Hydrogen-powered truck producer Hyzon Motors intends to deliver its first domestically constructed prime movers to Australian roads this yr because it raises its wager on the know-how’s skill to compete with purely battery-powered autos in decarbonising long-haul transport.
America-based start-up has designed and assembled the primary of its fleet of hydrogen-powered prime movers – business vehicles used to tow semi-trailers – at its Noble Park manufacturing web site in Melbourne’s south-east.
US-based Hyzon Motors has developed a zero-emissions hydrogen gas cell-powered prime mover that has been designed and constructed at its meeting plant in MelbourneCredit score: Eddie Jim
As heavy emitters throughout the nation trial hydrogen know-how as one of many choices to decrease their automobile emissions footprints and goal net-zero emissions, Hyzon will pitch the 200-kilowatt fuel-cell system to Australian fleet homeowners as an answer to a “uniquely Australian” drawback: the best way to ferry heavier payloads over longer distances with out producing emissions.
“We stay up for working with transport operators throughout Australia and New Zealand as we transfer ahead with the decarbonisation of our transport sector,” Hyzon’s managing director for Australia, John Edgley, mentioned earlier than an occasion to unveil the mannequin at Melbourne’s Kangan Institute on Tuesday.
Hydrogen gas cells, which emit solely water vapour, are seen as a promising device to assist decarbonise heavy transport and doubtlessly different industries so long as the method to fabricate the hydrogen is emissions-free.
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Electrical autos account for greater than 7 per cent of recent automotive gross sales in Australia, however heavy autos have been tougher to show inexperienced. Hyzon is one in all a number of start-ups selling hydrogen gas cells’ potential as a extra viable possibility for long-haul trucking than rechargeable batteries, that are giant and heavy, and wish extra downtime for recharging.
Nevertheless, excessive obstacles to the uptake of hydrogen-powered business autos loom, together with the prohibitively excessive price of the know-how in contrast with conventional diesel-engine autos.
Different hurdles embody the restricted availability of hydrogen-refilling stations and viable sources of zero-emissions hydrogen, resembling “inexperienced hydrogen” – the byproduct of utilizing renewable power to separate water into hydrogen and oxygen – or “blue hydrogen”, made when pure fuel is paired with controversial carbon seize and storage (CCS) to sequester the emissions earlier than they’re launched into the ambiance.
