Until a few years back, the excitement around fuel cells was obvious. Then investors got burned when performances and costs were not realized. That put a break on the fuel cell boom and made the industry face reality.
In order for fuel cells to be a competitive LZC (Low Zero Carbon) technology, it needs to prove that it works for 10, 20 or 30 years. Long term reliability hasn’t been proven yet.
Another major issue that fuel cells are facing is cost. For domestic applications it costs approximately as to install a small residential solar PV system, which a 100% Renewable Energy Technology. On the commercial sector, the cost of solar PV is reducing even further day by day around £2/Watt.
However, given that a fuel cell operates far more consistently than solar PV, the cost of electricity starts looking better. But then again the existing fuel cell technology is not a 100% Renewable technology as it needs natural gas to produce hydrogen.