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HTEC simply opened one other hydrogen fueling station in British Columbia. It sits gleaming and underused within the Decrease Mainland, another high-cost monument to a transportation future that by no means arrived. It’s an infrastructure undertaking aimed toward a market that doesn’t exist, serving automobiles that aren’t being pushed, with gas nobody’s shopping for—backed by public cash from governments apparently dedicated to propping up a dream lengthy after the dreamers have woken up.
In 2024, there are round 200 light-duty hydrogen gas cell electrical automobiles registered throughout the complete province of British Columbia. Not 200,000. Not even 2,000. Simply 200. Of these, roughly three-quarters are within the Decrease Mainland—residence to now 5 of the province’s seven hydrogen stations. Meaning about 150 automobiles may, from time to time, have pulled into one in every of HTEC’s 4 stations within the area in 2024. May. As a result of even that low quantity is deceiving. A very good portion of these automobiles belong to authorities companies or business fleets, a lot of which have been quietly parked for many of their service lives, contributing little to emissions reductions and even much less to hydrogen demand.
Let’s do the mathematics. At 15,000 kilometers per 12 months, the common light-duty automobile in BC would use about 150 kilograms of hydrogen. For fleet automobiles doing 30,000 kilometers a 12 months, the demand doubles. For those who assume good utilization—which no person on this enterprise ought to—HTEC’s 4 Decrease Mainland stations may need distributed just below 10,000 kilograms of hydrogen in 2024. At HTEC’s retail value of $14.70 per kilogram, that might quantity to about $138,000 in income per station. Not revenue. Income. That’s the best-case state of affairs.
However right here’s the factor: real-world hydrogen utilization doesn’t come anyplace close to these figures. Quebec’s hydrogen experiment was one other taxpayer-funded lesson in what occurs when hype overrides pragmatism. The provincial authorities acquired 46 Toyota Mirai sedans for its fleet and paid HTEC $5.2 million to construct a devoted hydrogen station with an onsite electrolyser in Quebec Metropolis to serve them. 4 years later, the outcomes have been unequivocal: the fleet racked up lower than 500,000 kilometers complete, averaging simply 2,700 kilometers per automobile per 12 months. That’s about 13% of what authorities fleet automobiles sometimes do. These weren’t personal residents forgetting to plug of their automobiles—these have been authorities staff explicitly instructed to make use of the automobiles, they usually nonetheless didn’t. The station, constructed to assist them, might solely refuel one automobile at a time and was down roughly one-third of the time, so governmental staff averted the automobiles besides as final resorts. Sure, a full third of the hours over all 4 years, over a 12 months in complete. The web end result? A per-kilogram subsidy approaching $500. Ultimately, the entire fleet was quietly decommissioned, the automobiles returned, and the station is now servicing the roughly 20 personal gas cell automobiles nonetheless on the roads of Quebec Metropolis, possible seeing the $7,500 a 12 months in revenues that Kelowna and Victoria stations see.
California didn’t fare a lot better. The state with probably the most hydrogen automobiles, the most important hydrogen station community, and the deepest properly of coverage assist has been stumbling over the identical logistical rocks for years. Evaluation of NREL knowledge reveals that within the first half of 2021, hydrogen stations within the state spent extra time offline than on-line—roughly 11,700 hours in upkeep versus 9,677 hours truly shelling out gas. That’s not a reliability subject; that’s a elementary system failure. Upkeep prices averaged over $10,000 per station per quarter. For stations meant to ship excessive throughput, that pencils out to almost 30% of their capital value yearly—when trade fashions sometimes assume 4%. The common station pumped 54 kilograms of hydrogen a day, sufficient for round 18 automobiles. The mathematics says that California’s hydrogen automobiles are being pushed about 40% as many miles because the US common. And that is in a state with tens of millions in ongoing assist and a concentrated automobile base of about 12,000 gas cell automobiles. If hydrogen can’t operate in probably the most favorable setting in North America, it’s not going to operate anyplace else.
Apply those self same utilization charges to BC’s fleet and the numbers collapse. A 40% utilization charge for personal automobiles brings annual consumption all the way down to 60 kilograms per automobile. For fleet automobiles, the ten% utilization seen in Quebec equates to a mere 30 kilograms. Meaning HTEC’s Decrease Mainland stations, in probably the most optimistic model of the lifelike state of affairs, may need distributed simply 2,600 kilograms in 2024—about two automobiles per day. Income in that case? Roughly $39,000 for the 12 months. In Victoria and Kelowna, the numbers are even worse. The one stations in these cities may need seen a automobile each two or three days and $7,500 in income.
Constructing a hydrogen station prices anyplace from $1 million to $4 million, relying on compression methods, storage capability, and allowing complexity. That’s earlier than upkeep, staffing, and electrical energy payments. These stations are capital-intensive, low-throughput operations, burning taxpayer money for every kilogram distributed. The stations aren’t breaking even, not remotely.
Do not forget that 30% value of capital for upkeep? Let’s halve that to fifteen%, and assume HTEC can handle to construct a station for $1 million (despite the fact that their Quebec station, which included an electrolyser, value $5.2 million). That’s nonetheless $150,000 per station to maintain it operating. Their hydrogen revenues aren’t even paying for upkeep, by no means thoughts operations. The Vancouver-area stations possible have $3,000 in annual electrical energy payments for compression, cooling, and shelling out methods. The hydrogen itself possible prices HTEC as a lot or greater than it sells it for to fabricate and truck to the websites.
There may be completely no manner for any of those stations to be something besides vibrant pink ink on HTEC’s stability sheet.
HTEC isn’t a public firm, which implies it doesn’t need to reply to retail buyers or file quarterly earnings that reveal the yawning chasm between station prices and precise demand. As an alternative, it’s backed by a mixture of institutional capital and personal fairness optimism. Chart Industries holds 25%—an organization with actual engineering chops but in addition a long-standing curiosity in propping up any gas that isn’t electrical energy. Apparently 22% of its pipeline of huge alternatives for the following three years is hydrogen-related, in order that’s not going to finish properly. I Squared Capital owns 35%, a personal fairness agency with whose vitality portfolio is 79% in fossil fuels, reasonably belying their claims to be centered on sustainable development. The remaining 40% of HTEC is held by authentic shareholders and staff.
So right here’s the actual query: what precisely do they suppose they’re investing in? As a result of proper now, it appears to be like lots much less like a development market and much more like a science truthful undertaking that the federal government unintentionally overfunded. That’s not a sustainable enterprise mannequin, which is why, like Ballard Energy, Plug Energy and FuelCell Energies, all of which have by no means turned a revenue and in reality misplaced billions every, HTEC is ranked as a high-risk to fail utterly and disappear on my deathwatch listing of hydrogen for transportation performs.
The governmental funding retains coming, nonetheless. HTEC’s newest growth is backed by a multi-source mix of presidency assist. Pure Assets Canada, by means of its Zero Emission Automobile Infrastructure Program, has issued funding for HTEC stations earlier than. The Province of British Columbia, by means of its CleanBC Go Electrical applications, continues to finance hydrogen infrastructure in parallel with its extra profitable EV initiatives. The federal-provincial H2 Gateway undertaking, with a projected price ticket of $900 million, exists explicitly to subsidize manufacturing, distribution, and fueling for a gas that has failed to seek out market traction within the light-duty sector. Vancouver-area municipalities have additionally provided zoning benefits and coverage assist, treating hydrogen like a magic bullet for clear transportation regardless of overwhelming proof on the contrary.
So the intense query is that this: what precisely did we simply pay for? Who advantages from the existence of one other underused, overbuilt fueling station in a area with fewer than 200 hydrogen automobiles and dwindling public curiosity in proudly owning one? If hydrogen had a spot in light-duty transport, it could have proven up by now. As an alternative, we’re left with the infrastructure equal of a ghost mall—empty parking areas, shiny pumps, and nobody coming.
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