Hyundai Motor has teamed with H2 Energy to build 1,000 fuel cell-electric trucks for the Swiss market. The commercial trucks will begin rolling out in 2019, which will likely make Hyundai the first company to commercially produce a heavy-duty truck powered by fuel cells.
The new Hyundai truck, teased in mid-September, has been designed in partnership with Swiss hydrogen company H2 Energy. Beginning in 2019, Hyundai and H2E will produce 1,000 units of the heavy-duty fuel cell-electric truck over a five-year period along with a supply chain of renewably-produced hydrogen. A memorandum of understanding between the companies was publicly signed on September 19th.
"We are yet again advancing the field of fuel cell technology in the automotive industry with today's announcement," said Cheol Lee, Executive Vice President and Head of Commercial Vehicle Division, Hyundai Motor. Lee was alluding to Hyundai's first mass-production foray into fuel cell-powered vehicles with the 2014 Hyundai Tucson Fuel Cell crossover and its new Nexo model.
"We will continue to see opportunities for expanding into other [global] markets by carefully monitoring multiple factors such as fuelling infrastructure and governmental policies," Lee continued.
The Hyundai fuel cell commercial truck has a hydrogen-fuelled system that produces 190 kW of power by combining two 95 kW fuel cell stacks in parallel. The truck is expected to have a range of about 400 km (238 miles) per full fill of H2 (Hyundai responded to queries to say that the estimated range is for a fully loaded truck). Eight large hydrogen tanks provide a total fuel capacity of 32.86 kg of hydrogen stored at 350 bar. Fuel tanks can be filled from empty in about seven minutes time.
The fuel cell-electric heavy-duty 4-by-2 cargo truck will be in the 18-ton (34-ton gross vehicle weight) segment, giving it a cargo and trailer capacity of up to 16 tons (14.5 tonnes). The truck measures 9,745 mm (384 inches) with a 5,130 mm (201 inch) wheelbase. It will be powered by a 350 kW (469 hp) traction motor producing up to 3,400 Nm (2,507 pound-feet) of torque.
Also included on the Hyundai commercial heavy-duty fuel cell-electric truck will be advanced safety systems. These include front collision avoidance assist and lane departure warning systems.
Source: Hyundai
