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Although General Motors and Toyota are pressing on with their fuel-cell technologies, both companies are now questioning the future of hydrogen-powered vehicles. Hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles have long been touted as the vehicles of the future — due to their water-only emissions — but their many hurdles and the emergence of more powerful lithium-ion batteries could see hydrogen-powered vehicles pushed to the back burner.

GM Vice Chairman Bob Lutz says that battery-powered vehicles are a much more viable option than fuel-cells, especially in the short-term. “If we get lithium-ion to 300 miles, then you need to ask yourself, Why do you need fuel cells?” Lutz told the Wall Street Journal.

Lutz added that the cost of fuel-cell vehicles is nowhere near “where we need to be on the costs curve.” It’s estimated that a hydrogen fuel-cell vehicle costs about $1 million, whereas GM’s Chevrolet Volt electric car is expected to retail for around $30,000 when it launches sometime around the turn of the decade.

Toyota President Katsuaki Watanabe also shares Lutz’s concern about the future of hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles. Watanabe agrees that the cost of hydrogen vehicles is too high right now but also noted a lack of infrastructure as a weak point of fuel-cell cars. Because of these factors, Wantanabe feels that “it will be difficult to see the spread of fuel cells in 10 years’ time.”

Despite GM and Toyota’s less-than-optimistic views about hydrogen vehicles, GM is currently testing a fleet of 100 Equinox fuel-cell vehicles and Toyota just completed a 350 mile trip in its hydrogen-powered FCHV.

However, Daimler AG — Mercedes-Benz’s parent company — is bullish on the future of hydrogen vehicles. Mercedes expects to be producing fuel-cell vehicles by 2010, and, if demand takes off, the German automaker is prepared to get hydrogen vehicles “into the cost range of conventional powertrains.”

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