Honda's FCX, its experimental fuel cell based car, is now legal to drive on the streets of Japan. This is the second-generation fuel cell model, as the earlier version had a hard time with cold weather. The work to get the fuel cells working in freezing conditions had the useful side effect of increasing their overall efficiency by 20%.

Interestingly, second generation Honda FCX cars could already be found on the road -- but in the US. Last month, Green Car Congress reported that the state of New York took delivery of two cold weather FCX for testing, joining several cities in California and the Los Angeles region's South Coast Air Quality Management District. That brought the number of FCX on the road in the US to a dozen; let's see how many now show up in Japan.