Sixt CEO wants hydrogen fuel station subsidies
FRANKFURT, Sept 7 (Reuters) - The chief executive of German car rental firm Sixt AG (SIXG.DE) supported hydrogen-fuelled cars in a newspaper interview on Sunday and made a plea for state support to build up a network of filling stations.
"Politicians must finally bring themselves to throw their weight behind a certain technology (alluding to hydrogen cars) ... we need more financial support," he told the Sunday paper Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung.
Sixt said he believed the technology had more environmental merits than natural gas-fuelled cars, for which the network of filling stations was also too small, and superior to electric cars, whose range he said was too small for business travellers.
Hydrogen fuel technology is years from being launched at large scale in Europe, but the U.S. state of California is building a filling-station network and hopes to inspire other mass car markets such as India and China with its initiative.
Sixt, one of Germany's leading car rental firms, still saw two-thirds of its customers opting for big limousines as their employers paid fuel costs, he said.
"Change can only come with subsidies. You can also do it with tax relief," Sixt said.
Profits at his firm would suffer in this year's economic downturn, he said, which would be the trigger for a greater focus on overseas markets including Australia.
Sixt has said its pretax profits this year will fall to between 115 and 125 million euros ($178.8 million) from 137 million in 2007. (Reporting by Vera Eckert; Editing by Quentin Bryar)
