It didn't catch on because it's stupid on multiple levels, from infrastructure engineering to realpolitik. Japan as a nation is just desperate for energy independence and pretending the hydrogen will be sourced from the expensive electrolysis and not cheap natural gas refinement was a way to get free government money.

They convinced themselves that all the petrostates, which includes America and Russia, would just abandon their current economic advantage to pay them billions of dollars to rebuild their entire vehicle fuel infrastructure, since they would be the industry leaders and the only major source of engineering knowhow.

It doesn't matter. What matters is the guy is tamping and cramming all the bulls he can find into the oil business China shop when the rest of the world leads in clean energy. When the dust settles, my guess is people will still be cold in winter and hot in summer and will still not care about where their energy comes from.

...you must be a graduate of my FAMILY accounting course, any problems with that?..menaces