It makes sense from a production and warehousing point of view. The right-side wheels are always mirror images of the left-side wheels on Honda's show cars, however.
Maybe a stupid question, but has anybody checked that EVERY Clarity has "backwards" wheels on one side, and is it always the right side, or is this a widespread assembly defect?
Every wheel on every Clarity is the same design--it's backwards from the designer's point of view when mounted on the right side of the car. Even the official Clarity accessory wheels on our car come in only one design.
Note how the wheels are mirror images on the Clarity Fuel Cell concept car. They show how the designer modified the design on the left side to be the single design for the production Clarity.