Honda's Home Hydrogen Fuel Station

Alongside the debut of the 2009 FCX Clarity, Honda also showed off the latest fourth generation version of their Home Energy Station (HES). The concept of the HES is to provide a self-contained unit to use a home's natural gas supply to heat the house, heat water, produce electricity and fuel a hydrogen car. The HES unit includes a steam reformer system to produce hydrogen from the gas, and a fuel cell of its own to provide electricity for the home. According to Honda's Stephen Ellis, using this system to generate hydrogen and fuel an FCX can reduce total well-to-wheel CO2 emissions by sixty percent compared to an equivalent gasoline-fueled car. Such a system is unlikely to be ready for home use before the middle of the next decade at the earliest, but if and when it does become practical it could provide a viable way to mitigate the problem of a hydrogen fueling infrastructure.