South Tyrol is pushing ahead with hydrogen and has announced the opening of five new filling stations over the next eight years, alongside ten fuel-cell cars supplied by Hyundai.
South Tyrol is trying again, and with the new LifeAlps project promoted by the European Commission it has announced the opening of 5 new hydrogen filling stations by 2028. But before we get into the details, let's take a step back and return to 2015, when… The project was then called HyFive (Hydrogen for Innovative Vehicles) and was the most important and ambitious European hydrogen project. Launched in April 2014 and running for 42 months (concluding in 2018), HyFive brought together car manufacturers (BMW, Daimler, Honda, Hyundai and Toyota), hydrogen suppliers and numerous energy sector experts, with the aim of building a European infrastructure dedicated to hydrogen. The goal was to prepare the most innovative European regions (Italy was among them, with the Institute for Technological Innovation in Bolzano acting as coordinator of the southern cluster, which included Bolzano, Innsbruck, Munich and Stuttgart) for the market launch of hydrogen cars. The project was only partially successful, and for Italy at least things did not go particularly well. The result? To this day, anyone wishing to buy a fuel-cell car can refuel only at the Bolzano Sud station, where hydrogen is produced from renewable sources (hydroelectric power), while the Eni facilities in San Donato Milanese and Venice are still awaiting opening. Working against the project are the cost of refuelling infrastructure (around €700,000), the economic and environmental sustainability of hydrogen production (which would make little sense if derived from fossil sources…) and the limited availability of car models that run on this fuel.
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Bolzano, 2020. South Tyrol is trying again, and through the LifeAlps project — whose objective is the reduction of CO2 emissions across various sectors — it returns to the topic of electric mobility (of which hydrogen could be the most virtuous expression) with the goal of transforming South Tyrol into a model region. This time the partners come from across the whole of South Tyrol and will join forces to expand the infrastructure network dedicated to hydrogen (and also to electric charging), to bring pilot fleets onto the roads and to develop zero-emission services (taxis and freight transport). In detail, the project envisages the installation of 33 latest-generation fast-charging points and the opening of 5 hydrogen filling stations for vehicles and buses in South Tyrol and along the A22 motorway within the next 8 years.
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Coordinating the project is Sasa, the public transport company serving the cities of Bolzano, Merano and Laives, supported by the Institute for Technological Innovation (IIT) in Bolzano. Other partners include Autostrada del Brennero, Alperia, Azienda Pubbliservizi Brunico, the Vinschgauer Energie Konsortium, Eurac and Strutture Trasporto Alto Adige. The shared objective is to expand the infrastructure network for electric mobility, creating both charging points and hydrogen filling stations. Here in detail are the works announced, though the timelines for their completion have not yet been defined:
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Meanwhile, as the only manufacturer alongside Toyota to be strongly committed to hydrogen, Hyundai is taking part in the project with a fleet of 10 examples of its Nexo hydrogen SUV, delivered in Bolzano by Andrea Crespi, managing director of Hyundai Italia. With a range of up to 660 kilometres and just 5 minutes needed to fill up, the Nexo fleet will be managed by the Bolzano public transport company and the Institute for Technological Innovation, which will make the vehicles available to various public and private organisations operating in the area through rental arrangements. Exactly as had already happened in 2014, when 12 Hyundai ix35 Fuel Cell units had been entrusted to as many organisations, and which to date have covered 920,000 kilometres on hydrogen. Hyundai's commitment to more sustainable mobility was recently reaffirmed with the announcement of the launch, by 2025, of 18 new fuel-cell, hybrid, electric and plug-in hybrid models.