(Photo: One of the fuel cell electric heavy-duty trucks from Project Portal. Credit: Toyota)Toyota and Kenworth’s fuel cell electric heavy-duty trucks hit the road in California this week. These zero-emission trucks were developed with support from the Port of Los Angeles, the California Air Resources Board (CARB), and Shell. UPS will be one of the first companies to use the vehicles.
Ten trucks are being deployed as part of Toyota and Kenworth’s Zero-and-Near-Zero Emission Freight Facilities Project (ZANZEFF). The companies said that Toyota Logistics Services will operate four, UPS will use three, Total Transportation Services Inc. will operate two, and Southern Counties Express will operate one.
“As a company always looking for the next innovative technology to better serve our customers, UPS was very pleased to be selected as a demonstrating partner for the hydrogen fuel cell electric semi project,” said Carlton Rose, president of global fleet maintenance and engineering for UPS. Currently their fleet has more than 10,000 alternative fuel and advanced technology vehicles.
More than 16,000 trucks serve the Los Angeles and Long Beach port complexes, the project collaborators note. The ten zero-emission trucks represent a drop in the bucket but still demonstrate a leap forward, the organizations say.
These new trucks build on Toyota’s Project Portal proof-of-concept trucks launched in April 2017. Since then, the alpha and beta proof-of-concept Class 8 trucks logged more than 14,000 miles of real world testing around the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach. They emitted nothing but water vapor, according to Toyota.
CARB invested $41 million with the Port of Los Angeles for the ZANZEFF project as part of California Climate Investments, a state initiative that puts billions of cap-and-trade dollars toward reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
In addition to the 10 new trucks, the project will include two large-capacity heavy-duty hydrogen fueling stations developed by Shell in Wilmington and Ontario, California. Another project phase calls for expanded use of zero-emissions technology in cargo terminal and warehouse environments.
Previously Toyota announced a collaboration with FuelCell Energy to build a fuel cell power generation plant at the Port of Long Beach. The Tri-Gen facility is in development and received an $8 million grant from the California Energy Commission in November.
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