ASIA’S two auto powerhouses, Japan and China, are jostling for supremacy in how future electric cars (EV) should generate their power — from batteries or hydrogen-powered fuel-cells.

    In a potentially high-stakes clash reminiscent of Sony versus Panasonic in the Beta-VHS video war in the 1980s, the winner could enjoy years of domination if their technology is adopted as a global standard by other manufacturers.

    This time, though, there should be a place in the autos market for both electric battery and hydrogen fuel-cell cars. The key question is which will power more mainstream cars — the market dominated today by the likes of Toyota, General Motors and Volkswagen.

    “We’re reaching a crossroads,” said James Chao, Shanghai-based Asia-Pacific managing director for industry consultant IHS Automotive. “It’s difficult to exaggerate the significance of the choice between batteries and hydrogen.

    “Billions of dollars will be invested in one or the other and may determine which companies will lead the industry through the end of this century.”

    China, a major oil importer and blighted by air pollution, is pushing for all-electric cars, offering incentives to buyers and opening its market to tech firms and others to produce electric vehicles.

    For a decade, China has pushed for the EV to become a mass-market car, hoping a low entry barrier will allow its relative latecomers to close a competitive gap with global rivals who have a century’s head-start in traditional combustion engines.

    “[China’s President] Xi Jinping explained it very well, saying that developing new energy vehicles is the Chinese auto industry’s only road to grow from being big to being strong,” Xu Heyi, chairman of Beijing Automotive Group, told reporters recently.

    Japan, though, sees the future differently and is investing heavily in fuel-cell technology and infrastructure as part of a national policy to foster what it calls a “hydrogen society,” where the zero-emission fuel would power homes and vehicles.

    Toyota Motor especially is keen to maintain the alternative propulsion lead it established a decade and a half ago with the full hybrid electric Prius.

    “It’s not that we’re not doing anything about the EV. Technically speaking, EV is a relatively easier technology,” said Koei Saga, Toyota’s senior managing officer in charge of vehicle powertrain technology. “But it needs to evolve. If you’re looking for the ultimate solution, the EV probably isn’t it.”

    To be sure, China and Japan are not alone. General Motor has joint research with Honda on hydrogen cars, while BMW is Toyota’s fuel-cell partner. Daimler in Europe and Hyundai Motor in South Korea are also carrying out their own research and development on a hydrogen car.

    Honda Motor unveiled a “mass-market” hydrogen fuel-cell car at the Tokyo Motor Show yesterday that will go on sale in Japan in March, to be followed by launches in the United States and Europe, key potential markets for the technology.

    Honda believes the car, dubbed the Clarity Fuel Cell, has reached the affordability range where a “fairly typical mainstream consumer could stretch to buy one,” said Toshihiro Mibe, a Honda operating officer. “We want this car to be the trigger for the ‘hydrogen society’.”

    The Clarity, which will retail for 7.66 million yen (US$63,970) before government subsidies, follows this year’s launch of Toyota’s hydrogen-powered Mirai. Mirai buyers benefit from subsidies of 3 million yen per vehicle.

    Honda’s main advance on Toyota’s technology is to have shrunk the fuel-cell stack — the ensemble of fuel-cell, motor and transmission — by a third from a 2008 model it leased to a few private buyers in California in a subsidized trial deal.

    That allows Honda to store the whole stack under the hood and package the car as “roomy enough to comfortably sit five adults,” said Kiyoshi Shimizu, chief engineer for the new car, though it still sacrifices trunk space to accommodate a bulky hydrogen fuel tank. The battery pack sits under the front seat.

    “With this, we now hope to make a hydrogen powertrain an option across our product line,” Shimizu added.

    China, meanwhile, is running full tilt at electric vehicles, and has opened its automotive industry to deep-pocketed technology firms to invest.

    The move has bred more than half a dozen Chinese-funded EV startups, backed by the likes of Baidu, Alibaba , Xiaomi and Tencent, as well as LeTV, a streaming video and Internet-connected television provider. (SD-Agencies)