In Memoriam: Automotive Fuel Cell Pioneer Geoffrey Ballard

In Memoriam: Automotive Fuel Cell Pioneer Geoffrey Ballard

By John O'Dell August 20, 2008

Although he expanded the dialog about the future of automotive propulsion, few in the auto industry noted the death on Aug. 2 of Geoff Ballard, the Canadian scientist who moved fuel-cell technology from the aerospace milieu into the heart of the transportation sector.

Several large newspapers ran obits, and of course Ballard's passing was larger news in the Canadian press. But the auto industry at large seemed strangely silent about the man whose drive to reconfigure fuel cells for transportation purposes forever changed ideas about how vehicles of the future will be powered.

Ballard fitted a fuel cell into a Vancouver transit bus in 1993, making the bus, which used hydrogen as source fuel, the world's first transport vehicle to be driven by electricity generated from a fuel cell.

Although he established his fuel-cell development company in 1979, it wasn't until the technology was proven on the road with the transit bus that Ballard Power Systems evolved into an empire, as virtually all the world's major automakers signed on in some fashion as partners and technology sharers.

But the major breakthrough has yet to come. Steady research and development has reduced size - and equally important, cost - by exponential degrees, but the potential for fuel-cell powerplants in the automotive mass market still is widely considered to be decades away.

Many industry watchers considered it a significant signpost about the fuel-cell's future when Ballard sold its automotive business to Ford Motor Co. and Daimler AG, choosing, the company said, to concentrate on development of stationary applications.

A man who seemed perpetually ahead of the curve, Ballard originally intended to develop lithium battery technology - today's industry darling -- for transportation purposes. When that effort failed, he shifted his focus to fuel cells.

Ballard, named by Time magazine in 1999 as a "Hero of the Planet," was 76.

Bill Visnic, Senior Editor, Edmunds Auto Observer

John O'Dell:  is an AutoObserver Senior Editor. Follow @AutoObserver on Twitter.