The Toyota Big Rig with Zero Emissions
Toyota (NYSE:TM) unveiled a zero-emission truck that runs on hydrogen fuel cells. Toyota Motor North America Executive V.P. Bob Carter discussed how the truck works and its impact on the environment.
“We’re here to announce the next step in the development of hydrogen fuel cells and just behind me is our full-sized heavy duty Series 8 tractor trailer,” said Carter.
Carter explained how the truck works, telling the FOX Business Network’s Stuart Varney, “It’s an electric vehicle first, but it actually produces the electricity that’s needed on board. It takes pure hydrogen, converts it to electricity that’s stored in the batteries to operate the vehicle.”
He added: “It’s actually quiet running, but it produces zero emissions.”
Carter predicts this could have a big impact on the environment considering the sizeable amount of truck traffic in and out of America’s ports.
“And the reason I’m at the port of entry today is that, as we know, this is an incredibly important port. There’s 42,000 cargo containers that move through this port every day. They’re moved around by 16,000 largely diesel trucks. With zero emissions we think we can have an incredible impact on the environment surrounding the Port of Long Beach and perhaps eventually ports around the world.”
According to Carter, it is not just a concept vehicle but will actually be hitting the roads this year.
“We’re going to actually work with the Port of Los Angeles. This truck will be moving cargo starting this summer. And again, we’ve developed this technology to really show the capabilities of this fuel cell technology which we’ve been running, we’ve been working on for 20 years.”