Hydrogen fuel cell trucks will represent 17pc of European sales in 2030, or 59,500 units, according to a December report commissioned by the EU’s Fuel Cells and Hydrogen Joint Undertaking (FCH JU).

By the same year, 100,000 hydrogen-powered trucks and 1,500 refuelling stations will be deployed across Europe, the 62 signatories to a November Hydrogen Europe statement pledged. These signatories include automakers, fuel cell and other hydrogen technology suppliers, hydrogen refuelling and infrastructure providers, and truck operators.

Yet demand so far remains minimal. In Germany—which can make a strong claim to be Europe’s hydrogen leader—there were just 49 hydrogen buses and one heavy-duty truck on the country’s roads in 2020, along with 979 cars, according to H2 Mobility, which is building Germany’s nationwide hydrogen infrastructure.

Standards uncertainty

H2 Mobility’s initial remit was to build out refuelling infrastructure for passenger vehicles, delivering hydrogen at a pressure of 700-bar. But slow consumer adoption of fuel cell cars, largely due to automakers only offering expensive vehicles, led the company to reorientate its strategy. It pivoted to also provide refuelling facilities for buses, which use 350-bar, and trucks, which may be built to accept the fuel at various pressures. Around ten of its 90 stations have been redesigned to enable bus and truck refuelling. Each station cost an average of €1.4mn ($1.69mn) to build from scratch.

“The biggest challenge is that the world seems to have fallen in love with Elon Musk” Bamford, Ryse

The lack of standardisation over the pressure required by heavy-duty trucks is one of the main difficulties in building out refuelling infrastructure, says H2 Mobility communication manager Sybille Riepe.

There are still discussions “over whether it is going to be 350, 500, 700-bar or [even] liquid”, she says, noting the large storage capacity of buses enables them to use the cheaper 350-bar standard. “You can just put the tanks on the roof, so it is not taking up any space inside.”

H2 Mobility delivered 17,070kg of hydrogen to buses in 1,189 refuelling visits, plus 107,303kg to cars in 38,580 visits, during 2020. Based on 90 operational stations, each received on average 1.2 refuelling visits per day. “You cannot earn money from hydrogen refuelling at the moment,” says Riepe.

Excluding Germany, there are just ten hydrogen refuelling stations for trucks and buses in Europe—three in the Netherlands, and one in each of Scotland, Belgium, France, Spain, Switzerland, Italy and the Czech Republic.

Denmark’s Everfuel supplies hydrogen to the Dutch province of South Holland for its fleet of hydrogen fuel cell buses. Initially comprising four buses, its fleet is set to expand to 24 by end-2021. As part of its 12-year contract, the company will build a refuelling station in Heinenoord, a town 10km south of the port city of Rotterdam.

The European Investment Bank loaned Everfuel €20.7mn in December, to commercialise hydrogen production for use by public and heavy-duty fuel cell vehicles. Everfuel will initially offtake hydrogen from chemical plants but it intends to move over to green hydrogen as soon as it is practical. It signed a contract with Nel at the end of December to build a 20MW electrolyser, to be operational mid-2022.

By contrast, H2 Mobility already sources 28pc of its hydrogen via renewable energy or biogas, while 30pc is offtake from chemical plants and 42pc comes from natural gas. “This will change, but it will take two-to-eight years to get 100pc renewable hydrogen,” says Riepe.

“You cannot earn money from hydrogen refuelling at the moment” Riepe, H2 Mobility

H2 Mobility—co-owned by Air Liquide, Daimler, Linde, OMV, Shell and Total—has received funding from Germany’s transport ministry and the European Commission. It is not permitted to produce its own hydrogen, as per the terms agreed by its shareholders.

Much of H2 Mobility’s hydrogen remains delivered by train or truck, while it trials pipeline deliveries in Cologne. In Brunsbuettel, near Hamburg, it has built a refuelling station next to a windfarm that is directly connected to an electrolyser.

“We are looking into different storage technologies… [including] having it transported to the station as liquid hydrogen and also stored there in liquid form,” adds Riepe. “We are trying to participate in finding new technologies.”

Liquid hydrogen, stored at -253°C, may be a viable refuelling option for trucks by 2030, the FCH JU report notes, recommending the construction of a refuelling network along Europe’s major routes that leaves no more than 150km between refuelling stations.

Bus route rollout

In the UK, Oxford’s Ryse Hydrogen is planning to build green hydrogen production facilities in Canterbury, Kent and on the outskirts of Glasgow in Scotland. These will have a combined initial capacity of up to 18MW and will use electricity from solar PV installations as well as on- and offshore windfarms.

Ryse, which finances and builds refuelling stations on behalf of corporate customers, will transport the hydrogen to its own refuelling stations via truck.

“We are a one-stop-shop—if you want a zero-emissions solution that does everything a diesel bus will do, that [answer] is hydrogen. And we would do everything—planning permission, developing a site, connecting a site, the whole works,” says Jo Bamford, the founder and chairman of Ryse.

“The biggest challenge is that the world seems to have fallen in love with Elon Musk. Yet the reality is batteries are very good for certain things—but the bigger and heavier they are, the more problematic they become.”

39,769 – Refuellings by H2 Mobility’s 90 refuelling stations during 2020

Bamford is also the chairman of Northern Irish bus manufacturer Wrightbus, which he rescued from administration in 2019 with the aim of building demand for hydrogen. Wrightbus has sold 15 hydrogen buses to the Scottish city of Aberdeen and 20 to each of the English cities of Birmingham and London.

“The real difficulty with hydrogen is how to marry up supply and demand. The thing I like about buses is that, if I have 200 buses returning to a depot to fill up each day, I have got demand. And if I have got demand, I can produce hydrogen,” says Bamford.

A four-year pilot scheme in Aberdeen put six hydrogen fuel cell buses and a refuelling station into commercial operation. Concluded in March 2019, the buses were available 80pc of the time, below diesel buses’ 85-95pc. The pilot also found that refuelling speed must be increased, and energy consumption at the refuelling station improved, if they are to operate with the same costs as diesel equivalents.

Around 60 filling stations in Britain provide fuel for 80pc of the country’s trucks, Bamford estimates. “It is not that difficult to convert 60 filling stations to offer hydrogen,” he says. “It is the same across Europe.”

Bamford describes hydrogen refuelling stations as “science experiments” due to their slow rollout. “They are not productionised. Batteries have been productionised and their costs have fallen significantly. Over the next five years, every part of the hydrogen supply chain will go down [in cost] very quickly, as they get productionised.”

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Author: Matt Smith