Exploring the marketability of fuel cell electric vehicles in terms of infrastructure and hydrogen costs in Spain

This paper aims to analyze the costs associated with the initial transition to the use of hydrogen as a fuel for road transportation in Spain from a double perspective: that of the investor in the required infrastructure, and that of the end-user who will have to pay for the fuel. To this end, different types of hydrogen refueling stations are taken into consideration, as are strategies for production and delivery of the gas. Scenarios of distributed production (at the actual hydrogen fueling stations) and centralized production (at medium or large-sized plants that produce hydrogen that is subsequently delivered to different fueling stations) are contemplated. Hydrogen production systems based on the reforming of fuels and also on the electrolysis of water are analyzed; renewable and non-renewable systems are compared. Lastly, the case of a Spanish city is analyzed from both perspectives. This analysis allows estimation of the magnitude of the gap between fuel cell road vehicles and gasoline vehicles in terms of fuel price for this country.