Geneva Motor Show of this year is already fully-loaded with some best pieces of metal but that doesn’t means enough! To increase more heat in the land of Swiss, Hyundai had saved its offering for the last to steal all limelight on its paddock there.
As soon as it surfaced, we wasted no time to write it up. We already know the world is shifting from EVs to a more popular one hydrogen fuel cells, and that too had created some groups of organizations and all; as of now it is turned into reality from just a good looking PowerPoint presentation slide of carmakers. Hyundai is the first organization to reveal its hydrogen-fuel based production spec i.e. SUV Hyundai ix35 at its Ulsan plant of Korea.
All this was happened yesterday and the first unit which drove out from the production line was given a special treatment by VIPs namely (from left to right in the image) Ki-Sang Lee, Hyundai’s senior VP and Head of Eco Friendly Vehicle R&D Center; Gaphan Yoon, Hyundai’s Executive VP and CEO of Ulsan Plant; Mang Woo Park, Mayor of Ulsan City and Eok Jo Kim, Hyundai Vice Chairman.
Commenting on such a deliberating occasion, Mayor of Ulsan City says, “Assembly-line production of fuel cell vehicles marks a crucial milestone in the history of the automobile industry not just in Korea, but throughout the world.”
Hydrogen based Hyundai ix35 stands a bit different with new front grille and bumpers along with tweaked fog lamps and instrument panel. A 7” GPS screen had been added to build its hi-tech persona. These much we think so is good enough for satisfying aesthetics but the things which matters a lot is its actual performance. No to disappointment, the green SUV claimed a top notch of 160 kmph with 0-100 kmph slot in 12.5 seconds.
Overall, it does needs only few minutes to refuel itself at the filling station for running a total length of 594 kilometers, unlikely to that several hours of charge for around 160 kilometers in EVs.
We hope so that it may had cleared homologation test as well, because Hyundai is claiming it to export in the markets of Copenhagen, Denmark, Skåne and Sweden. Already the new ix35 had ran around 2 million miles in Europe, US and Korea for testing the abilities in actual form, but will finally reside in the Geneva’s event of this year in its original production specific avatar.
A lot of award had been won under its tag which had gained after million dollars expenditure on the engineers’ team in Mabuk R&D center, Korea. Though, it is a different aspect that many thronging hours had also been showered on this, which too deserves a consideration along with the fat spending figures. Giving a support on its own board of European Union, Europe had laid down the maps of hydrogen fuel stations and its future that requires around 1000 vehicles to prove it a success until 2015.
Mr. Mang Woo Park, the Mayor of Ulsan City too shares the same kind of thought that was going on our mind. It can be clearly refined from his statement, “By supplying more hydrogen refueling stations to support the eco-friendly fuel cell vehicles produced, we will make Ulsan the landmark for eco-friendly automobiles” which really sounds true in all sense.
Lastly just to add as a reminder, hydrogen fuelled technology uses a stack of H2 cell for producing electricity which in return churns electric motor and hence the vehicle is driven. Carbon emissions are an exception to it but another component that pours out from it exhaust note is nothing else but “water”.
Future sounds interesting with Hyundai’s ix35, isn’t it! And it is almost the same thing being echoed by Mr. Eok Jo Kim voice, “With the Hyundai ix35 Fuel Cell vehicle, Hyundai is leading the way into the zero-emissions future.”
