Saturday, September 19.
Alone on the track, the white racing car spins around the 24 Hours of Le Mans circuit for a lap of honor, before the grand start of the 88th edition of the world's greatest endurance race.
Like the Toyota TS050, it has a hybrid engine and is powered by electricity.
Except that, instead of emitting CO2, the H24, the name of the car, rejects ... water.
Perfect for the environment.
Still very confidential, this energy is promised a very bright future, as much on the circuits as for everyone.
But we will have to wait.
For the 2024 edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, the Automobile Club de l'Ouest, organizer of the event, announced the presence of hydrogen cars: “For endurance racing, we want to go towards zero emissions, says Pierre Fillon, the president of the ACO.
It is a solution for the future, as if we were reinventing the car.
By launching Mission H24 with Green GT (a Swiss engineering laboratory) in 2018, our ambition was to demonstrate, step by step, that hydrogen technology was not a science fiction, but a concrete, efficient and promising solution.
We will use the 24 Hours as a showcase to show that green hydrogen (without petroleum) works and that it is not dangerous.
In four years, it will be a test bed, but there will be a championship from 2025. "
"That a hydrogen vehicle be able to win the 24 Hours"
In its operation, the hydrogen engine uses the principle of the combustion of dihydrogen (H2) and oxygen (O2) taken from the air.
The mixture powers a fuel cell, which produces electricity.
If the hydrogen is pure, its combustion only rejects water.
Currently, Toyota, Hyundai, and Honda to a lesser extent, offer production vehicles, used in particular by some Parisian taxis.
Stations are rare but they should become widespread by 2030, with a recharge time of a few minutes.
The H24 is lighter, technologically more advanced and more efficient than the current LMPH2G.
DR
Why such a long deadline for a technology that corresponds to the general desire to protect the environment?
“We are starting from a long way off,” explains Pierre Fillon.
The 24 Hours of Le Mans has always been a field of innovation for everyday vehicles.
Our laboratory car evolves at its own pace.
Next year, she will race in the Michelin Le Mans Cup.
The will is that a hydrogen vehicle be able to win the 24 Hours within four years.
"
On the eve of the 2020 edition, Plastic Omnium has officially become a partner of Mission H24.
Leader in energy storage in vehicles (9.2 billion euros in turnover, 32,000 employees in 131 factories for the group in 2019), this French group is the exclusive supplier of high pressure tanks for Mission H24: "It is a great pride to be part of this project, advance Christian Kopp, the general manager.
The technology is very complicated, but we believe in hydrogen for mobility uses.
“It should first invest in transport, road, rail and air.