Hyundai has promised to deliver a production hydrogen fuel cell car (probably an SUV) by 2012, three years before Toyota, Honda, or any of the others.  They’ve also said they’ll match or beat Toyota’s planned $50,000 price tag for the HFC vehicle (no other automaker has talked price).

Those are big words, but Hyundai has been on a roll and it may be possible.

They plan to put 500-1,000 fuel cell vehicles on the road in 2012 and have production up to 10,000 units by 2015.  With that many units in production, prices could begin dropping quickly.  Especially with new fuel cell technologies that don’t require platinum in the catalyst.

However this works out, it’s great to see competition amongst not only the various car companies making hydrogen fuel cell cars, but between the competing technologies such as hybrids, battery electrics, hydrogen fuel cells, and fuel alternatives.

The future could not only be petroleum-free, but it could have a lot of alternative vehicles running on a variety of power sources to suit the need.  Diversity is where it’s at and has been missing from the automotive world since its earliest days.

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