The Los Angeles International Auto Show is this week and the word on the street is hydrogen according to ExtremeTech. Hyundai announced plans on Wednesday to introduce a new hydrogen fuel cell powered Tuscon in 2014.

While it may sound dangerous at first, Hyundai told reporters that unlike gasoline and other fuels that spill onto the ground hydrogen quickly rises, should it ever leak out into the air.

Hydrogen powered automobiles have many benefits for the environment. First off the hydrogen powered engine is expected to allow the vehicle to go 300 miles before needing to be refueled vs the 75-100 mile range for most EVs and the 200-250 mile range for Teslas. In addition the hydrogen powered fuel cell is mixing with oxygen in the air with the only emission being water.

Hyundai didn’t say if it was abandoning electric vehicle research but at a recent event in South Korea the company’s President of R&D, Kwon Moon-Sik said that “the future holds only limited economies of scale for lithium-ion batteries beyond what has been achieved.” obviously eluding to the fact that they don’t expect the price of the Lithium Ion batteries needed for EV cars to come down in price anytime soon.

ExtremeTech reported that Toyota believes there will be a “Moore’s Law” price curve for hydrogen powered vehicles where they cost $1,000,000 to produce in 2007, $50,000 in 2015 and $25,000 by 2020.  While pricing may still be steep for a number of years the overall benefits could outweigh the cost for environmentally cautious drivers.

The only other problem with hydrogen powered vehicles at the moment is refueling stations. In California they have 9 stations which represents about 1 for every 1000 traditional gas stations. Many cities across the country are still adding electric recharging stations for electric vehicles.  If hydrogen power becomes the way of the future over electric vehicles we could see an influx of hydrogen refueling stations by the time the next significant price decrease in production costs arrives in 2020.

More here.