What are some Hydrogen Fuel Cell Challenges?

Question

Hydrogen isn't actually an energy source -- it's an energy carrier [source: CECA]. Hydrogen carries the energy that's created when it's produced. It's similar to electricity: We can't burn electricity (which is an energy carrier), but electricity can be produced by burning energy sources like natural gas or petroleum. Then electricity transports this energy to other places, like the outlets in your home.

Answer 1

As jleb stated, storage is an issue. There are a number of other big problems with hydrogen. One of the largest is cost, it is more expensive to produce hydrogen and it is more expensive to produce cars made of hydrogen. These hydrogen fuel cell cars can cost up to two million for prototypes and usually have fragile components which many consider unable to hold up to harsher roads, speed bumps, and pot holes. You don't want to drive over an airport speed bump and rupture your fragile hydrogen tank. Hydrogen might be a future fuel, but there are more efficient fuels we can use now. I see the country switching over to electric for cars and small trucks and bio-diesel for big trucks and semis.

Answer 2

Hydrogen cars have many problems.  Where to get the hydrogen in the first place, how to transport and store it, how to make fuel cells (which currently use platinum) affordable, etc.  I wrote a wiki article on the subject linked below.

Answer 3

Problem number one is storage.  It is impossible to contain hydrogen for any significant length of time because it seeps through solid material.