According to Daimler Truck, the run started Monday 25th September in the afternoon at Mercedes-Benz Truck’s Customer Center in Woerth am Rhein. It then finished on Tuesday morning 26th September in Berlin.
The truck completed the run fully-loaded with a gross combined vehicle weight of 40 tons under real-life conditions. The record drive with sealed tanks and controlled mileage was also independently confirmed by an inspection document from TÜV Rheinland.
Commenting on the feat, Rhineland-Palatinate’s Secretary of State for Economic Affairs, Petra Dick-Walther, said:
“Today is a great day! A hydrogen-powered truck is taking off from Rhineland-Palatinate all the way to Berlin. We are proud that such a far-reaching innovation comes out of Rhineland-Palatinate and was developed and tested at the plant in Woerth. This is testimony to the innovative spirit of Rhineland-Palatinate and will change the transport industry for good. It marks a milestone in the transformation and decarbonization of the transport sector – thanks to new technologies. The journey of the GenH2 Truck from Rhineland-Palatinate to Berlin makes this tangible.”
Andreas Gorbach, Member of the Board of Management of Daimler Truck AG, Head of Truck Technology, added:
“To decarbonize transport, we need both battery-electric and hydrogen-powered drive technologies. The sweet spot for fuel cell trucks lies in flexible and demanding long-haul transportation tasks. By cracking the 1,000-kilometer mark with one fill, we have now impressively demonstrated: Hydrogen in trucks is anything but hot air, and we are making very good progress on the road to series production. At the same time, our record run today is a reminder that decarbonizing transportation requires two other factors in addition to the right drive technologies: a green energy infrastructure and competitive costs compared to conventional vehicles.”
Ahead of the run, the Mercedes-Benz GenH2 Truck was fueled with liquid hydrogen at Daimler Truck’s filling station at the company’s development and testing centre in Woerth.
Photo: Daimler Truck press materials
The hydrogen, supplied by Air Liquide, is of renewable origin, as it has been produced from biomethane with guarantees of origin. During the refuelling process, cryogenic liquid hydrogen at minus 253 degrees Celsius was filled into two 40 kg tanks mounted on either side of the truck chassis.
Daimler Truck says it refers liquid hydrogen in the development of hydrogen-based drives. It claims that in this aggregate state, the energy carrier has a significantly higher energy density in relation to volume compared to gaseous hydrogen. As a result, more hydrogen can be carried, which significantly increases the range and enables comparable performance of the vehicle with that of a conventional diesel truck.