Dear Readers!
The discussion about rising energy prices is taking on ever greater dimensions. Now, German economic minister Robert Habeck wants to grant the German competition regulation agency (Bundeskartellamt) new rights. Swift to oppose such alleged unconstitutionality is not only Handelsverband Deutschland (the general association for commerce in Germany).
Dear Readers!
We could have had it so much easier. Everything we need today, we could have built and prepared long ago. But we knew, or at least suspected, that it might eventually come to this. The Club of Rome had prophesied exactly this scenario already fifty years ago.
I could be wrong, of course. But I feel like more and more members of the hydrogen community have had enough of people constantly talking about their favorite colors. During the past several months, we’ve seen debate after debate about the pros and cons of green, blue and turquoise hydrogen. First in Germany, now in Brussels.
Now that’s what you call luck. Right around the editorial deadline of our sister magazine HZwei, the German government debated, passed and presented its strategy to support the hydrogen and fuel cell industry.
Five federal ministries were involved in drafting the strategy. Their compromise agreement sets a 2030 target of “only” 5 gigawatts in installed electrolyzer capacity, not 10, as the German science minister Anja Karliczek strongly proposed.
It’s been a long time since things were moving forward at the pace they have been in recent months. And it has been just as long since the mood was that optimistic in the energy sector. Wherever you look, you feel as if a new chapter has begun. It certainly feels a lot different than past times of doom and gloom in the fuel cell and hydrogen industry.
During my research for the article on the second generation of Honda‘s fuel cell vehicle, the Clarity Fuel Cell (see Honda Hands Over Keys for First Clarity Fuel Cell), I suddenly remembered days long past. More specifically, I recalled news pieces that I had written or read many years ago. I did a bit of a search and found the following lines, which I would like to share with you:
“One must recognize the distinct accomplishment of the second-biggest Japanese carmaker, Honda, which – like archrival Toyota – succeeded before all automotive manufacturers in the Western world to supply customers with fuel cell cars.