Fuel Cell Vehicle for Mining and Construction Environment

Hybrid and electrified drives can be found in many road-bound applications, where they have proven their performance and robustness in everyday use. In the mining and construction machinery sector, fuel cell electric drives are practically hardly tried and tested and are therefore not yet used in practice, even though this technology offers significant advantages. Compared to battery electric drives, they offer shorter refueling times and longer operating times. Additionally, they eliminate exhaust emissions when compared to hydrogen combustion engines. The limited use of hydrogen fuel cells in these vehicle applications is mainly due to the harsh environment and the corresponding requirements on the powertrain. The focus of the work presented here is on the development of a test vehicle powered by a hydrogen fuel cell to demonstrate an emission-free drivetrain in the mining and construction environment. Furthermore, the impact of the very challenging boundary conditions of the use case on the vehicle, the drive system, the operating strategy of the drive and the vehicle energy management, the thermal management, the high requirements for filtering the intake air, as well as the service life of the fuel cell system are discussed.