The total ban on combustion engines for heavy trucks is off the table, but goods transport should still be as emission-free as possible in the future. Mercedes is developing batteries as well as hydrogen trucks, but prefers the latter for long-distance transport. Now they have one like this "GenH2 semi-trailer truck cracks the 1000 kilometer mark.
The prototype, which is approved for public traffic, covered a distance of 1,047 kilometers on one tank of liquid hydrogen. The fully loaded 40-ton truck set off from the customer center in Wörth am Rhein in the afternoon and reached Berlin the following morning. “We have now impressively proven that hydrogen is anything but hot air for trucks and we are making very good progress towards series production “, said Daimler Truck board member Andreas Gorbach. The demonstration drive is also an appeal that, in addition to the right drive technologies, two other factors are necessary for the decarbonization of transport: a green energy infrastructure and competitive costs compared to conventional vehicles. The hydrogen supplied by Air Liquide was made from biomethane. When refueling, liquid hydrogen at a temperature of minus 253 degrees Celsius was filled into two 40-kilogram tanks each mounted on the side of the chassis. Thanks to the particularly good insulation of the vehicle tanks, the hydrogen can be kept at the same temperature for a sufficiently long time without active cooling. Liquid hydrogen has advantages When developing hydrogen-based drives, Daimler Truck prefers liquid hydrogen in the long term. In this aggregate state, the energy source has a significantly higher energy density relative to its volume. This means that more hydrogen can be transported, which significantly increases the range and enables performance comparable to that of a conventional diesel truck.
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