√New Toyota boss doubles down on hydrogen and electric cars
Amid the surge in electric vehicles, the world’s biggest car maker is looking further down the road at hydrogen power to supplement its range of upcoming eco options.
Japanese car giant Toyota is doubling down on hydrogen and electric power as it looks further down the road at future environmentally-friendly vehicles.
Koji Sato – who will succeed Akio Toyoda as Toyota’s CEO on April 1 – has told Automotive News hydrogen-powered vehicles remain a “viable option” for carbon-neutral motoring, despite most automakers investing heavily in electric cars.
“We want to ensure that hydrogen stays a viable option,” Mr Sato told Automotive News south-east Asian correspondent, Hans Greimel.
“We need a production and transport supply chain. Unless we see evolution there, we cannot expect a volume increase in the energy’s use.”
MORE: Toyota boss says other industry executives secretly doubt the switch to electric power
According to Automotive News, Toyota has aligned itself with industrial giant Kawasaki Heavy Industries – which builds carrier ships for liquid hydrogen – and energy company Iwatani Corporation to provide better infrastructure for hydrogen-powered cars in Japan when the vehicles become more widely available.
As well as being the world’s largest car-maker by volume, Toyota has been one of the biggest supporters of hydrogen-powered vehicles, while also being critical of the mass adoption of electric cars.
The Toyota Mirai – which uses hydrogen to generate electricity in a fuel cell, powering an electric motor – has been produced across two generations since 2014, while the company has also been developing petrol engines to run on hydrogen fuel.
Since early 2021, Toyota has unveiled a number of prototype cars powered by petrol engines which have been converted to run on hydrogen, both as a gas and liquid – producing almost no emissions from the exhaust pipe.
Despite its insistence on hydrogen cars as a carbon-neutral alternative to electric vehicles, Toyota is yet to publicly announce plans for its future hydrogen-powered model range, with Mr Sato telling Automotive News “we don’t have a very specific business goal at this time.”
Toyota’s scepticism of a switch to solely electric cars is contrasted by its plans to sell 3.5 million battery-powered vehicles worldwide in 2030, with 12 new models to be launched before the end of the decade.
The post New Toyota boss doubles down on hydrogen and electric cars appeared first on Drive.
Post a Comment for "√New Toyota boss doubles down on hydrogen and electric cars"