Hydrogen-powered truck manufacturer Hyzon Motors intends to bring its first locally built prime movers to Australian roads this year as it raises its bet on the technology’s ability to compete with purely battery-powered vehicles in decarbonising long-haul transport.
The United States-based start-up has designed and assembled the first of its fleet of hydrogen-powered prime movers – commercial trucks used to tow semi-trailers – at its Noble Park manufacturing site in Melbourne’s south-east.
US-based Hyzon Motors has developed a zero-emissions hydrogen fuel cell-powered prime mover that has been designed and built at its assembly plant in MelbourneCredit: Eddie Jim
As heavy emitters across the country trial hydrogen technology as one of the options to lower their vehicle emissions footprints and target net-zero emissions, Hyzon will pitch the 200-kilowatt fuel-cell system to Australian fleet owners as a solution to a “uniquely Australian” problem: how to ferry heavier payloads over longer distances without generating emissions.
“We look forward to working with transport operators across Australia and New Zealand as we move forward with the decarbonisation of our transport sector,” Hyzon’s managing director for Australia, John Edgley, said before an event to unveil the model at Melbourne’s Kangan Institute on Tuesday.
Hydrogen fuel cells, which emit only water vapour, are seen as a promising tool to help decarbonise heavy transport and potentially other industries as long as the process to manufacture the hydrogen is emissions-free.
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Electric vehicles account for more than 7 per cent of new car sales in Australia, but heavy vehicles have been harder to turn green. Hyzon is one of several start-ups promoting hydrogen fuel cells’ potential as a more viable option for long-haul trucking than rechargeable batteries, which are large and heavy, and need more downtime for recharging.
However, high barriers to the uptake of hydrogen-powered commercial vehicles loom, including the prohibitively high cost of the technology compared with traditional diesel-engine vehicles.
Other hurdles include the limited availability of hydrogen-refilling stations and viable sources of zero-emissions hydrogen, such as “green hydrogen” – the byproduct of using renewable energy to split water into hydrogen and oxygen – or “blue hydrogen”, made when natural gas is paired with controversial carbon capture and storage (CCS) to sequester the emissions before they are released into the atmosphere.