Francistown — Toyota engineers are busy working on a next generation eco-friendly car running on fuel cells.

Toyota Motor Corporation president, Katsuaki Watanabe told reporters recently that when they started the research and development of the fuel cars, some people predicted that they might be commercialized by around 2010. "But that's difficult," he said.

"The technological advances are significant. The only problem is the cost."

Japanese companies have been working to create a viable car that would produce electricity through a chemical reaction between hydrogen and oxygen, leaving water as the only by product.

Last year Toyota reported success in a test of a fuel-cell car, the FCHV, which was driven about 560 km on a single filling and finished with 30% of the hydrogen still in the tank.

This technology will take a long time for motorists to use since they would need hydrogen filling stations to be put up first. Watanabe said; "It will probably be a long way ahead until we can start mass production, considering problems linked to difficulties in how to stock hydrogen and where to draw hydrogen from.

"It'll take a long time to solve these problems, but we will definitely commercialise it as I believe it is a promising power source."