The world’s very first internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicle wasn’t powered by gasoline but rather by hydrogen. Way back in 1807, Francois Isaac de Rivaz used a hydrogen-filled ballon to drive an engine he developed to propel an experimental vehicle—more than 50 years before the first gasoline-powered engine was invented by Nicolaus August Otto. The first electric vehicle didn’t appear until 1888 via the Flocken Elektrowagen, and the basis for modern hydrogen fuel cell vehicles (HFCVs) arrived a year later when Ludwig Mond and Carl Langer demonstrated and patented the technology in 1889.
So although hydrogen-powered vehicles theoretically came first, forerunners are not always the ultimate frontrunners, and after more than a century of passenger cars proliferating across the globe, HFCVs have lagged to a distant third behind gas and battery electric vehicles (BEVs).
Recent Comments