Hydrogen vehicles for Qatar: Optimizing incentives through a life cycle cost analysis

The work introduces a life cycle cost (LCC) comparison between gasoline, electric, and hydrogen fuel cell vehicles (HFCVs) and optimizes policy instruments to close the gap between HFCVs and other technologies within Qatar context. Python modeling is used for data integration and LCC calculation, accounting for key economic, performance, and environmental factors. While linear programing is applied to optimize the policy instrument mix, using the LCC value as the objective function. Initially, the baseline yields a 15% difference between HFCVs' and battery electric vehicles' (BEVs) LCCs and a 9% gap between the latter and internal combustion engine vehicles (ICEVs). Afterward, environmental tax, gasoline, vehicle purchase tax, hydrogen fuel subsidy, and HFCV purchase incentive are established. The results reflect that tax implementation increases ICEVs LCCs by up to 16.52%, while HFCVs benefit from incentives, lowering their LCC by 29%. Lastly, to eliminate the HFCVs-ICEVs gap, an 80% fuel subsidy combined with a 20% purchase incentive is required, while to bridge the HFCV-BEV gap, a 17.93% purchase incentive is necessary. Furthermore, to enable HFCV adoption, the necessity for policy instruments declines over time, being unnecessary after 20 years.