A Clean Logistics truck is parked at a hydrogen filling station operated by the service provider GP Joule.
(Photo: GP Joule)
Dusseldorf The traffic turnaround is much more difficult in heavy goods traffic than in the private sector. While the electric drive with charging from the plug has prevailed in cars, the fuel cell with hydrogen refueling is still a real option for trucks. The North German truck builder Clean Logistics offers such vehicles – and now reports an order for 5000 vehicles.
The energy service provider GP Joule has secured the hydrogen-powered 40-ton trucks by means of a framework agreement. According to the client, the contract volume is “in the low single-digit billion euro range”. According to the company, this is the largest contract of its kind in the industry.
The energy service provider will resell and lend the trucks to its customers in connection with the corresponding infrastructure. The company from Reußenköge in North Friesland builds filling stations and supplies hydrogen that is produced in its own electrolysis plants using solar and wind energy.
The keyword is market stimulation: “With the framework agreement, we want to help ensure that hydrogen truck production moves from the manufacturing stage to the series production phase, and of course promote hydrogen sales,” explains a spokesman for GP Joule.
Top jobs of the day
Find the best jobs now and
be notified by email.
The company expects the first delivery of Clean Logistics in the fall of 2023. According to the company spokesman, scaling effects should then take effect and boost annual production. The young company does not build the vehicles itself, but equips used diesel trucks with hydrogen tanks, batteries, fuel cells and the “Hyboss” control software. This eliminates the costly and time-consuming step of completely in-house development.
Manufacturer increases jobs
This procedure is called “conversion”. In the case of the 5,000 trucks covered by the framework agreement with GP Joule, however, Clean Logistics will use new vehicles: “We obtain frames, cabins and assistance systems from various suppliers,” says company boss Dirk Graszt.
“A hydrogen-powered truck takes 10 to 15 minutes to refuel; After that, the range is up to 500 kilometers.” Company spokesman GP Joule
Companies like Daimler Truck are also researching the use of hydrogen-powered fuel cells in their trucks. There are already Mercedes Sprinters with fuel cells, but they don’t roll off the assembly line in series. The start-up E-Works Mobility is converting used vans to electric drives based on a similar concept. Demand is high: for the coming year, the company expects sales in the tens of millions. The automotive supplier Bosch is also buying up Mercedes vans and, like Clean Logistics, is using hydrogen for the conversion.
At GP Joule, the end users of the vehicles are mainly companies with their own large truck fleets, including freight forwarding companies, suppliers or producers of furniture and other goods, says a spokesman. The company is convinced that hydrogen will play a greater role in the heavy-duty sector than in passenger transport. “A hydrogen-powered truck takes 10 to 15 minutes to refuel; After that, the range is up to 500 kilometers.” However, the hydrogen infrastructure is still poorly developed and the efficiency of the energy carrier is far less efficient than the plug-in technology.
As early as June, Clean Logistics announced in a press release that it would expand production capacities: 50 additional production stations and almost 300 jobs are to be created. “We plan to create another 500 jobs over the next five years,” says Dirk Graszt, founder and CEO of Clean Logistics. GP Joule has already reserved 40 production places for the presentation of the hydrogen truck in June.
In addition to the 40-ton model “Fyuriant”, Clean Logistics also produces the hydrogen-powered bus “Pyuron”.
More: China wants to be climate neutral by 2060 – also with hydrogen engines from Cologne