Hydrogen Industry Vet Says Fuel Cells Still a ‘Go’

Forvia’s Tarek Abdel-Baset said from the floor of the 2025 ACT Expo that despite the pall of uncertainty facing the automotive and heavy truck sectors, companies in the hydrogen fuel-cell chain are optimistic.

May 20, 2025

Chris Clonts

Tarek Abdel-Baset, Forvia’s chief engineer for hydrogen storage systems, has two decades of experience in alt-fuel transporation development, with all the ups and downs that entails. So he was a good person for SAE Media to ask about the industry vibe at the 2025 Advanced Clean Transportation Expo in Anaheim.

There’s a lot of uncertainty right now, but everyone in the hydrogen sector seems to keep pushing forward. Is that a sign of belief in the fuel’s future?

We've been through this kind of Valley of Death a few times. This is my third cycle of a hype hangover, right? But, it makes good business sense somewhere. Last time it was forklifts that actually got us through that valley. There was a real good business model that worked without subsidies, and that was the 2010 market. Now we've come through, and we have advanced the technology. There are more things making sense: backup power, etc. Now vehicles are starting to make more sense.

We were all coming to the conference wondering what the mood was going to be like. Clearly, you can see, it is better than anyone imagined.

What have you noticed about trends of interest in non-hydrogen fuels this year?

The main thing we were looking for is whether there still a lot of presence of hydrogen versus the other fuels. Because slowly, we've seen this shift more towards hydrogen. When I first started attending these [expos] it was all CNG and a little bit of BEV. Then it went all BEV. This year, it's still very strong in hydrogen amid a more balanced mix overall. We do see some CNG coming back into play, right? But the hydrogen players are all still here. It’s encouraging to see.

It seems the primary debate is between the BEV believers and the hydrogen disciples. Is that accurate?

I'm gonna be an advocate for EVs too. And I come from a world where for years we were, you know, fuel cells vs. BEVs, and now we've made up, and some of my best friends are battery guys, and now we know each other's place now. So there is more capacity in the [electrical] grid than most people will give it credit for, but I definitely think it's going to be used on the light-duty [passenger car] side, the grid will absorb a lot of that. There's some neat tricks you can play with demand and all this. There are tricks that can absorb that.

Now, once you go over to the heavy duty sector, it's 10 times more energy [required] that I need to move. It's literally a 10-fold increase and the electrical grid could absorb that with the right investment and equipment. But can the [current] grid absorb it or not? The question isn’t can the grid do it. The question is whether you do it cheaper and better with hydrogen. Hydrogen, as you know, is a really good buffer. Hydrogen stores energy better than batteries do in terms of when you're storing large amounts of it. It's a better buffer.

Forvia displayed its carbon-fiber hydrogen storage tanks at ACT 2025. It also announced that Symbio, its joint venture with Stellantis and Michelin, is partnering with Savage to build fuel-cell-powered drayage trucks as demonstration models.