 And welcome to Stan The Energy Man here on Think Tech, who I am, Stan Osserman. And I'm coming to use live and direct from retirement here in Honolulu. And nobody ever told me how busy retirement can be. And I've already tiled one bedroom, just finished the grout ceiling today. Cutting grass, mopping floors, doing laundry, time and stuff is kind of tough. But I'm also talking to a few folks, I'm still doing hydrogen stuff on the side. This Thursday we're taking a film crew out to the Big Island to look at Blue Planet Ranch. And look at their hydrogen setup, hopefully that'll be in a documentary here shortly. Working with a couple of other consultants on projects in Japan and here in Honolulu. And looking forward to doing the work I can to help decarbonize the city and county and state of Hawaii, the city and county of Honolulu and state of Hawaii. Today's a really great show for me, and I'm bringing back a guest that I haven't talked to for a while. But he's been a critical part of bringing hydrogen technology to the state of Hawaii. His company is US Hybrid. They're in Torrance, California, right there in beautiful downtown Los Angeles. And Vasco Darzi is the president and CEO of US Hybrid. But his checkered history is just incredible. He does everything from teaching at the university to history and some aviation companies and windmills, wind turbines. And he does an incredibly detailed job of building hydrogen vehicles, especially large class eight hydrogen fuel cell vehicles. So, Vas, great to have you on the show today. It's been too long since I talked to you, and I'm glad you could be on the show. Aloha, Stan. It's my pleasure to be on the show. Thank you so much. And Aloha to all the audience. I miss Hawaii, and after you tell me about all the fun about retirement, maybe I should just think about continuing working and don't even think about retirement. Anyway, there's still a couple of lots on the big island near where I'm gonna be building my house, so you have to come over and check it out. I may just become your guest as much the way you mention about all this tile work, I may just become your guest and it's not going to be time for myself. All right. Well, Vas, could you tell the audience a little bit about your background and how you ended up running US hybrid, you know, taking over and running it? Well, all my education has been about electric vehicle. I reproduced the first batch of electric vehicle back in 1982. My master, my PhD, everything has been about electric powertrain. Everything has been about how to make the electric motor more compact to make it more efficient. Because all the fuel economy, all of the emission reduction is really due to the electric powertrain, and I can get more into this thing. So I did that, then when I graduated, I took a teaching position at Calisthen San Francisco, and I became an associate professor. But after a couple years, it was not really at the pace I want to be. Then I got involved with the windmills, and then I did a lot of work on electric vehicles for General Motors way before. But then Hughes Aircraft took over EV1 program and they asked me to come and lead that. Then I came and I was a technical director of General Motor EV1. That's when I just said, OK, enough of university, I'm going to move to Los Angeles and take this as the first global production vehicle. And it was in many ways a major milestone to break the perception of audience on what the electric motor can do. So the EV1 performance even today is compatible to Tesla per pound. However, that was 1989. That was a little bit ahead of his time. Fortunately, I was involved with the ZEV initial mandate to show about feasibility of the electric drivetrain. That's really how I got deep into design and production for manufacturing at a larger scale for OEM. Then when General Motor decided to spin off views, this is Hughes Power Control in Torrance, we had the choice to go and work at Detroit or not. And I decided not and open started US Hybrid. This is started US Hybrid with a focus specifically on nothing but the efficient zero emission power trains for vehicle and focus with the commercial vehicle. Why commercial vehicle? Because the operators is smart. The mission vehicle's mission is clear. You know what the vehicle has to do. You can quantify emission, fuel, everything to the customer because it's used and it's used 10, 12, 14 hours. So the saving you get both in emission reduction and in fuel consumption reduction accumulates quickly. Whereas a passenger vehicle may drive 20 minutes, one hour, half an hour, and it's random. So that was really how we got involved with this. Yeah, Boss, can you do me a favor? Because one of the real epiphanies that you fostered in me was the concept of hybrid drivetrains. In other words, you explained to me the efficiency of an internal combustion engine, how bad it was, especially accelerating, decelerating, and why a hybrid drivetrain is so much better. And that people need to understand that a hybrid drivetrain is basically an electric drivetrain, but it gets its electricity from different sources, either batteries or generators or fuel cells. So could you kind of explain that logic? I know you focus on the big vehicles, but man, when you told me about the reason that hybrids are so good, it just was a real eye-opener for me. Absolutely. Many people, the purpose of hybrid is to make the combustion engine more efficient. Combustion engine is most efficient when it's full throttle. However, when you let the throttle go, then it becomes less efficient. And while you're behind the traffic, you start just to keep consuming power or fuel. So those are major problems. Imagine if our cell phone screen would not go to sleep, then the cell phone would become useless because it would not be able to have sufficient energy on board. So with a hybrid, we can downsize the engine so the engine is more efficient. And also, when I'm parked behind a stoplight or something, the engine can shut down. If I'm just crawling, like my wife, going into a Starbucks drive-in, then the electric can do that job. However, when you get into a highway and you need to go from city A to city B, then the engine kicks in. An example of that is the Toyota Prius. So what the Toyota Prius hybrid is, is making the engine more efficient. However, still, all the energy is coming from combustion. So the next thing to do, and by the way, when we take a big engine and we downsize it, we don't sacrifice performance. We add electric to compensate for that power. So when you think about Lexus, for example, Lexus basically took the same engine but added more horsepower to it because a typical user of Lexus like to see the power. Whereas Toyota downsized the engine to a 1.2-liter or 1.6-liter engine doing the job of a 3.5-liter engine. Yet the fuel economy of double or triple or fuel economy of a 1.0-liter engine. So that is the fundamental of transportation. Bottom line is traffic is not going away. So what we are doing, we are decoupling traffic from good use. Half of our energy and more than 60% of our emission is due to traffic. Now, some people think trains are more efficient than trucks for cargo. That's not true, but they are more efficient because they have no stop. They just keep going. Therefore, they're more efficient because they have no traffic. So what hybrid does, it decouples traffic from good use. So it doesn't matter what type of traffic you have, you will still get your fuel economy. And that is a key point. Now, we did hybrids and we did battery electric and back then we had lead acid battery, then we had nickel-matter hydride and then recently and lately everything is around lithium-ion. But even believe it or not, we use silver zinc. We use zinc-based batteries which are very high energy but it's a very low power density because it does not give you the power. It's designed to give you a very small nozzle. So we did all of that. Now the battery technology has come to improve better. That means we used to use terms at General Motor called battery to car weight ratio. We used to be at 50, 50%. An example of that is Tesla. Tesla made the vehicle light weight so the battery is actually more dominant weight of the parts. So in any case, we did all of that and now the question becomes the most efficient powertrain is electric and our train has been electric. Our trains, people don't know that, our trains are hybrid. I have a huge engine driving a generator then I have electric motor on every power cart, not every cart, but every power cart. So electric powertrain has been therefore is a main workhorse. Now we are applying that into transportation. So the question becomes, do I use a gasoline engine and natural gas engine, a diesel engine? Do I use a bigger battery or do I use a fuel cell hydrogen? So this is the fuel side and that is a powertrain side. So optimizing powertrain is the key technology is what has enabled this industry. Now we can focus on energy source. See if you have that liberty. Now we can focus about energy source. Why hydrogen? Why diesel? Why natural gas? Or some other people use other technologies whether it's air, this or that. But nevertheless, the focus of powertrain is one technology and optimizing it. The focus of energy source is another and we have the liberty to look at the customers and how the customer uses the vehicle and say, okay, go with the battery or go with the fuel cell or go with the natural gas because let's face it, in our country today natural gas is American fuel. It is much cleaner than diesel, but it's not as efficient. So if you can make that more efficient by making it hybrid, which we have done basically we took a natural gas engine. Many people don't know that. When you take an engine and you make a natural gas you lose about 30%, 40% of your torque and power. So what we do, we add 200% power. So now suddenly you have a natural gas engine, nine liter and we add 380 horsepower electric. Now you have 650 horsepower which is outperforming at 15 liter diesel at 80,000 pound. This is a full size truck. So there is no limitation in the ability of electric drive. Really it's all about how do we get the return on your investment? What is the value proposition for the user? What benefit would the operator get from it? Yes, operator loves the environment, operator loves to be clean, but at the end of the day he needs to have or he or she needs to have a share of the pie. So we have to make it first, more fuel efficient, second cleaner. Otherwise without making it more fuel efficient such that operating cost is lower people will not take you just because you're clean. That is what many people miss is that our powertrain is two times, three times more efficient which means one third or one half the greenhouse gas at minimum. And if you make that engine cleaner then I will have one fifth or one eighth of the cleanest gas, greenhouse gas, all right? Now let me just sideline for you a little bit. If you take a natural gas engine as we have done with a class A truck this is 80,018 wheeler, couldn't get any bigger. Literally in California, if your truck is bigger you cannot drive over the highway. Of course in Michigan, you can go to 120,000 pound that's different story. But given our bridges in California given our roads in California, you cannot do that. So by making that natural gas, by making it hybrid we reduce the greenhouse gas by 65%. We reduce the carbon footprint by that much, about 60%. So we are already at the estate target and we don't sacrifice any performance. Now that is only a transitional phase. Right. And right now the natural gas is relatively cheap so it's also more economical. Yeah, Vas, we're gonna take a quick break here and we'll be back in 60 seconds and we'll let you continue on but you had some really important points. We need to be economical but natural gas, it's CH4. It's one carbon atom and four hydrogen atoms. It's gotta be cleaner than all that oil and diesel. So we'll be back in 60 seconds. Thank you. Aloha, my name is Victoria and I'm a host at the Adventures in Small Business. This is a collaboration between US Small Business Administration Hawaii District Office and its partners where we showcase the stories of local entrepreneurs in small businesses, talk about how to start a business talk about great tips for small business owners. Please join us every Thursday, 11 a.m. at Think Tech, Hawaii. Can you sir? Mahalo. Hello, I'm Mofi Hanuman. I wanna tell you about a great show that appears on Think Tech, Hawaii. It's all about tourism. In fact, we call it Tourism 101 where we talk about the issues and challenges that faces our number one industry throughout the state. We'll have some interesting guests, very informative dialogue and allow you an opportunity to maybe learn a little bit more by why this industry is so important for our state. It's been great for us in the past. We need it today and especially going forward. That's Tourism 101 on Think Tech, Hawaii. Mahalo. Welcome back to Stan Energyman here live and direct from downtown Honolulu. I'm Stan Osman talking to Abbas Gadarzi from US Hybrid. So Abbas, I had to cut you off there for the break but you really got me all excited again because natural gas on the mainland is relatively cheap and much cleaner like you say than running diesel. We've been talking to Joe Pratt who used to work at Sandia and he's building a new ferry in San Francisco that runs on hydrogen. And that brought to mind how energy intensive it is to move a ship or a boat through the water because water doesn't compress so you don't coast very well in water as soon as the power comes off the boat wants to stop. So how does this hybrid, if traffic impacts vehicles how does the hybrid technology help with ocean going vehicles? Well, the ocean going vehicle are a different story. If you look at the tugboat hybrid applies to tugboat perfectly because they are there to do a momentary job and then they set aside for a long time. But when you think about an ocean going vessel especially if it's moving cargo then it is really energy consuming. Then your power train has to be really, really efficient. You have to give the efficiency proposition. Clean proposition is not sufficient because nobody is regulating that marine vessel outside of the port boundaries. Of course, during the port even a port of LA or port of Long Beach once they get into the port area they are regulated and they're watched let's not get to that in detail. Now, however, if you have entertainment ferry for all these tourist type then hybrid applies to that. But when we talk about a container ship it's a different story. Now, when we talk about cruise ship we could consider hybrid and actually have positive return on investment. That means we get our monies back. But when you talk about a container's movement vessel it is so, so economically challenged. Margin are so low. And as you know a couple of years ago there was a two or three major ship or one bankrupt because they don't have the money to invest in capital equipment to become more efficient so they can recap it in five years or 10 years. All right? Thanks a lot. I'm sorry, go ahead. I was going to say that but you mentioned that in the ports the vessels are regulated and that brings up one of your projects that you're working on now in port of Los Angeles and Port of Long Beach is the federal government and state of California are starting to really buckle down on emissions in the ports not from the ship so much although they're doing that but also all the vehicles that move all the cargo away from the ships and take them around. So why don't you talk to us a little bit about that project? Absolutely. California, especially Southern California especially South Coast where the Los Angeles Pasadena these areas are one of the really worst polluted area because it's called non-attainment. How many days in a year is your emission in air so bad that children cannot go to the school or asthma becomes severe? So emission in the port does not stay in the port. It goes into the next block, next highway, next mile and so on so and the way the wind pattern is it collects all of that into communities that are really, really adversely impacted by that pollution. So California has to clean his air to have less they be fully compliant so it does not have days that does not meet the federal emission standard otherwise they have to pay huge penalty. So this is a direct one-to-one money. Therefore, passenger vehicles have become very clean. These trucks, they are the major contributor to Southern California emission and because they are concentrated they are making a huge negative impact to the communities in that neighborhood on 710 or 110, these are the highways that goes to Port of LA or Port of Long Beach. The neighborhood around there asthma is bad and so on so so therefore the whole California community has to do something about it and that starts with cleaning the port first, cleaning the trucks second, cleaning the ships and all the marine vehicles third and then of course before all of this California clean the industry. That was the major thing they did. Now transportation is coming after that. So it's a big effort, why is it big? Because when you do a passenger car you may drive in one hour or two hours. These truckers drive 14 hours, 16 hours. Now we get into why hydrogen? Because when you do have a battery truck it's a tractor that means you have a very, very confined area. It's not a truck that you can trade payload to battery. No, it's a tractor that has finite otherwise you cannot hitch to the trailer. And if you make that battery then you have limited range. Hydrogen has the same zero emission but it has much more density. So the guy who is driving the truck or the truck driver, guy or the girl makes no difference. They can run two shifts or three shifts and then it takes them five or 10 minutes to recharge or refuel. Whereas if they go battery they may have to freeze their asset during the charging. So many people think the battery and fuel cell are competing technology. In fact, no, they are 100% complimentary. One applies to one area just because the way the user uses it. Whereas the other one, like a hydrogen applies to the other category, the way the vehicle is used and the mission that it has to have. If you don't have to have more than one shift, if you have plenty of downtime, if your truck or bus has a home to go to so they can plug in, then battery is fine. But if you have to go to shift, what are you gonna do? That's where you see battery is starting to have a problem because I have to use a second shift to charge. I cannot have two shifts. So these are the things that are impacting how we interface with the customers and what we recommend to them so they can see the perceived value to them. Okay, we're gonna bring up your first image of us so you can talk about your hydrogen drivetrain, your hybrid drivetrain. So basically what you have here is where engine used to be. Now you have a fuel cell engine. Now remember, fuel cell engine is just like an engine. It uses the same turbocharger that we use for air. It uses the same injector as we use in irregular engines. So where used to be a combustion engine, now we have an engine that has no combustion. It has zero emission. Going forward 10 years, 20 years down the line, I don't have to worry about this vehicle having any emission. Then the same tank that used to be natural gas, now it's hydrogen. So if you look from outside and inside, it's 100% transparent to the driver operator. One another confusing item that it goes on in the industry is people think that fuel cell or battery would displace the rest of the technology. That is not the case. Basically the supply chain, all the truck, all the fueling storage, most of the components are a lot in common. So we're talking about supply chain, supplying a different product, not going out of business. This is not floppy drive versus flash drive that you can see the whole industry going to be wiped out. That is really a big fear factor that we have to work on and educate people to say that, hey, economically, it's not going to disturb the community. It's not going to create a losing job, except it's going to create a better value job, higher paid job, different job, cleaner job with no social guilt. Right. Let's throw a picture up of a finished product, what the truck looks like, because as you point out to the driver, it's really transparent. It still has the same or more torque. It has the same range. It fills up with fuel just as quickly as a gasoline diesel or even a natural gas vehicle. If I take that label from that truck, the driver would not know if this is fuel cell or natural gas vehicle. If he or she does not open the hood, it will not know that. And we go out of our way to make it transparent to the driver, so additional training is not needed. On top of that, we have to provide the design to the fire department. So during the emergency issues, emergency risk, emergency handling, they know how to handle this. So therefore, we try to have the least disturbance to the operator. Remember, our number one job is to deliver to customer what they need to make a living, to deliver to customer what they need because that's what they use to make a living. So that is not compromisable. We try to do that while being efficient and being clean to the environment. All right. We're coming up close to the end of our time here, Abbas. So I tell you what, if I can get a commitment from you, I'd actually like to have you back on in a couple of weeks to talk about hydrogen safety because you brought that up and you brought up training the firemen and everything. But that's one of the other big hurdles besides the perception of a less capable drive train if you're not running diesel. The other thing is safety. People have a real big misconception about hydrogen safety. So I'm gonna probably have to have you back on and talk about that for a bit. But I wanna- It would be my pleasure anytime. All right. I wanna thank you so much for being on the show today and sharing with us a little bit about, you know, what you're up to in the drainage trucks and the port trucks. And I know you're doing a lot more stuff and you've got the emails to prove it, but we'll get back with you in a couple of weeks and we'll talk hydrogen safety and we'll talk about some of the other things you're working on. But thanks again so much for being on the show. It is my pleasure. Thank you. Okay, Abbas Aloha and for the rest of you, we'll see you next week on Stand Energy Man, Allah. Mahalo.