alt Hacker NewsThey are not delusional.
Japanese car manufacturers were late to EVs, and in order to prevent a gap in the market where EV-first competitors can steal market share from them, they lobby the government to subsidize and create a new market segment in the form of hydrogen cars. There they have a head start via some latent research and more reuse of ICE car platforms. I'm sure the hydrogen division is well aware that they are doing research on a dead-end technology (at least for the automotive sector).
The exact same thing happened in Germany. In 2020 there was a huge push from politicians to push more hydrogen technology to distract from the fact that German car manufacturers were lagging behind, as well as general missed initiatives for renewable energy. Now, 6 years later those initatives are deader than ever.
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Hydrogen is simply a really bad fuel for cars. It is hard to transport and store liquid hydrogen
You're explaining the practical consequences of their delusion, but delusion it remains. Hydrogen for cars isn't going to work to save them, even with the lobbying. Granted, they were probably screwed anyway, so they had no good options.