Toyota and Kenworth put together an event that Andre attended, and it proves that hydrogen may be the way forward for the trucking industry.
Based in Gardena, California, the Toyota North American Hydrogen Headquarters (H2HQ) invited Andre to witness a project Toyota and partners have spent billions on. They have been working on developing hydrogen fuel-cell semi-trucks While using hydrogen fuel for vehicles, and fuel-cell vehicles are nothing new, getting to see behind the scenes is a huge opportunity.
By the way: that office used to be called, “Toyota Motors North America (TMNA) R&D California.”
“Toyota has developed hydrogen fuel cell electric solutions for more than three decades, and we will continue to advance this scalable, zero-emission technology as part of our electrified portfolio. Renaming this facility as North American (H2) Headquarters represents our leadership in fuel cell development creating real-world products to help reduce carbon emissions.”
Ted Ogawa, President and CEO, Toyota Motor North America
Toyota is aiming to find new solutions to fighting carbon emmissions. Even if some ideas are unpopular.
By now, you probably know that many automakers are slowing down on their push for BEVs (battery electric vehicles). A while back, the most resistant company to going all EV was Toyota. Mind you, they are developing EV tech, but they are doubling down on their hybrid tech. Still, I find it interesting that many critics who feel Toyota isn’t being environmentally sound has completely ignored their hydrogen tech.
At the same time, there are a bunch of other automakers exploring H2 tech. Toyota and Hyundai, seem to be taking the lead with fuel-cell tech. I mean, if you look at what actually powers these trucks – it’s all electricity. The hydrogen is simply used to power the batteries that power the electric motors.
There is more than one type of H2 fuel vehicle.
Not only can you use hydrogen in a vehicle that uses it to make electricity, you can use it in internal combustion engines as well. Granted, there’s more to it than simply substituting petrol with H2, but it’s been done for years. I mention this because: while Toyota is working with hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles, they recently developed vehicles that run on liquid hydrogen.
