A General Motors Corp. energy technology expert discussed the importance of creating infrastructure for alternative fuels with ASU faculty and students Tuesday afternoon.
Byron McCormick, executive director of the Fuel Cell Activities Group for GM, spoke to more than two dozen students and professors about the importance of hydrogen fuel cells in the future of the national energy infrastructure, the automotive industry and the environment.
McCormick gave the presentation, “Hydrogen and the New DNA of the Automobile,” on the fourth floor of the Barry Goldwater Center for Science and Engineering at ASU’s Tempe campus.
He challenged students to contribute to the solution to the current energy crisis and discussed the global dilemma caused by dependence on fossil fuels.
“If we keep extrapolating energy the way we have been, by 2030, we will need seven Saudi Arabias to accommodate the demand. We don’t have seven Saudi Arabias,” he said.
McCormick told the audience that hydrogen fuel cell technology is essential to the progress of humanity.
Once the technology finds the combination of the right tax policy and the right infrastructure, it will become a reality, he said.
“This isn’t a U.S. problem — it’s a world problem. And right now Germany is showing the most interest,” he said. “Building the infrastructure to accommodate all the new energy technology will create jobs and maybe help us out of this current economic crisis.”
McCormick helped design the fuel system for the new Chevy Tahoe and the Cadillac Escalade hybrids — both large sport utility vehicles, he said, have the same fuel economy as a Toyota Corolla.
Making the shift from gasoline-powered cars to hydrogen-fuel-cell-powered cars is not as easy as simply taking the technology to the consumer, McCormick said.
He said he thinks car manufacturers and world governments should be well on their way toward primary use of hydrogen-fuel technology by 2015.
Hydrogen-fueled cars require the same types of service stations as gasoline powered cars, and as of right now, the service infrastructure is not in place.
“GM and Shell gasoline have pooled their efforts and done a study that shows that 70 percent of the population lives in the 100 biggest cities in the country,” McCormick said. “We found that it would take $10 [billion] to $15 billion to build 11,700 hydrogen-fuel service stations in strategic places in these cities that would make servicing cars plausible for the consumer.”
Right now, Las Vegas is one of the only cities with even one hydrogen-fuel station, McCormick said, but a study called Project Driveway is underway to get the feedback necessary to begin a plan for developing the infrastructure necessary to make hydrogen-fuel-cell automobiles convenient.
Project Driveway is a study in New York and Los Angeles where GM gives people hydrogen-fueled cars for about three months and, using GPS, tracks where they most frequently drive, McCormick said.
“Then the drivers give us feedback about things we need to work on, and we can see the best places to build service stations,” he said.
Mechanical engineering graduate student Rahil Modi said to really make these cars affordable and comparable to gasoline-powered cars in terms of power, designers are going to have to start from the ground up.
“We all want bucket seats and accessories, and all of that stuff is heavy,” Modi said. “When you add weight, it takes that much more energy to move the car.”
Reach the reporter at jaking5@asu.edu.
