New Zealand’s first hydrogen fuel truck, the Hyundai Xcient, has arrived into the country.
The road-ready truck landed at Ports of Auckland on November 18 with a hydrogen supply on tap and was driven to Hyundai NZ’s Mt Wellington headquarters.
It’s the first of five trucks which will hit local roads next year running freight across the country in a real-world demonstration within commercial fleets.
New Zealand is just the second market outside Korea to commence a multiple truck programme with the heavy-duty trucks already in Switzerland for commercial operation. This fleet has now exceeded more than two million kilometres of regular commercial service.
The Xcient has a manufacturer gross vehicle weight (GVW) of 28 tonnes and a combined gross combination weight of 42 tonnes. It will operate lower than this in New Zealand due to road weight limitations.
Earlier this year, Hyundai NZ received $500,000 from the Low Emission Vehicles Contestable Fund for the introduction of hydrogen powered trucks to New Zealand.
It aims is to speed up adoption by helping industry, government and the public grow in confidence to use hydrogen powered trucks, the company says.
The trucks will be introduced into an on-road (in-service) demonstration programme with specialists in heavy vehicle transport and road transport logistics. Those partners are still to be confirmed.
They will be fuelled by Hyundai NZ until the first group of hydrogen refuelling stations are available.
The Xcient is powered by a 350kw electric motor with 2237Nm of torque. Driving energy is provided by a 180kW hydrogen fuel cell system with dual 90kW fuel cell stacks combined with a 72kWh battery.
Seven tanks make a combined storage capacity of just over 32kg of hydrogen for a range of around 400km.
Each Xcient fuel cell vehicle is expected to save around 50 tonnes of CO2 per year in place of a diesel truck based on 80,000kms per annum.
