Honda previews new fuel cell vehicle with 300-mile range
Honda will use the Tokyo auto show for the global premiere of its Clarity fuel cell vehicle, which will be available for lease to customers in Japan in March before being made available in other parts of the world. The Clarity’s innovative new features include a 33% smaller fuel stack, which enables it to fit into the engine compartment under the hood, rather than in the centre of vehicle, as in Toyota’s Mirai; cutting into passenger space. Clarity will be built in small volumes initially in Japan, and for the first year, Honda will lease the roughly $64,000 fuel cell vehicle largely to government and business customers who have partnered with the automaker in the past. This will allow Honda to continue to collect information about the car before it is sold to individual customers.

Honda unveiled its first production hydrogen-powered fuel cell sedan, the Clarity Fuel Cell, at the Tokyo Motor Show on Tuesday. Though Honda has dabbled in hydrogen power since the late 1980s, the five-passenger Clarity Fuel Cell sedan is the first hydrogen-powered model that the Japanese carmaker has intended to offer up to the public.

Credit: Honda

The Clarity Fuel Cell represents a leap forward for hydrogen fuel cell vehicles (FCVs). Honda has managed to shrink the size of the hydrogen fuel cell stack by 33%, down to the size of a V6 gasoline engine. This compact shape allows designers to fit it underneath the hood of the car -- a first for FCVs. Until this point fuel cells have been so large that they needed to be packaged elsewhere in the vehicle, like in Toyota's Mirai, which has its fuel cell stack in the center of the vehicle, cutting into interior space.

Credit: Honda

When full of hydrogen, the Clarity Fuel Cell can travel 700 km (434 miles) on a single charge, which is around 50 km further than the Toyota Mirai. For those of you figure junkies, Honda boasts the fuel cell stack has a power output of 100 kW while the electric motor that actually drives the wheels has a maximum output of 130 kW. I'd love to tell you how that translates into a 0 to 60 mph time, but Honda hasn't revealed those figures.

Credit: Honda

Honda will begin leasing the Clarity Fuel Cell to Japanese municipalities and businesses in March 2016. It will later open sales to the general public, with entry into the U.S. and European markets following that. Right now, the Clarity Fuel Cell is priced at 7.66 million yen or $62,807. Whether it'll hold that price when offered in America is unclear.