Ford is hard at work exploring more avenues of hydrogen technology, as evidenced by a patent published by the European Patent Office that CarBuzz discovered. Therein, the Blue Oval details a mounting system for a hydrogen fuel cell vehicle's tank. As you may know, hydrogen is a relatively volatile element that must be stored at high pressure. The tank has to be very strong indeed, as this can expand while being filled and contract as the hydrogen is depleted through consumption.

To improve the durability of the tank, Ford's invention sees the tank essentially made up of two parts, one of which can slide out to increase capacity as the tank is filled and can slide back in as the tank drains, thereby ensuring that the hydrogen remains pressurized at the optimal level.

The nitty-gritty of the patent need not be discussed here, but it's relatively similar to one we discovered from BMW, where multiple small tanks can shift individually within their casings.

Our focus is that this indicates Ford's continued interest in hydrogen technology, following a patent discovered by Muscle Cars & Trucks roughly a year ago. In that document, Ford described a turbocharged combustion engine fed by hydrogen.

This patent discusses hydrogen fuel cell technology, indicating that Ford is looking at all avenues. But why does Ford care about hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles (FCEV) when it has several all-electric vehicles in production and development?

Battery electric vehicles (BEVs) like the Mustang Mach-E and F-150 Lightning can service the masses. Still, there is plenty of real-world evidence to prove that BEVs are highly impractical for towing, particularly for customers of Super Duty vehicles, many of whom require at least 10,000 pounds of sustained towing capacity.

Ford CEO Jim Farley said as much late last year while explaining why this range of heavy-hitting workhorses won't utilize BEV technology anytime soon: "If you're pulling 10,000 lbs, an electric truck is not the right solution. And 95% of our customers tow more than 10,000 lbs. This is a really important segment for our country, and it will probably go hydrogen fuel cell before it goes pure electric."

Thus, we suspect this patent, which appears to use a box frame chassis, is aimed specifically at an F-250 Super Duty FCEV.

That said, if hydrogen technology continues to improve, there's no reason it can't someday be adapted to your Explorer.