"I don't think it's critical to be first," says Steve Ellis, manager of fuel-cell marketing for American Honda Motor Co.

"But maybe it's more important than what is first is done with extremely high quality and (with) products that leave a positive lasting impression on the customer."

Regardless of who's first, fuel-cell cars will make up only a fraction of the auto market for two or more decades, says Ellis. And automakers likely won't sell them profitably for some time.

Honda unveiled its FCX hydrogen-fuel cell concept car at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit last January and announced it would produce a model based on the show car within three or four years.

It's in a race with other major automakers to bring the zero-emission technology to dealer showrooms.

Honda, like its competitors, has a small fleet of early-generation FCX cars mostly in the hands of fleet customers to test the technology over a long term.

Some 15 of the tall, boxy hatchbacks are trundling around California and New York and another dozen are in Asia.

It brought a handful of the cars to Vancouver for this week's Globe 2006 environmental business conference.

Fuel cells produce electricity by chemically breaking down hydrogen. When pure hydrogen is used, the only byproducts are heat and water, although some pollution is produced if fuels such as gasoline are used to make the hydrogen.

Honda was an early licensee of fuel-cell stack technology developed by Vancouver-based Ballard Power Systems.

But eventually, like Toyota and General Motors, Honda struck out on its own, though Ellis says some Ballard-based Hondas are still operating.

Fuel-cell stacks are the heart of a fuel-cell car, says Ellis, and engine development is at the core of Honda's self-image, so going it alone was a logical choice.