Move over CNG, fuel-cell buses are here
Home ground for the CNG experiment, Delhi is also going to play host - within the next six months - to the first of six demonstration fuel-cell buses routed through the United Nations Development Project (UNDP). Each bus is said to cost a whopping 10 lakh dollars.
These are zero-emission vehicles the Union ministry of non-conventional energy sources also hopes to develop within the country - and even try to put its own versions on the road in a few years.
Ambitious? Perhaps. But certainly not achievable without financial incentives and support. Says ministry senior advisor S K Chopra, "The cost-differential for alternative energy vehicles has to be supported (initially) because these would be cleaner. If we go by purely economic considerations, we will never get anywhere." His minister, M Kanappan, used a seminar at the ongoing Auto Expo here to call on the industry to come forward in this sector.
At the moment, fuel-cell vehicles may be a dream for Indians. But other options are closer home. Of alternatives such as electric, bio-fuel and hydrogen energy vehicles, Chopra sees battery-powered electric vehicles - particularly electric hybrid vehicles, which use a conventional engine with electric motor powered by traction batteries and/fuel cells - as having the greatest potential for commercialization in the short-term.
The inhibiting factors continue to be technology constraints and electric vehicles being viewed as suitable mainly for short hauls. The biggest hurdle, across the board, is cost. Therefore, a helping hand is desired.
In fact, the ministry seems to be seeking the same kind of support CNG has been given for the past couple of years, and using the same logic of public health, to push for excise and customs duty cuts and backing from Union and state governments to get cleaner, alternative fuel vehicles onto the roads in much greater numbers, and in speedier fashion.
"The technology is ripe," says Chopra. Bringing down duties will ensure the price is comparable to the CNG. Competition will eventually bring the price down further. Obviously, no long-term programme can continue to be based on subsidies alone.
