View source for How much is this development influenced by oil prices?

At a certain moment the price of oil will rise to an extreme high level. This will stimulate the use of alternative fuels and the development of its technology. It is likely the the transition will go very smooth. The creation of a hydrogen society will take some more 50 years. technology still has to be developed to make it cheaper, more efficient and reliable. The first H2 fuel cars are expected to go in mass production around 2020. So it is more the developent of the technology that determines than the oil price. Of course when we run out of oil faster that expected the investments to change over  will be automatically increase. However the time period 2005-2020 will be focused on improving technology to make it able to compete with the fossil fueled vehicles.