Toyota Motor Corp, the world’s largest automaker said on Tuesday that it hopes to sell 400 in Japan and 300 in the rest of the world in the first year.
Mitsuhisa Kato, an executive vice president of the company, said Mirai will sell for about $57,600 before taxes.
The company said it already has about 200 pre-orders for the vehicle from government agencies and companies that want to go green. And Kato adds that Toyota hopes to help build a “hydrogen society”.
The issue now on ground is not just the high cost of the car, but how easy it would be to its fuel – hydrogen. Only a few hydrogen filling stations exist around the world, though some governments are already subsidising the construction of more.
Japan, the home of Toyota, has about 30 stations. A few stations have opened in California, USA. There are plans in Germany, United Kingdom and a few are European countries to build them.
“Mirai” can travel 650 to 700 kilometres on its two tanks of hydrogen. Hydrogen may be more expensive than gas initially, because there are so few customers but, over time, Toyota expects it will be cheaper to run a car on hydrogen than with gas.
Yoshikazu Tanaka, deputy chief engineer for Toyota’s next generation vehicle development, was quoted as saying that he expects it will take 10-20 years for the Mirai to reach sales in the tens of thousands of vehicles a year.
He admits it is a risk but added that Toyota views it as a challenge just as it did with with its gasoline-electric hybrid, the Prius, which now sells in big numbers.
Hoping to offset the inconvenience of finding fuel, Toyota gave the car a futuristic look inside and out. Mirai means future in Japanese.
According to the Christian Science Monitor, Toyota is working with French energy giant Air Liquide to create 12 hydrogen stations in New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island. Toyota hopes that New York and Boston will serve as the main hydrogen hubs in the region.
In May, Toyota loaned $7.3 million to FirstElement Fuels to support 19 hydrogen fueling stations around California.
Both Honda and Hyundai are also experimenting with limited sales and leases of such fuel cell vehicles.
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