The greenhouse is nice and airy, everyone has plenty of legroom and the overall feel of the car just screams "road trip." It just makes you wish there were more hydrogen refueling stations, say, on the way from LA to Las Vegas and LA to Palm Springs. In town and on the highway the FCX Clarity just drives like any other car. Except it does sort of make all other cars on the road seem so last century and just a little bit passé.
This Car Simply Needs a Larger Refueling Infrastructure
The FCX Clarity can be leased for approximately $600 a month (currently maintenance and hydrogen is free) but Honda is not making any money on the vehicles. Each unit would have to sell for millions of dollars to re-coup their development costs but if a larger refueling infrastructure was in place the laws of mass production would bring the cost of these vehicles down dramatically.
The hydrogen refueling station I visited once during my time with the FCX Clarity was completely solar powered and "off-the-grid" as they say. So, if you think that electric Nissan Leaf is really "green" you are kidding yourself because where do you think electricity comes from? Electricity plants that burn coal and from various nuclear power plants that are just as susceptible to natural disaster as that site in Japan.
Hydrogen, to our way of thinking, just makes sense as the next logical step in Humanity's constant quest to solve their transportation and environmental issues. And if the U.S. Government can
instead spend all of the money allocated to electric cars which, in case you missed it, are still not very recyclable and have serious range issues. Our Clarity went 220 miles on a tank and refilled in just under 5 minutes. Sounds like normal driving, eh?
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