Daimler Trucks & Buses, one of the world’s largest commercial vehicle manufacturers, pursues a sustainable corporate strategy and aims to offer only new vehicles that are CO2-neutral in driving operation (“tank-to-wheel”) in the triad markets of Europe, Japan and NAFTA by 2039. Already by 2022, Daimler Trucks & Buses’ plans to include series-produced vehicles with battery-electric drive in its vehicle portfolio in its main sales regions Europe, USA and Japan. By the end of the next decade, Daimler Trucks & Buses will also extend its range of vehicles with hydrogen-powered series production vehicles.

Just this week Daimler Trucks & Buses celebrated the world premiere of the FUSO brand fuel-cell prototype “Vision F-Cell” at the Tokyo Motor Show in Japan, thus further strengthening its activity in the hydrogen field. The 7.5-tonner has a drive with a maximum output of 135 kW. The range is up to 300 kilometers. The “Vision F-Cell” electric powertrain architecture is basically comparable to that of a battery-powered truck – apart from significantly reduced battery power and additional hydrogen tanks.

Daimler has been working on drive technologies based on hydrogen for more than 30 years. To date the company’s fuel cell vehicles have traveled many millions of kilometers, demonstrating the marketability of this drive concept. Still, there are very specific challenges in the commercial vehicle sector, such as service life and payload availability. Battery-electric and hydrogen-drive technologies offer different benefits depending on the purpose and therefore complement each other