Hydrogen Road Tour: How can H₂ cars can go 1,700 miles? Use a tanker truck

The Hydrogen Road Tour is scheduled to roll into the Hydrogen + Fuel Cells 2009 here in Vancouver tomorrow after 1,700 miles and nine days on the road. But, with the range of even the best hydrogen vehicles in the hundreds of miles and H₂ stations not exactly around every corner, we were curious about how the dozen hydrogen vehicles on the drive managed the trip. We got the following email from Angela Nanalal, the Hydrogen Station designer for Powertech Labs, one of the main supporters of the Hydrogen Road Tour:

Powertech sponsored and provided all of the 700 bar fueling on the trip. We worked with the California Fuel Cell Partnership to co-organize this event. Our mobile fueler is packaged into a 16-foot trailer. The hydrogen is fed to us from an Air Products fueler at 350 bar (5000 psig). We then compress it directly into the vehicles at 700 bar (10,000 psig). We had 14 fueling stops along the way at 700 bar.

So, there you have it. The secret to going 1,700 miles in a hydrogen vehicle is a 16-foot support trailer. We'll have pictures and more information from the arrival ceremony tomorrow.