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The significance of this concept vehicle is that it is but one of many shown this year, of which the most important may well have been the Toyota 1/x. The development cycle for cars is 3-5 years when no new technology is included; the Prius is 10 years old and Ford and GM still can't build one. So what the Crosscage and others mean is we are seeing better-funded more enlightened companies start to gear up for low-carbon vehicles and fuels. Some like the Vectrix and pretty soon the Tesla are available today at a high cost. The consumer-viable ones will follow. In particular we should watch the exploding markets in China and India, though we should also be aware that a plateau on oil production and high oil prices could ironically bring innovation to a halt there. I have some more discussion at Jawfish.

Aren't motorcycles already far more efficient than cars? They get 80 miles/gallon.
So is there a necessity to improve mileage?

The battery is a fuel cell that is available today and works well. Electric motors have 100% torque at zero rpm. They are extremely efficient and the "fuel" is available in every home. Hydrogen is not a primary fuel source, but an energy transfer mechanism. Thus when all of the costs associated are tabulated, it loses to other more efficient energy transfer mechanisms, such as electric power generation, especially when distributed solar becomes well established.

People buy motorcycles for sound. They will have to add an artificial sound as speed increases so the driver gets some feedback or he/she will fail to gage speed properly. That with no hydroden fueling stations (who wants to use up garage space let alone pay for one), make this a loser.

Also, fuel cells aren't zero-emissions. It takes hydrogen to make electricity, so unless you get all of your electricty from nuclear, wind, solar, or hydro, you are using greenhouse gasses. It also takes water to make hydrogen and it is starting to become more scarce (the same problem we have with switching to ethanol).

This is a certain loser. Who wants a motorcycle which is quiet like a mouse?

You can make hydrogen at home. Requirements: Electricity and water.

Doesn't seem like a show-stopper to me.

However, in the general case, full-electric vehicles are better; ultracaps a la' EEStor will make a far more attractive package. Deceleration and braking energies are recoverable, ultracaps won't wear out, they provide higher currents than batteries (both charge and discharge.) A few years of engineering HV to low voltage converters into the practical range, much as switching power supplies evolved, and I expect electric vehicles will dominate quite easily.

Presuming EEStor comes through, or something like what they promise shows up from another quarter.

Because batteries... speaking as an engineer, batteries are inconvenient, temperature sensitive, limited charge/discharge regime, obfuscatory as to actual charge state and actual condition, heavy, and ecologically speaking, a nightmare.

Hydrogen transport and storage is problematic; it leaks through just about anything, and we have to remember that its role is storage, like a battery or ultracap -- it doesn't create energy, as it takes a great deal of energy to *get* hydrogen, and you don't win in the conversion back to energy. Better to make it at home on demand. what to do when you're away from home... a unit on the bike that will do the job? Just add water and AC, and wait?