Doing the Alcan Highway on Hydrogen: A High-Tech Drive Through a Low-Tech Wilderness
Toyota gets a lot of attention because of the vehicles we build and sell that are powered by a system we call Hybrid Synergy Drive. The best-known of these is of course the Prius. There are others, as well.
But the most familiar form of Hybrid Synergy Drive, which combines the virtues of an efficient gas engine with those of a battery pack and a powerful electric motor to deliver improved fuel economy and reduced exhaust emissions, is just one component of what we’re doing in our search for what we call sustainable mobility.
Among other things, as part of our Hybrid Synergy family of vehicles, we’re exploring hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles. These rely on the reaction between oxygen and hydrogen, in a complex system called a fuel-cell stack that replaces the internal-combustion engine, to create electricity that is used to power the vehicle and all its systems. The only by-product is pure water. Sounds pretty good, doesn’t it? But though hydrogen-vehicle technology is well advanced, the vehicles themselves are still a long way from consumer driveways, not least because of the lack of an infrastructure to manufacture, store and deliver the hydrogen needed to power them.
Indeed, roadside refueling of hydrogen vehicles at the gas-pressure levels that the vehicles need isn’t even legal in some places. But it is in Canada. That made Canada’s famed Alcan Highway a dandy place for us to demonstrate the capabilities of our experimental Highlander FCHV.
So we set up a trip down the Alcan, and we planned for 300 miles between fuel stops. We felt that this distance was a good one because it’s well within our FCHV’s range, and because it’s a typical and acceptable range for a conventional gasoline-powered vehicle. It seemed a good standard against which to measure the usability and practicality of the Highlander FCHV.
Additionally, this seemed a valuable opportunity to test the vehicle’s power system against some of the challenges associated with fuel-cell power trains. These include starting and operating in cold temperatures, and standing up to the vibration and harshness of rough roads over a long distance, and over a long time.
You know about the Alcan Highway, right? It comprises more than 1,500 miles of roadway that was carved through the Canadian wilderness, from Dawson Creek, British Columbia to a point about 300 miles short of Fairbanks, Alaska, through the rugged Yukon Territory, in 1942.
The road itself is mostly paved, but it’s rough, with frost heaves, potholes and worse. In addition to vehicular traffic, it’s also got moose, grizzly bears and other animals vying for the right-of-way. We’re always up for a challenge and a bit of adventure, so this trip sounded just right to our intrepid Torrance-based Advanced Technologies Group team.
Our plan was to travel the 2,300-mile distance from Fairbanks to Vancouver, British Columbia, covering much of the distance over the Alcan, in seven days – and to do it without practice runs or pre-trip evaluations. Call it Alcan-plus. If we made it to Vancouver, great. If not – well, we’d just chalk the whole experience up to research and development. Except for some trip-specific graphics and tubular guards for the grille, rockers and rear end, the Highlander FCHV was left in its standard prototype form.
We enlisted the aid of Linde AG, which provided a supply of hydrogen that was carried with us on a truck, and Powertech Labs, which supplied a self-contained refueling rig that came along on another truck. Both trucks traveled ahead of us and set up shop at predetermined intervals so we could refuel according to plan. And, just in case, a pair of Tundra pickups followed along behind as support vehicles.
As we made our way toward Vancouver, we covered the most remote sections of the Yukon Territory. We encountered very cold weather, very rough roads, and herds of elk, goats, caribou and buffalo. We crawled past those animals at very low speeds, and, on open stretches of road, sailed along at more than 90 m.p.h.
When we reached our destination seven days after setting out, we tallied up everything that had gone wrong with our vehicle and found that our list contained – well, absolutely nothing at all. Our Highlander FCHV performed without a glitch - just as we suspected it would.
So what did the trip prove? Well, for starters, it proved that our FCHV works really well. It underscored the viability of hydrogen as a fuel. And it proved to us that if, and when, hydrogen finally becomes widely available to consumers, Toyota will have the technology to make reliable, clean-running, affordable vehicles available. That’s part of our commitment to sustainable mobility. And it’s part of our commitment to our http://www.fivestartoyota.com/
Toyota gets a lot of attention because of the vehicles we build and sell that are powered by a system we call Hybrid Synergy Drive. The best-known of these is of course the Prius. There are others, as well.
But the most familiar form of Hybrid Synergy Drive, which combines the virtues of an efficient gas engine with those of a battery pack and a powerful electric motor to deliver improved fuel economy and reduced exhaust emissions, is just one component of what we’re doing in our search for what we call sustainable mobility.
Among other things, as part of our Hybrid Synergy family of vehicles, we’re exploring hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles. These rely on the reaction between oxygen and hydrogen, in a complex system called a fuel-cell stack that replaces the internal-combustion engine, to create electricity that is used to power the vehicle and all its systems. The only by-product is pure water. Sounds pretty good, doesn’t it? But though hydrogen-vehicle technology is well advanced, the vehicles themselves are still a long way from consumer driveways, not least because of the lack of an infrastructure to manufacture, store and deliver the hydrogen needed to power them.
Indeed, roadside refueling of hydrogen vehicles at the gas-pressure levels that the vehicles need isn’t even legal in some places. But it is in Canada. That made Canada’s famed Alcan Highway a dandy place for us to demonstrate the capabilities of our experimental Highlander FCHV.
So we set up a trip down the Alcan, and we planned for 300 miles between fuel stops. We felt that this distance was a good one because it’s well within our FCHV’s range, and because it’s a typical and acceptable range for a conventional gasoline-powered vehicle. It seemed a good standard against which to measure the usability and practicality of the Highlander FCHV.
Additionally, this seemed a valuable opportunity to test the vehicle’s power system against some of the challenges associated with fuel-cell power trains. These include starting and operating in cold temperatures, and standing up to the vibration and harshness of rough roads over a long distance, and over a long time.
You know about the Alcan Highway, right? It comprises more than 1,500 miles of roadway that was carved through the Canadian wilderness, from Dawson Creek, British Columbia to a point about 300 miles short of Fairbanks, Alaska, through the rugged Yukon Territory, in 1942.
The road itself is mostly paved, but it’s rough, with frost heaves, potholes and worse. In addition to vehicular traffic, it’s also got moose, grizzly bears and other animals vying for the right-of-way. We’re always up for a challenge and a bit of adventure, so this trip sounded just right to our intrepid Torrance-based Advanced Technologies Group team.
Our plan was to travel the 2,300-mile distance from Fairbanks to Vancouver, British Columbia, covering much of the distance over the Alcan, in seven days – and to do it without practice runs or pre-trip evaluations. Call it Alcan-plus. If we made it to Vancouver, great. If not – well, we’d just chalk the whole experience up to research and development. Except for some trip-specific graphics and tubular guards for the grille, rockers and rear end, the Highlander FCHV was left in its standard prototype form.
We enlisted the aid of Linde AG, which provided a supply of hydrogen that was carried with us on a truck, and Powertech Labs, which supplied a self-contained refueling rig that came along on another truck. Both trucks traveled ahead of us and set up shop at predetermined intervals so we could refuel according to plan. And, just in case, a pair of Tundra pickups followed along behind as support vehicles.
As we made our way toward Vancouver, we covered the most remote sections of the Yukon Territory. We encountered very cold weather, very rough roads, and herds of elk, goats, caribou and buffalo. We crawled past those animals at very low speeds, and, on open stretches of road, sailed along at more than 90 m.p.h.
When we reached our destination seven days after setting out, we tallied up everything that had gone wrong with our vehicle and found that our list contained – well, absolutely nothing at all. Our Highlander FCHV performed without a glitch - just as we suspected it would.
So what did the trip prove? Well, for starters, it proved that our FCHV works really well. It underscored the viability of hydrogen as a fuel. And it proved to us that if, and when, hydrogen finally becomes widely available to consumers, Toyota will have the technology to make reliable, clean-running, affordable vehicles available. That’s part of our commitment to sustainable mobility. And it’s part of our commitment to our http://www.fivestartoyota.com/
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