Viritech awarded government grant for radical fuel cell HGV powertrain

Our member Viritech shares some exciting news.

Viritech awarded government grant for radical fuel cell HGV powertrain

• Viritech will lead Project ICEBreaker to develop a 40-tonne hydrogen fuel cell truck that approaches weight-parity with a diesel equivalent. 
  
  
• Offering freight operators the same payload as current trucks is key to adoption of zero-emission vehicles
  
  
• Other partners in the project are HORIBA MIRA and Intelligent Energy
  

Viritech is to lead a major project to develop and build a 40-tonne demonstration HGV which will be exhibited at the LCV CENEX event in September 2024. The £3 million project (50% funded by the Advanced Propulsion Centre) will showcase Viritech’s technology which radically improves the efficiency of hydrogen fuel cell trucks.

Viritech will be responsible for the unique energy management system. This uses the fuel cell as the primary energy source, with fast discharge/recharge batteries providing power for transient conditions (e.g. pulling away from rest). 

The powertrain also features Viritech’s proprietary DC-DC Converter which simultaneously manages both the battery pack and the fuel cell. By combining the two separate DC-DC converters for fuel cell and battery pack, the system reacts far more quickly and saves considerable cost and weight.

The net result is a powertrain that is up to five tonnes lighter than a battery-electric equivalent, and approaches mass-parity with a conventional diesel truck. This transforms the economics of zero-emission freight logistics.

 Intelligent Energy will be supplying its latest generation IE-DRIVE™ HD100 fuel cells, and HORIBA MIRA will be providing advanced digital tools (validation, digital twin, and modelling of Total Cost of Ownership) to ensure that the advantages of the Viritech concept are transferred to real-world usage. 

Timothy Lyons, CEO of Viritech said, “The ICEBreaker program enables Viritech to move the development of its high-performance hydrogen powertrain technology to the next stage, by working with our partners HORIBA MIRA and Intelligent Energy to integrate a hydrogen fuel cell powertrain on a 40-tonne truck, and to demonstrate the huge benefits of this technology to manufacturers and their fleet customers.”

Read more here.