied to one model year under specific circumstances. That article was spam when it was written, can you provide a first party source for these massive discounts?
- Aurornis 8mo ago
  Depreciation is measured against the price someone actually paid. The MSRP doesn’t matter. The S stands for suggested.
stetrain 8mo ago
This is a source of a lot of similar press around EV depreciation. They compare the MSRP of an EV 3 years ago with the current used market price, ignoring that the actual price paid is often significantly less due a combination of discounts, tax credits, and rebates.
- cosmic_cheese 8mo ago
  The part that's interesting to me is how much the depreciation is posed as negative rather than positive. The long term value of a car is only really relevant if one is constantly cycling through cars and needs the trade-in/resale value. If a car isn't viewed as an investment and/or the intention is to drive it into the ground, depreciation is purely positive because it means that there's insanely good deals on some great cars right now. Of course everybody's needs are different, but for a lot of people there's nothing that comes remotely close of the value of a gently driven, practically new 1-3 year old lease return EV.

themafia 8mo ago

In the US. How does their value fare in Japan?

decimalenough 8mo ago
Given the complete collapse in sales last year (-83% to 432 units, in a market of over 4M cars sold), I'd venture to guess they're faring pretty badly. https://www.automotiveworld.com/news/fcev-sales-in-japan-fall-83-as-refuelling-stations-close/ https://www.automotiveworld.com/news/fcev-sales-in-japan-fal...
numpad0 8mo ago
https://www.carsensor.net/usedcar/bTO/s235/index.html https://www.carsensor.net/usedcar/bTO/s235/index.html

LTL_FTC 8mo ago

Toyota restricted the sale of its hydrogen fuel cell vehicles to specific, qualified customers who lived or worked near existing, functional hydrogen refueling stations. I remember looking into them when first released but realized I wasn’t eligible and the fact that Toyota restricted the sale meant there was a huge risk in buying them. With all the recent outrage and lawsuits, I wonder how many buyers actually did their due diligence and weighed the risk before committing to them? Or maybe the huge fuel subsidy was seen as a win even if this event played out? Idk but I commend Toyota for taking the risk and going for it. Edit: typo

decimalenough 8mo ago
Approximately zero regular consumers purchased hydrogen cars. They were all fleet purchases designed primarily to publish burnish eco-friendly credentials, like this: "This new initiative reinforces Air Liquide's commitment to decarbonizing transportation and accelerating the shift toward sustainable and low-carbon mobility solutions." https://www.airliquide.com/group/press-releases-news/2025-11-17/air-liquide-integrates-first-hydrogen-powered-trucks-its-logistics-netherlands https://www.airliquide.com/group/press-releases-news/2025-11... Of course, Air Liquide would also profit massively from building hydrogen infra if it did become commonplace.
- kotaKat 8mo ago
  Funny thing, Air Liquide. They were going to build a massive green hydrogen plant in upstate NY and backed out when the tax credits disappeared... https://www.airproducts.com/company/news-center/2025/02/0224-air-products-to-exit-three-us-based-projects https://www.airproducts.com/company/news-center/2025/02/0224...
  - Aurornis 8mo ago
    > and backed out when the tax credits disappeared... As they should. If the terms of the deal change, you need to start over with the business case and financials. If you want someone to be mad at, it’s the politicians making these bad tax credit decisions. Not the companies trying to respond to the tax credit incentives. Getting companies to build things they otherwise wouldn’t is the entire purpose of tax credits.

BadBadJellyBean 8mo ago

I don't think hydrogen will ever be a thing for personal cars. Apart from the abysmal "well to wheel" efficiency it's also just such a hassle to create a fuel network for it. Gasoline is bad enough but a gas that will just leak away whatever you do seems like a stretch. It is just so much simpler with electricity. Pretty much every gas station already has it. No driving it around with trucks. Just maybe once install a bigger cable or a battery/capacitor.

bombcar 8mo ago
My understanding is most hydrogen fueling stations produce the hydrogen onsite via electrolysis of water. EDIT: My understanding was wrong - it's produced locally onsite but via steam-methane reforming: https://www.energy.gov/eere/fuelcells/hydrogen-production-natural-gas-reforming https://www.energy.gov/eere/fuelcells/hydrogen-production-na...
- hvb2 8mo ago
  If you can do that at a meaningful rate you might as well install ev charging and just not electrolyse when cars are charging
  - b112 8mo ago
    He didn't say it doesn't have local tanks. Only that it makes h2 local. You can still make h2 to replenish, and have storage. This is akin to how almost all power used to charge cars, is not-green. For example, there are still Ng, coal, and other types of power plants. If cars switched to gas, instead of electric charging, then some of those could be shut down. But the true point, is as we convert to more and more solar, we'll eventually shut down the last of the fossil fuel burner plants, and eventually the cars will all be green power sourced. Same with h2. Getting non-polling cars out the door and into people's hands, is key. Eventually, where the power comes from will be clean. And really, we're already having issues with power infra, even before AI, so re-purposing Ng pipelines for H2 would be a great thing.
    - 8mo ago

haunter 8mo ago

Beautiful car but for example I live in Hungary and there is a grand total of one charging station in the whole coutry in Budapest. Yes it's free to charge but probably only makes sense to get a Mirai if you are a Bolt or Uber driver. Nice tech demo though. Here is the european charging station map https://h2.live/en/ https://h2.live/en/ Benelux countries, Switzerland, and the Ruhr area are most likely the best places to own this car

joecool1029 8mo ago

Why was it made? I ask because GM’s EV-1 was discussed earlier and it basically existed due to California’s zero-emission requirement in the 90’s. Is this just Toyota doing some random R&D while fulfilling a state minimum requirement?

testing22321 8mo ago
To trick people into thinking hydrogen cars are the future so they don’t buy an EV now. I’ve driven my own vehicles through 65 countries on 5 continents, and even the most remote villages in Africa and South America had electricity of some form. I’ve never seen a hydrogen filling station in my life. The idea we can build out that infrastructure faster than bolster the electric grid is laughably stupid. Downright deceptive.
- sieabahlpark 8mo ago
  [dead]
- avidiax 8mo ago
  I think there's some truth to this. Toyota desperately needs the future to play to their strengths, something more complicated than EVs, which I think is behind their obsession with hybrids. Not sure that a fuel cell vehicle isn't just an EV with extra steps, however.
numpad0 8mo ago
I think that + it's an EV that Toyota don't have to source the battery cells. FCEVs are full EVs just like Tesla, that uses a different kind of battery than Li-ion.
- beAbU 8mo ago
  The latest model comes with a li-ion battery pack. Previous model had Nimh cells I think.
  - 8mo ago

deleted 8mo ago

[deleted]

SilverElfin 8mo ago

I still feel hydrogen fuel cells are the better choice. The convenience of refilling quickly is great. Maybe that’ll matter less if PHEVs are allowed to exist but with some places banning gas cars entirely, I don’t have hope.

elsonrodriguez 8mo ago
The inefficiency of creating, transporting, and converting hydrogen into motion is way too much to bear for the purpose of eliminating a 45 minute charging stop.
audunw 8mo ago
The convenience of filling is only there if you have the fuel stations. Considering how expensive it is I’d argue that it’s far better to spend that money on EV charging infrastructure, you get a lot more bang for gour buck. And EVs are arguable significantly more convenient when you have the infrastructure. Would you buy a phone that lasted a week or two, but you had to go to a phone filling station to refill it? And yes, EVs can be more convenient also for street parking. It’s just an infrastructure problem and by now there are dozens of different solutions for every parking situation imaginable. It’s frankly absurd reading debates about this online from Norway. It’s over. Yeah Norway has money and cheap electricity, that’s what makes it possible to “speed run” the technology transition. But other than that it’s a worst case scenario for EVs. Lots of people with only street parking in Oslo. Winter that’s brutal on range. People who love to drive hours and hours to their cabin every weekend. With skis on the roof. Part of schengen so people drive all the way down to croatia in summer. We gave EVs and Hydrogen cars the same chance. Same benefits. EVs won. End of story. Though a hydrogen station near me blew up in a spectacularly loud explosion so maybe that makes me a bit biased.
SideburnsOfDoom 8mo ago
> The convenience of refilling quickly is great. Is it more convenient than plugging in an EV overnight at home, and having a full "tank" every morning? It is not. Electricity supply is everywhere. More so than Gasoline supply, and far far more so than hydrogen supply.
8mo ago

constantcrying 8mo ago

When comparing EVs to hydrogen cars it is very obvious that one is the superior solution. An EV is a clear simplification of an ICE. Add a Battery and replace the mechanical complexity of a combustion engine with a relatively simple electric motor. So many components are now unnecessary and so many problems just go away. EVs also make charging simpler. Hydrogen cars on the other hand are very complex and also quite inefficient, requiring many steps to go from hydrogen generation to motor movement. And they require a very sophisticated network of charging infrastructure, which has to deal with an explosive gas at high pressures. Something which is dangerous even in highly controlled industrial environments. I just do not see a single reason why hydrogen cars would catch on. EVs are good already and come with many benefits.

glitchc 8mo ago
> An EV is a clear simplification of an ICE. Add a Battery and replace the mechanical complexity of a combustion engine with a relatively simple electric motor. So many components are now unnecessary and so many problems just go away. EVs also make charging simpler. Is it? Then why isn't it cheaper to produce and cheaper to own? > Hydrogen cars on the other hand are very complex and also quite inefficient, requiring many steps to go from hydrogen generation to motor movement. And they require a very sophisticated network of charging infrastructure, which has to deal with an explosive gas at high pressures. Something which is dangerous even in highly controlled industrial environments. It's a standard combustion engine, nothing special.
- mjamesaustin 8mo ago
  EVs are cheaper to own – the fuel savings are enormous. EVs aren't cheaper to produce yet, but battery costs are still falling and they will reach parity with ICE vehicles soon.
  - bdangubic 8mo ago
    EVs are so much more cheaper to own that it is difficult to explain to people who own ICE cars as they, in majority of cases, just cannot comprehend it

aunty_helen 8mo ago

Kinda glad this is the case. When people go out of their way to avoid common sense they should be punished. Hydrogen is such a terrible idea it was never getting off the ground. There seems to be some kind of psychosis around it being the next oil and therefore greedy people want to get in early on. But this blinds them to the basic chemistry and physics.

marcosdumay 8mo ago
> There seems to be some kind of psychosis around it being the next oil There's a very well financed propaganda campaign.
- pjc50 8mo ago
  Yes, it's not the new oil, it's the same oil in "green" packaging. Plus some comforting lies about carbon capture.
  - aunty_helen 8mo ago
    Even if it was fully green, you can’t run an electrolysis system from home. So you have to buy it, so there’s a market and an expensive solution. Electricity comes out the wall.
    - thrownthatway 8mo ago
      What do you mean? You can run electrolysis from a cup.
      - aunty_helen 8mo ago
        I know, I have one of those weird H shaped flasks with the plat electrodes. I also have a gas bbq, yet couldn't fill up a LNG car at my house. Maybe there's something more to it than just making small amounts of room temperature / pressure H2.
      - 8mo ago

alexose 8mo ago

I've always been fascinated with these things. Is there any way to make your own H2 to fuel them? I suspect the purity requirements are too high for at-home electrolysis...

retired 8mo ago

Cheapest second generation Mirai I could find is €9950 including VAT. It has scuffs all-round but no major or structural damage. Only 103k km. This was a €71,000 car four years ago. That is 86% of the value gone. And you were driving around on very expensive hydrogen (compared to diesel and BEV).

vel0city 8mo ago
> And you were driving around on very expensive hydrogen That original owner was probably doing all those miles on the free hydrogen given by Toyota.
- retired 8mo ago
  That program was not available in my region

empathy_m 8mo ago

At one point recently the Mirai came with a fuel incentive program: when you buy the car, Toyota gives you a gift card worth $15,000 towards fuel at hydrogen stations. An interesting second part of the program was that if you live near a hydrogen station but it's broken, Toyota will instead reimburse a rental car and gas for the rental, one week at a time but presumably for as long the hydrogen fuel station remains broken.

kccqzy 8mo ago
$15,000 worth of fuel card sounds generous until you find that hydrogen stations have jacked up prices to $36/kg.
- smcin 8mo ago
  Full tank capacity of a Mirai is ~5 kg / (120 liters in volume).
- stbtrax 8mo ago
  still means nothing, what is the mileage or $/mi there?
  - ErroneousBosh 8mo ago
    Apparently 1kg of hydrogen is about 60 miles range, which seems like a lot, but apparently fuel cells are that good. Currently hydrogen fuel if you can get it is about 15 quid a kilo in the UK, giving a tank range of around 400 miles for £80. This makes it a little more expensive than diesel, considerably more expensive than petrol, and roughly the same price as electric. By comparison Autogas LPG is around 92p/litre (or about £1.80 per kilo) and in a very large heavy 4.6 litre Range Rover you get around 250-300 miles for your £80 tankful, depending on how heavy your right foot is.
    - foota 8mo ago
      > This makes it a little more expensive than diesel, considerably more expensive than petrol, and roughly the same price as electric Is electric charging more expensive in the UK than petrol? That's nuts.

whatever1 8mo ago

Not that much worse than an ev.

vel0city 8mo ago
Used models for my five year old EV are still selling for ~50% of what I paid for, so no, its far worse than most EVs.
- whatever1 8mo ago
  Looking at Ford Mach-E. I don't see the number you are seeing. I can find 2024 Mach-E 50% off its MSRP.
  - vel0city 8mo ago
    Looking at 2021 Mach E Premiums around me in good shape and normal mileage, most are ~$22k. The car was originally $49k MSRP. So ~45% retained value, I rounded. Mea culpa. But when you factor in that the original owner really got it for $7,500+ in rebates that's more like 52% of retained value. So the truth is really somewhere in between. 2024's around me are listed around $34-36k. MSRP was $47k. Didn't qualify for federal rebates. 34/47 is 72% of retained value, a loss of 28%. Also a 2024 model year is two model years old not one. That's far from 65% lost value.

sksasi 8mo ago

A full tank would cost $200 for about 300-350 mile range.

oceanplexian 8mo ago

If you think depreciation on a few cars is bad wait until you find out how many hundreds of millions taxpayers spent to build hydrogen stations for cars that don’t exist. At least it’s not as blatant of a green energy scam as the high speed rail to nowhere. In this case they actually built a few stations that worked.

stevenhubertron 8mo ago

Cars are not investments.

1970-01-01 8mo ago
Depends on the car. Some are so special they will have a better ROI than your retirement plan. https://www.myartbroker.com/investing/articles/top-10-most-investable-cars https://www.myartbroker.com/investing/articles/top-10-most-i...

dehrmann 8mo ago

It's got the EV problem, but 100x worse. No only do you have to worry about where to find a place to refuel, there are far fewer of them, and level 1 charging isn't a fallback. It also doesn't have the EV upsides.

some-guy 8mo ago

I lived a block away from a hydrogen fuel station in Oakland, and in the ten years I was there I maybe saw two different Mirais use it.

swifferfan 8mo ago

Obligatory paper - Does a Hydrogen Economy Make Sense? (2006) https://alpha.chem.umb.edu/chemistry/ch471/evans%20files/Proceedings%20of%20the%20IEEE%202006%20Bossel.pdf https://alpha.chem.umb.edu/chemistry/ch471/evans%20files/Pro... Nothing fundamental has changed in the last 2 decades to refute the arguments Bossel made in 2006.

dizhn 8mo ago

According to some youtube (doomer) videos I watched a lot of EVs and luxury cars also had this kind of depreciation lately.

GregDavidson 8mo ago

This technology is completely amazing - for large fleet vehicles like buses, trucks, ferries, etc. Also airplanes! Getting this so compact and refined is a technological miracle. Now put it where it fits!

throwaway473825 8mo ago
Buses are already largely electric (with the US as a notable exception), and trucks are quickly getting there: https://www.electrive.com/2026/01/23/year-end-surge-electric-trucks-outsell-diesel-for-the-first-time-in-china/ https://www.electrive.com/2026/01/23/year-end-surge-electric... Meanwhile, hydrogen trucks are nowhere to be found...
dyauspitr 8mo ago
A huge tank of hydrogen is a bomb. This isn’t like gasoline that takes a lot to ignite.

seltzered_ 8mo ago

Theres something clickbaity and missing from this article, I encourage watching youtubers like 'mirai club' for better info. What i recall from his videos is: - The Mirai made financial sense AS A LEASE for folks in Southern California back in 2022 (possibly 2023) because: - Car prices in general (including EVs) were fairly highly priced at the time due to demand, the chip shortage, etc. - There were clean vehicle incentives to get a Toyota Mirai, including things like a hydrogen fuel fill up card to cover expenses. - At the time there was some assumptions that hydrogen fuel costs would go down over time, but they actually went up. Again, I suspect most folks LEASED the Mirai due to it being a very niche car with limited usage outside of california due to the lack of hydrogen fuel stations. Youre now seeing some viral videos on the ultra low cost used Mirai's showing up in states that dont have hydrogen infrastructure due to some odd car dealer auction buys (Transport Evolved has a youtube video on this.) The article does talk about the lack of investment in hydrogen infrastructure, this is true and theres been a huge split between announced infrastructure investments and what has actually happened (see https://bsky.app/profile/janrosenow.bsky.social/post/3labfzivnoy2z https://bsky.app/profile/janrosenow.bsky.social/post/3labfzi... for a chart going through 2021-2024). The current US political situation and its impact on clean energy probably doesn't help either.

jjtheblunt 8mo ago
The Mirai was _only_ available as a lease, back in the 2018 timeframe anyway, in Southern California.
haneul 8mo ago
There were also really good financing deals during Covid. Net for me after all costs after resale was $1k for the years I owned the car (the 2nd gen). But I got in near the bottom and got out before the market for it dumped.

HoldOnAMinute 8mo ago

The last time I checked local ads, they were giving these cars away free, and you could get a tax deduction. They were paying you to take it.

pazimzadeh 8mo ago

This article is too long because it's written by a llm

jacquesm 8mo ago

You only see Mirais within spitting distance of the one place where they can tank. The network just isn't developed to the point that owning one of these makes any sense at all.

cryptoegorophy 8mo ago

Sorry. EVs won.

decryption 8mo ago

I'm surprised it's only 65%. There's hardly anywhere to fuel these things up and the price of hydrogen isn't exactly a bargain.

bitmasher9 8mo ago

Hydrogen fuel solves a long term strategic problem for Japan, which is why the Mirai got as far as it did. Japan imports energy. They have to be very careful about which type of energy they build infrastructure for, because they must pay to import that type of energy for decades or centuries. (LNG vs Coal use very different equipment) This is specifically a strategic problem for Japan compared to other energy importers because they both use a lot of energy, and don’t have a military option to secure a foreign supply. Hydrogen fuel could be created by almost any energy source and then used just like any other fuel source. Ideally Japan would like to pay energy exporters to convert their energy to Hydrogen so Japan has maximum flexibility when importing energy. Projects like the Mirai exist as proof of concepts for Hydrogen, and the United States was never going to be an early widespread adopter of this technology.

alephnerd 8mo ago
^^^ This. But Japan has also been heavily investing in solid state batteries, whose supply chain Idemetsu Kosan and Toyota have begun to productionize [0]. The Japanese government made a decision in the early 2000s to make a dual-pronged bet on Hydrogen and solid-state battery chemistry because they lacked the supply chain and a legal method to access IP for lithium ion batteries. On the other hand, Samsung and LG got the license for Li-On back during the NMC days, and BYD was able to piggyback on Samsung and Berkshire's IP access when both took growth equity stakes in BYD decades ago. Another reason that a lot of people overlook is the Hydrogen supply chain overlaps heavily with the supply chain needed to domestically produce nitrogen-fixing fertilizers which is heavily concentrated in a handful of countries (especially Russia with whom Japan has had a border dispute with since the end of WW2) [1]. [0] - https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/idemitsu-build-pilot-solid-electrolyte-plant-toyotas-evs-2026-01-29/ https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/idemitsu-build-pi... [1] - https://www.fas.usda.gov/data/impacts-and-repercussions-price-increases-global-fertilizer-market https://www.fas.usda.gov/data/impacts-and-repercussions-pric...
jillesvangurp 8mo ago
Japan has a lot of potential for wind and geothermal power. And much of it isn't too bad for solar either. The madness with hydrogen in Japan is that they produce most of it from imported LNG. If they'd solve domestic clean energy, they'd have no need for hydrogen in transport. EVs are a lot more efficient than hydrogen vehicles. So they'd need a lot less clean energy to power those. Japan is slowly and belatedly figuring out that physics and economics just won't favor hydrogen, ever. The Mirai is an exercise in futility. It doesn't make any economic sense whatsoever. It never has. Toyota at this point is grudgingly producing more EVs per quarter than it ever produced hydrogen vehicles (in total). They only sell a few hundred per year at this point. The only reason they still make them at all is because they are being subsidized to do that.

killingtime74 8mo ago

I went to the Toyota museum where they actually have one of these cars as a cross section. I would never drive one. It's like driving around with a massive bomb under the rear seat. Forget thermal runway from batteries, I wonder how big the crater of the explosion from one these would be.

sandworm101 8mo ago
Safer than liquid fuel. There are videos out there of what a leak+fire looks like on a hydrogen and gasoline car. You would rather be trapped in the hydrogen car. https://youtu.be/OA8dNFiVaF0 https://youtu.be/OA8dNFiVaF0

m463 8mo ago

It's really simple. 1 Kg of hydrogen is SUPER EXPENSIVE (equivalent ~ 1 gallon of gas) $17/gallong when I looked at the pumps When the Mirai first came out, owners didn't care because the fuel was free. But after that ended, they had to buy it for themselves. who wants to pay that? (also, stations weren't plentiful like EV chargers, and even though you could fill up faster than an EV charge, who cares when you can't go very far (distance-wise from home).

ycui1986 8mo ago

the reality is no where to get the fuel. hydrogen stations are shutting down not building up.

m4rtink 8mo ago

It looks like Mirai has no future after all... I am sorry. ;-)

elzbardico 8mo ago

Toyota should have bought a page from pre-brain-damage Elon Musk's book and built a nationwide hydrogen-fueling infra-structure. Teslas may not be anymore the future of EVs, but we can't deny that by building the Power Charger infrastructure, Tesla gave consumers the confidence to buy an EV knowing that it wouldn't be basically a geofenced vehicle.

unixhero 8mo ago

Hydrogen gas-stations have blown up in the past https://www.nrk.no/norge/eksplosjon-ved-hydrogenstasjon-1.14582914 https://www.nrk.no/norge/eksplosjon-ved-hydrogenstasjon-1.14...