Hyundai takes almost three quarters of the global hydrogen cell electric vehicle market
The hydrogen fuel cell Mirai is a generational electric vehicle this year, making Toyota Motor one of the few radical advocates of this type of transport. It is all the more interesting to find out that this year Hyundai Motor has come out on top in terms of the number of hydrogen cars sold.
Business Korea shared the relevant statistics from SNE Research. According to the results of the first nine months of this year, 6,664 vehicles on hydrogen fuel cells were sold worldwide, of which 73.8% (4917 units) fell to the share of Hyundai Motor. The Korean automaker increased sales of its Nexo model by 61.3% over the same period last year.
Toyota is forced to settle for only second place with 11.5% of the market and 767 sold hydrogen fuel cell vehicles. The anticipation of a generation change for the Mirai was not the only factor behind Toyota’s 61.8% decline in sales. The US market, where the bulk of these machines is sold, has shown sluggish demand for a long time due to the restrictive measures associated with the pandemic.
Honda, which ranks third in the first nine months of this year, sold only 187 hydrogen fuel cell vehicles during the reporting period, which is 27.2% worse than the same period last year. Overall, the hydrogen fuel cell passenger car market shrank by 3.2% year-on-year, with ageing Toyota and Honda models making a major contribution to this dynamic.
Looking at the third quarter separately, 2,594 hydrogen fuel cell vehicles were sold globally, up 27.2% from the same quarter last year. Hyundai managed to increase sales volumes by 65.8% to 2036 cars, and Chinese manufacturers also showed good growth dynamics. In the PRC, hydrogen fuel cell vehicles are now most actively used in the field of freight and passenger transportation. Here, in particular, buses are equipped with such power plants.
Interestingly, Hyundai Motor’s internal plans include maintaining a dominant position in the hydrogen fuel cell car market until the end of the five-year plan. For this, the Korean company is going to develop the infrastructure of filling stations. Hydrogen stored under high pressure is used by the power plant to generate electricity during travel, and such a car produces only clean water as “waste”.
