Driving without guilt gets one step nearer

Bad news for environmentalists, and even worse news for car fans. Sachito Fujimoto, Honda's chief engineer at its research and development department, says it's going to be at least 15 to 20 years before zero emission fuel cells become mainstream. Sop, no quick fix in sight for global warming.

For car fans, it means two more decades of hearing about how much closer engineers have come to making it mainstream. We'll have been driven demented by the time fuel cells finally arrive on our forecourts. Besides, the weight of newsprint expended on the subject before the first regular car goes on the sale must affect the benefits to be accrued when it's finally introduced.

Yet there is some hope. Honda has seemingly cracked the major fuel-cell problem of batteries just not working at cold temperatures.

In cold climes, batteries of any sort lose power more quickly. The sort of battery power needed to push 2-tonne of metal at over 100km/h simply didn't work below 0°.

Now Honda has succeeded in creating fuel cells which can work in temperatures as low as -20°. In the world of fuel cells that's an important development.

At the Geneva motor show we jumped at the chance to escape the interminable press conferences around parked cars to get behind the wheel and test drive the end result: Honda's supermini hydrogen-powered FCX.

Outside, there no sign of anything new. It didn't run on a bed of air, nor did we have to wear protective suits. The whole thing was quite normal - the speedometer read mph and we tipped along at over 96 km/h (60mph) on the motorway with more power on tap. Officially it can reach 150km/h as a top speed.

With electricity, power is almost instant. It hits peak output just 3 seconds after take-off.

There was the odd flashing light sequence to the left and right where the rev counter should be, but these were more for effect and explanation. All in all, we were driving yet another supermini - except that, being one of only 20 on the road so far, Fujimoto reckons each costs the same as 100 Civics.

Like the current Toyota Prius, the FCX is silent when running in town, a nightmare for inattentive pedestrians. On the hills, there's a whirr of activity from the front, like a hairdryer on full blast or a washing machine on spin cycle.

But all of this can be overcome. After all, few car companies don't tinker with engine acoustics to make them sound meatier. What this needs is a hidden MP3 player and speakers with the soundtrack of a V8.

In every other respect, this car is ready for the road. It has even undergone the normal front, rear and side impact crash tests, the first fuel-cell vehicle to be certified for commercial use back in 2002.

Now this cold-conquering version has been certified too. So, now the cars are on the road, what's holding things back? Quite simply, it's down to range and infrastructure. The FCX manages 430km on a full tank. That's reasonable for a fuel cell car but impractical for everyday motoring, given that you'd have to go to Iceland to find a commercially run hydrogen filling station.

Questions still hang over hydrogen-powered cars. One is whether we can get filling stations up and running and store the stuff safely. The next is whether we can create enough hydrogen naturally. If we have to turn to fossil fuels again for hydrogen, then its benefits will be questioned.

Fujimoto suggests that by the time the FCX and its like are on the road, small solar-powered hydrogen stations will line the world's roads. If it all comes to pass, then motorists can look forward to guilt-free motoring.