Clean Energy Finance Corporation chief executive Oliver Yates says he is a big fan of hydrogen energy, and believes that right now solar-to-hydrogen fuels in regional Australia would be cheaper at the pump than petrol. All that is missing are the hydrogen fuel cell cars and a refuelling network.

But Yates would like to fix that. “I’m a self-proclaimed hydrogen junkie,” he quipped in a speech to 6th World Hydrogen Technologies Conference in Sydney this week. That was opposed to the overall Australian economy, which he said was a “carbon junkie” and needed to drop its habit of heavy emissions.

Yates has a vision of having hydrogen fuels follow the NBN network around Australia. This, he says, would provide power for the telecoms towers, and also provide a network of fuelling stations that could be used by commercial and heavy vehicles – utes, trucks, buses and even tractors – and at the distances required in regional Australia.

“There is an ability for hydrogen to be a piggy back technology – with one investment, Australia can solve two problems. Can we think that far ahead?”

Yates said that an array of solar panels, with an electrolysed to transform the electricity into hydrogen (just add water and bottle the left over pure oxygen) might be able to deliver fuel at around $1.25 a litre. In areas such as Mt Isa, where fuel had to be trucked vast distances, petrol prices were above $1.40. In other areas, even more.

Yates said that potentially in some remote areas, it would be possible to cut out the costly transportation of fuels. “We have got significant solar resources, and significant wind resources,” Yates said.

“We like the hydrogen space; it is versatile, transportable and flexible and economic in regional Australia right now. It is a very exiting market.”

Yates said that he was also interested in encouraged fleets of fuel cell vehicles, which he said could lower emissions and increase the uptake of renewable energy, as well as increase energy security. Hydrogen had the advantage of being able to generate on site (with solar), store the energy onsite, and provide refuelling on site.

The big challenge was to get the FCVs – fuel cell vehicles – to justify the expense in refuelling infrastructure. In Japan, they have had the same problem – a chicken and egg situation that was only resolved when the big three car manufacturers – Toyota, Honda and Nissan – pledged to build fuel cell vehicles, and the big power companies vowed to provide the infrastructure.

That is now starting to emerge. The Toyota Mirai, which went on sale in Japan this year, has been unveiled in Australia. But it is not on sale here, and not likely to be for several years, although it will be taken to Canberra’s Park Hyatt this week to show to politicians. Hyundai has unveiled a single vehicle in Australia, the ix35, and has even built a refuelling station in Sydney to service that one vehicle.

“Those two vehicles are a key step to realising the transition to low carbon can provide to us all,” Yates said, indicating that the CEFC was interested in financing such developments. “Hydrogen is a new technology, refueling is a new technology. Banks are nervous about financing new technology, and that is where the CEFC can step in.

Australia has a real problem in the transport fuels sector. Currently, it has little or no emissions or fuel standards, although environment minister Greg Hunt is talking about changing that. The NRMA has pointed to the risks of importing nearly all its transport fuels.

Yates says Australia needs to encouraging investment in low or zero emission vehicles. Australia, he said, sells one million vehicles a year, and Australia’s vehicles were the least efficient in the world, with emissions 43 per cent higher than the EU on average.

“In a carbon-constrained economy, we have got a lot of work to do to improve vehicle efficiency standards in Australia.”

One company looking to develop a system of home-or business-based hydrogen refuelling systems in Sefca.

CEO Martin Burns says the technology is expensive and clunky, but no more so than the initial mobile phones.