It sounds as though they have some way to go to catch up with Alstom:

' On July 15th, the Federal Railway Authority in Germany (Eisenbahn-Bundesamt) has given its approval Alstom’ first series production hydrogen trains which will go in operation in Lower Saxony this summer. Alstom has delivered 14 iLint fuel cell trains to Landesnahverkehrsgesellschaft Niedersachsen (LNVG) which will be operated by Eisenbahnen und Verkehrsbetriebe Elbe-Weser GmbH (evb).

With this step Alstom is the first rail vehicle manufacturer in the world to bring a hydrogen series fleet into the market. It is the first vehicle type approval of a hydrogen fuel call train under the new legal framework of the 4th railway package.

The trains are used in Lower Saxony in the evb network and are based in Bremervörde, where a hydrogen fuelling station was built by the gas and engineering company Linde near Bremervörde station on behalf of the Landesnahverkehrsgesellschaft Niedersachsen (LNVG).

The contract between LNVG and Alstom also includes 30 years of maintenance and energy supply for the trains. With the acquisition of the trains, Verkehrsbetriebe Elbe-Weser GmbH (EVB) can gradually take their old diesel-powered trains out of regular service.'

https://www.urban-transport-magazine.com/en/alstom-receives-series-approval-for-ilint-and-expands-international-hydrogen-projects/

I do not understand the enthusiasm for using hydrogen for this application except that it allows big oil to keep selling natural gas. However, there is going to be a shortage of natural gas in Europe this winter anyway. Most the local rail cars could be a combination of catenary and battery which would be more energy efficient and have an overall lower operating cost.

"The two car “Hybari" train costs about $35 million ( 4 billion yen) and can travel up to 140 kilometers (87 miles) at a top speed of 100 km/h on a single filling of hydrogen." $35 million for140 kilometers at a top speed of 100 km/hr and they need hydrogen fuel cells to accomplish this? This is a joke or either it is another of Toyota's WTF projects.

Regarding catenary systems etc, the costs of track electrification however done is substantial.

Europe has far more of its network electrified than, for instance, the US, but there are lower limits of volume etc where it is not economic.

It is for those where hydrogen fuel cell trains are to be used.

So long as provision is made for fueling stations, the fuel cell trains are basically a drop in replacement for diesel, avoiding the hassles of battery systems, with substantial downtimes for charging or stocking of batteries for battery swapping.

The fuel cell trains also don't suffer so much as battery systems do when the temperature drops, so extensive rescheduling is avoided.

Essentially way less hassle to run than battery systems, which is also why they are a popular solution in, for instance, fork lift trucks, although battery versions can of course be used in that application.

@sd:

' I am relatively sure that in the US, it is considerably cheaper to make hydrogen using steam reformation than using electrolysis'

Probably, most places. But take for instance the Great Plains, wind power is cheap there, but with limited markets. On site production of hydrogen would keep the wheels turning on long distance trains.
And costs are ever dropping.

There are detailed figures on the costs, usage etc in each application in the links I have supplied if you want to get into the weeds as to why the engineers have made the choices they have.

And in Europe there is indeed a surplus of power which could be used for hydrogen production, at the wrong time of year for demand when renewables oversupply the grid. Hydrogen production is a great way of using and storing it.

As for ammonia etc, that is a great application for the vast farms being built in the Middle East from renewables, as the ammonia is easily transported.

I am comfortable in claiming that ammonia produced in Europe will remain more expensive than importing it from other places with better renewables.

I tend to assume that the engineers do a reasonable job, and have not missed the obvious, in the absence of strong evidence to the contrary.

The fuel cell trains seem to work fine, are operationally seamless compared to their diesel equivalent, and all the metrics for cost are falling over time.

I find it hard to believe that they have got it all wrong.

Costs in the US are a very different matter.

@Davemart:

I am not against hydrogen. We need clean hydrogen for a whole number of things.

What I am against is wasting energy when there are more efficient ways to do things especially if they also costs less.

A few comments about myself. I have a undergraduate in physics and 3 graduate degrees in mechanical engineering including a doctorate all from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. My first electric car project was in 1967. I had not worked in the auto industry directly but have had job offers from both GM and Ford and have consulted for both. I am mostly retired but still advise students working on FormulaSAE Electric where the students design, build and compete with an electric race car. I have also been involved in the startup of 3 companies. I know something about engineering and consulted 2 years ago on the design of axial flux motors that were probably intended for electric drones. The project was sponsored by NASA and DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Project Agency).

@sd:

I am not dissing you, and I try in spite of being a grumpy old man to keep things civil here.

To be clear I have no engineering chops at all, and never pretend to have.

But I know a man who does, so to speak.

And a cat can look at a King, so numeric arguments have worth, no matter who presents them.

As I noted, the links I have given are detailed and specific, showing usage patterns, what worked with batteries, electrified rail, hydrogen and so on, so my view would be that criticism should take that on board, and directly argue to them.

My own view would be that there appear to be sound reasons for the choice of hydrogen to run trains where usage is not high enough to warrant electrification of the rail, one way or another, that it works fine, provides decarbonisation especially considering that in Europe a lot of renewables are currently chucked away for want of means to store them, that costs of all inputs are rapidly dropping, and that a ten fold increase in three years is game changing.

I don't really understand whats not to like, or see any substantial reason for claiming that the engineers have screwed up, but I will certainly pay attention to any counter arguments which actually address their laid out rationales in detail.

@Gryf:

From your link:

' Combined, these technologies allow Hydrofuel to produce Green NH3 using $.02/kWh electricity for as low as $220 a tonne, whereas fossil-fuel derived NH3 is currently selling at $1,500 to $2,000 a tonne.

Green Hydrogen can be separated out from this ammonia to sell at about $1.50 a kg, compared to traditional green H2 which sells for up to $15 a kg. Even at $.08/kWh the production of green Ammonia and releasing Hydrogen from it will be lower cost than any hydrocarbon fuel.'

That is remarkable for North America, where green hydrogen is far less competitive than in Europe.

I would also point out that the likes of Topsoe Haldor, who are much more mainstream having massive expertise and running installations producing ammonia and hydrogen by conventional means, are also backing and moving heavily to green ammonia and hydrogen, so this is not some far out thought experiment, but moving to be industry standard.

Gryf:

I was trying to put some numbers on the energy costs of extracting the hydrogen from LOHC, but mislaid my reference which was talking of the order of 30% from memory.

I did dig this out:

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.energyfuels.1c01170

' Liquid organic hydrogen carriers (LOHCs) store hydrogen by covalent bonds in a safe and dense manner. Recovery of hydrogen is realized by an endothermal dehydrogenation reaction. Theoretically, its heat demand could be covered by waste heat, e.g., from a fuel cell. However, to facilitate this, it is crucial to increase the temperature level of polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells and lower the temperature level of the dehydrogenation reaction.'

I would not be too bothered about the energy penalty in stationary applications, as there are all sorts of strategies to minimize it or use otherwise waste heat sources etc, but it seems likely to be rather more challenging in mobile applications.

It is just possible that Siemens who are giving it a go know rather more about it than I do though! ;-)

Alstom's compressed hydrogen tanks seem to work just fine though, so I am inclined to the view that if it ain't broke, don't fix it......