‘Electric cars have limited range, even more so in winter, and take a long time to recharge’

• WE are once again being led astray by government – by being encouraged to ditch our petrol and diesel vehicles in favour of electric.

The cars have limited range, even more so in winter, and take a long time to recharge. There can never be enough charging points if we were all to change.

The batteries have limited life and cannot be recycled. We already have insufficient power generation capacity in winter months, even before our aging nuclear power stations are phased out in the near future.

Hydrogen-fuelled cars have been manufactured by Toyota, Honda and Hyundai since 2008. They have a minimum 300-mile range, winter or summer, are quickly refuelled, will last over 250,000 miles with minimal servicing, and the only emission is water vapour.

They are currently expensive only because of small production runs. Japan has 160 hydrogen fuelling stations, California 100, Germany 85 with 300 more planned, Denmark 10 and the UK just eight.

German manufacturers are buying the hydrogen technology from Japan but at present produce no vehicles. Daimler and Volvo are developing commercial hydrogen vehicles, which can never be battery powered, because of the size and weight of the batteries.

Most hydrogen is at present generated by steam reforming using natural gas. Proton exchange membrane electrolysis can be done on site at existing fuel stations.

It requires electricity but can be generated off peak, helping to balance the national grid. Unlike electricity hydrogen can be easily stored.

This is the only long-term solution and the government should be encouraging the industry to make this leap, because buying electric cars as an interim measure is a huge waste of resources.

PETER CLAPP,
NW1