Vision Industries receives $27M purchase order for 100 hydrogen fuel cell plug-in hybrid Class 8 Trucks
11 May 2012
Vision Industries has finalized the purchase order agreement for 100 hydrogen fuel cell plug-in hybrid Tyrano Class 8 trucks (earlier post) with Total Transportation Services, Inc. (TTS-I) of Rancho Dominquez, California. (Earlier post.)
The electric motor produces 400 kW peak and 3,300 ft-lb (4,474 N·m) of torque. With a the standard H2 fuel tank configuration, the Tyrano can cover 200 miles (400 miles on an extended configuration) over an 8 hour shift.
The purchase agreement also allows TTS-I to purchase an additional 300 Vision trucks, bringing the total value of a contract to approximately $108 million dollars.
This Purchase Order demonstrates that the trucking industry has embraced the zero-emission platform. It will give regulatory agencies comfort in finally pushing the zero-emission technologies that are needed.
—Vic La Rosa, TTS-I President
Since hydrogen is produced from natural gas mostly, the extra expense of using fuel cells with hydrogen instead of engines or turbines with compressed or liquid natural gas is a fraud upon the public if any public monies subsidize this test; since hydraulic hybrids can reduce fuel use to half in some cases without the expense of fuel cells and large electric motors and electronic motor controllers and batteries. ..HG..
Posted by: Henry Gibson | 11 May 2012 at 11:54 PM
HG:
The Hyundai Tucson gets 72 mpge.
Try getting that with a natural gas vehicle.
The loses in conversion are made up by the greater efficiency.
Greater efficiency is on the cards as fuel cells and conversion improve, and in addition although the cheapest way at present is to produce hydrogen using NG a host of other sources are possible.
The icing on the cake is that hydrogen is completely free from pollution at point of use.
Natural gas vehibles will always be second best to petrol, whereas hydrogen ones have the potential to be way better.
They also combine superbly for lighter vehicles in a plug in hybrid, without all the complications of basically two systems in the Volt.
Posted by: Davemart | 12 May 2012 at 12:59 AM
Does anyone know the cost of an average class 8 truck. $270,000 per truck seems very costly.
Posted by: Jimr | 12 May 2012 at 03:21 AM
Also can anyone tell me exactly what a "fuel cell, plugin , hybrid" consists of. Is it batteries and fuel cells, no combustion engine?
Posted by: Jimr | 12 May 2012 at 06:13 AM
Things are definetly moving along fast. fuel cells are realy the only way you can make a truck like this and keep it zev.
Posted by: wintermane2000 | 12 May 2012 at 10:13 AM
@JimR:
Yep, you;ve got it. Here is a design exercise from Peugeot:
http://www.greencarcongress.com/2009/12/fisypac-20091208.html#more
Fuel cells have come a long way since 2009, and many of the difficulties they mention such as durability have now been overcome.
Nissan have always been electricity source agnostic, batteries, fuel cells, or any combination thereof.
They have always developed a half size stack as an RE to go with their full sized one, and reckon that they are ready to go as soon as someone puts in the infrastructure.
Of course, for local driving the battery will do the job, and you would only need hydrogen filling statiions on the main routes.
Unlike the Volt, the car remains pure electric, and is not melding two very different systems.
You still don't need many of the bits in an ICE car, such as complex transmissions, and the exhaust pipe is a low temperature pipe whith just funnels water out, with no cataytic convcerter to try to deal with NOx and so on.
Posted by: Davemart | 12 May 2012 at 11:44 AM
Nope.
Posted by: Arne | 13 May 2012 at 04:49 AM
A combo composed of a small low cost durable fuel cell and a bank of high performance ultra capacitors may also work for private vehicles if the very expensive hydrogen essential infrastructure was in place worldwide.
However, both the FC and ultra caps are currently very costly making commercialization a risky endeavor even if hydrogen was available at a reasonable price.
Posted by: HarveyD | 13 May 2012 at 08:03 AM
anne that truck carries less and can only go 150 miles UNLOADED on a charge. This one can go 400 miles in the extended config.
Posted by: wintermane2000 | 13 May 2012 at 10:45 AM