The European Commission has adopted two proposals that will push forward the development and marketing of clean and safe hydrogen vehicles.

The first proposal involves setting up the Fuel Cells and Hydrogen Joint Technology Initiative (JTI), a programme of research, development and demonstration activities.

This public-private partnership will be implemented over the next six years with financial input from the EU of E470 million, which will be matched by the private sector.

The JTI should accelerate the development of hydrogen technologies to the point of commercial take-off between 2010 and 2020.

Secondly, a number of hydrogen cars are ready for market introduction today, such as Honda’s FCX.

Thus, the Commission proposes to simplify their approval so that they will be seen more often on Europe’s streets.

At the moment, hydrogen vehicles are not included in the EU vehicle type-approval system, which results in complicated and costly approval procedures that hinders vehicles being placed on the market.

The proposal will bring hydrogen vehicles into the type-approval framework.

Both proposals will now be considered by the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers.