Analyzing potential lead markets for hydrogen fuel cell vehicles in Europe: Expert views and spatial perspective

The paper presents spatially explicit results for 2722 s study 27 countries of the European Union were considered in the analysis as the study was concluded before 1st July 2013 when the 28th Member State – Croatia- has joined the EU. ries of European Union indicating the potential lead markets for hydrogen fuel cell vehicles in 2030 and 2050. The assessment combined an expert elicitation survey results and a decision-making rule applied on a regional level using region specific characteristics. It has been shown that in 2030 the EU15 countries have a higher hydrogen FCV lead market score than EU12, with the difference of the lead market potential between EU15 and EU12 reduced in 2050. The results of the study can help policy makers to identify measures that could foster the deployment of hydrogen regions in specific lead markets. This is especially crucial as a large scale deployment of hydrogen vehicles and the related infrastructure needs to develop with lead markets as nuclei for further market replication and spread.