In 2014, Toyota’s then president, Akio Toyoda, said he “saw the future” and that the launch of the company’s flagship hydrogen-powered vehicle, the Mirai, would mark a “turning point” in the automotive industry.
After selling just 27,500 hydrogen-powered vehicles over the next decade, the world’s largest automaker is no longer so sure. “I can’t say for sure that the future of hydrogen power is bright,” Hiroki Nakajima, Toyota’s chief technology officer, told reporters at Japan’s Fuji Speedway in November.