last updated 14th April 05
by 4ecotips.com

Market worth 1.2m yen by 2020

Japan's fuel cell market is set to soar in the next decade, more than tripling between 2015 and 2020. A report released by Tokyo-based market research firm Fuji Keizai, states that the fuel cell market will be worth 282.8 billion yen in 2015 and 1.2 trillion yen by 2020.

Commercialisation efforts for polymer exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cells for stationary applications will be stimulated by a monitoring project by the Japanese government starting this year, it says.

Solid oxide fuel cells are expected to enter the practical application phase after ongoing R&D projects commissioned by the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO) are completed in fiscal 2007.

These two types of fuel cells are predicted to lead the new market.

As regards fuel cell transport, the report expects mass marketing to the general public to begin after 2015. Fuel cell vehicles before this time will be mainly limited to corporate and government customers that own fleets of cars.