For Bertrand Piccard, the government's hydrogen plan "is a very good thing"

INTERVIEW

With 7 billion euros on the table, including 2 billion for the period 2021-2027, the "hydrogen plan" presented Tuesday by the French government is taking shape.

Hydrogen technology is a sector of the future, as part of the ecological transition.

Bertrand Piccard, president of the Solar Impulse Foundation and guest of Europe 1 on Tuesday, is convinced that this plan "is a very good thing" and that it only lacked the political will to finally launch it.

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Moreover, he says, "the first fuel cells that used hydrogen date back to the 1960s and were used by NASA in the space program".

Fifty years later, "the technology is ready but as long as it is allowed to pollute", continues Bertrand Piccard, "the car manufacturers will continue to do what they have always done".

"An extremely clear signal"

About forty hydrogen stations have been identified by the Afhypac (French Association for Hydrogen and Fuel Cells) observatory on French roads.

These stations, like electric terminals, are used to recharge the batteries of cars running on hydrogen.

Today, public aid is taking on a new dimension to develop this sector and this "green" means of transport.

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The last plan, in 2018, had planned to devote 100 million euros to hydrogen, significantly less than the current plan and its 7 billion euros.

"This plan gives an extremely clear signal to the industry," said the president of the Solar Impulse Foundation, "namely that it is in this direction that we must go, that it is in this sector that we must invest".

"France is no further behind than the rest of Europe or the world," concludes finally, optimistic, Bertrand Piccard.