Hydrogen is the future fuel. Along with fuel cells, hydrogen offers a reliable carrier.

Since 1993, the prophets of the hydrogen economy have declared again and again that the technology already exists. Which left consumers to wonder, where’s the car and why am I still pumping unleaded? Well, the world can stop wondering. After 13 years of teasing announcements and endless talk, the era of the hydrogen fuel cell has finally arrived … sort of. Well, not exactly, but almost. Contrary to popular misconception, hydrogen fuel cells are not a new technology. In 1889, chemists Ludwig Mond and Charles Langer built the first device using oxygen and coal gas to produce power and water through a chemical reaction. But fuel cells were weak and fragile and complicated to make, and by the end of the 1800s it was clear that the internal combustion engine – that gas-chugging, smoke-belching scourge – was set to revolutionize every industry in the world. Marc Melaina, a professor at the University of California, Davis, has spent much of his academic career studying the economics of hydrogen transportation. The bottom line: it’s expensive but not impossible. “The fact that they’ve made improvements in vehicle performance is critical, but cost [reductions] also have to be realized and that can only happen through mass production,” he says. “So stations have to be put down for consumer convenience, then mass production of vehicles can ramp up, but the two basically have to happen at the same time for the economics to pay off.” That, he says, is going to require investment from automakers, energy companies and government, all working in partnership, all taking a bit of a leap of faith that hydrogen really is the best bet for the future. The car works which itself is a great achievement.

Now other ways of production of Hydrogen from plants is being attempted.

Dr.A.Jagadeesh Nellore (AP), India