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With companies like Toyota and Renault continuing to bombard us with the eco-friendly technologies of hybrid and fully-electric vehicles, there are still some groups out there dedicated to a sustainable, emission-free future though the use of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles.

The debate over whether hydrogen fuel cell, hybrid, plug-in hybrid or fully-electric vehicles are the way forward will continue and it is not the purpose of this article to fuel that debate. However it’s difficult to see how competition for the sustainable future of the motor car is a bad thing.

Hydrogen advocates will tell you that there is only one way for the car industry to completely rid itself of its carbon footprint and it’s a technology that has fallen off the radar somewhat recently; the hydrogen fuel cell.

Yet this week a number of promising stories have emerged that demonstrated the benefits afforded by hydrogen and indicate a positive direction for the industry to head in.

Opel has revealed that they do not foresee electric cars ever being able to overcome the range restrictions that batteries present, despite a number of other firms claiming that battery technology will vastly improve in the next few years. The company plans to have a hydrogen fuel cell vehicle on sale commercially sometime around 2015.

Mike Murray, a science teaching at Skyview High School in the USA, educates his freshman students about the benefits of a hydrogen-powered future in the hopes that they become a catalyst for change. Murray was quoted as saying: “Hydrogen fuels is exactly where we’re going with this country. Detroit can either get with the program, or watch the revolution.”

A group of students from The Hague University of Applied Sciences won first prize for Europe’s most fuel-efficient city car at European Shell Eco Marathon. The hydrogen car they developed uses 14 times less energy than the average electrical car and was able to achieve a range of 747 kilometres on a single litre of hydrogen.

Finally, Mercedes-Benz successfully completed a round-the-world drive with three B-Class fuel cell vehicles. More than 30,000 kilometres of driving the vehicles confirmed for the company that now is the time to start pushing fuel cells, with the main setback currently being a lack of infrastructure. Part of drives purpose was to lobby for a more comprehensive network of hydrogen refueling stations, currently of which there are only 200 worldwide.

What is known is that these types of initiatives need more government support. It is estimated that $10 billion could establish a hydrogen network in the US which would see a station within 10km of most urban drivers and every 50 km along highway. It sounds expensive and not completely comprehensive, but this sort of thing is far more forward thinking and could achieve much more than any carbon tax or emissions trading scheme.