Mercedes-Benz has put the word out that its hydrogen fuel cell 2017 GLC F-Cell (pictured below) will makes its debut at the 2017 Frankfurt Motor Show. This commercial FCEV will go on sale for roughly, at this writing, around $75,000 USD and will also be leased for a now undisclosed sum.
According to AutoCar, “Thomas Weber, Mercedes’ head of research and development, told Autocar the company had finalised the engineering parameters for the new model, which is rumoured to be based around the recently introduced GLC …
“Despite basing earlier fuel cell prototypes on the B-Class, Weber said the continued high cost of the fuel stack makes a hydrogen fuel cell model commercially viable only in higher classes.”
According to the automaker, the 2017 Mercedes-Benz GLC F-Cell will be using a new and improve fuel cell, will have a range of around 373 miles and will be able to refuel in 3 minutes.
Now, several times in the past, I’ve driven the Mercedes-Benz B-Class F-Cell and found it to be a decent vehicle. At the car shows the B-Class F-Cell has proven itself to be one of the most popular fuel cell vehicles at the ride ‘n’ drives. And in 2010, a limited number of these vehicles went into serial production in Germany. As of this writing, a small number of pre-owned B-Class F-Cells are still being leased in California.
If you can hold out a little longer and want to drive a Mercedes FCEV, you may want to wait until the 2017 Mercedes-Benz GLC F-Cell rolls out since it’s a bit larger than the B-Class F-Cell and will have significantly upgraded technology.
This is smart-
The manufacturers are introducing FCEVs at the rate of one or two a year so they don’t outpace the rate of infrastructure development and they keep FCEVs in the spotlight.
And they are building FCEVs in different market segments so they don’t steal sales from each other. (The Mirai and the upcoming Honda FCEV sedan being a possible exception)
I hope that GM will sell the Colorado FCEV pickup truck to the public and cover another market segment. At the very least, companies like Air Liquide would be happy to have a hydrogen powered service vehicle, and many hydrogen forklift equipped warehouses would be happy to have a pickup truck they can operate indoors using their existing fueling equipment.