Riversimple, the new British hydrogen car

It looks different, and the whole way it is built and intended to be used is different too.

The Rasa is the product of Riversimple, a company based in Wales. On board they have talent from F1, aerospace and multinational companies. They building a car which will last at least 15 years, has few moving parts and is intended to be rented rather than bought. That’s a different way of doing things.

At the heart of the project is the goal of building and running cars with minimal impact on the environment, from sourcing the materials to make the cars, to running them on the road.

Huge Spowers is the founder of Riversimple, and he took inspiration from Lotus. With experience of designing and building race cars himself, Spowers has gone for low weight as one way of keeping consumption of everything down. The two-seater weighs just 580kg. There is extensive use of carbonfibre, aluminium and sustainably sourced carbonfibre reinforced plastic and glassfibre reinforced polymer body panels.

Motive power comes from a small hydrogen fuel cell that only weighs 19kg. The 8.5kW cell pumps electricity to a motor at each wheel, with a healthy equivalent of 443lb ft of torque. The cell only produces electricity and water so there are no gaseous emissions whatsoever.

There are only 18 moving parts in the drivetrain, so wear and tear should be minimal. Instead of being built so that you’ll need to buy spares and replacements at regular intervals, the Rasa is built to last 15 years at least. But buying and running the car is not the business model.

Riversimple are aiming for a model where you rent the car, or get involved with car sharing. More than that, they’re going to open source all of their research and development, so that anyone can contribute to develop the technology. There are clear risks in such a plan, but Spowers is confident they can stay as development leaders.

Another stumbling block is the lack of refilling stations, but Riversimple is rolling out a beta test programme where they are giving 20 cars away in city locations. This too should speed up the process, with fresh experience and insights coming in from all over the country. The hope then is that those centres become strong enough to justify building a hydrogen fuel station there.

As it stands, the car is still in development phase, but it’s remarkably sporty for a car with such green credentials. Doubtless this is down to Spowers’ back story, but it really is like a small sports car. There is only forward and reverse, so it’s simple to drive and performed well in an urban environment.

The handling and ride are a touch too sporty but these aspects will be made more comfortable and accommodating for production vehicles. If all goes well, then there will be a production run of 3500 vehicles in 2018.