There are plenty of battery electric excavators on the market. Including from Hyundai. Volvo has a 23 ton one on the market, for example (bigger than this thing). They works just fine and Hyundai know this very well.
The reason Hyundai is doing this is for the same reason they've been doing loads of stuff with hydrogen for many years: subsidies. They get loads of government money. In Korea. In the US. And elsewhere. There's lots of money to be had. Hyundai gets paid to perpetuate the myth that hydrogen has a future in transport.
And the beauty of it is that it isn't wasted effort. Most hydrogen vehicles are battery electric vehicles where a tiny battery is powered by a fuel cell. Most of the tech aside from the fuel cell and hydrogen stuff is kind of 100% the same. When it flops, you just ditch those bits and shove in a bigger battery and boom nice battery electric excavator.
The market is pretty much rejecting hydrogen on roads (too many battery electrical trucks being sold debunking the myth that they'll never work at this point). So, they switch to construction. Of course the exact same stuff is going to happen there. Cheaper batteries are driving down cost. There are loads of products targeting this market already from a wide range of vendors. Hydrogen is going to be a complete and utter dud there too.
> Of course the exact same stuff is going to happen there. Cheaper batteries are driving down cost.
The thing with batteries is that currently they require stuff sourced from one autocracy or another in pretty large quantities if you want decent power density. Hydrogen in contrast, that is pretty easy to make, any reasonably smart highschooler can whip up an electrolysis apparatus.
Hydrogen is definitely orders of magnitude worse in efficiency (especially if it, or the synthfuel it is used to produce, is burned of all things), no question. But we as the Western countries definitely need expertise and capabilities for geopolitical reasons.
The reason Hyundai is doing this is for the same reason they've been doing loads of stuff with hydrogen for many years: subsidies. They get loads of government money. In Korea. In the US. And elsewhere. There's lots of money to be had. Hyundai gets paid to perpetuate the myth that hydrogen has a future in transport.
And the beauty of it is that it isn't wasted effort. Most hydrogen vehicles are battery electric vehicles where a tiny battery is powered by a fuel cell. Most of the tech aside from the fuel cell and hydrogen stuff is kind of 100% the same. When it flops, you just ditch those bits and shove in a bigger battery and boom nice battery electric excavator.
The market is pretty much rejecting hydrogen on roads (too many battery electrical trucks being sold debunking the myth that they'll never work at this point). So, they switch to construction. Of course the exact same stuff is going to happen there. Cheaper batteries are driving down cost. There are loads of products targeting this market already from a wide range of vendors. Hydrogen is going to be a complete and utter dud there too.