(Frankfurt/Germany) – The municipal bus company In-der-City-Bus GmbH (ICB) has put the first hydrogen filling station into operation in Frankfurt am Main. This allows the city's public transport fleet to be refueled directly at the depot.
Opening of the hydrogen filling station in Frankfurt (from left): Martin Hulecki (ICB managing director), Stephanie Schramm (ICB managing director), Tom Reinhold, (managing director of the municipal local transport company Traffiq), city councilor Wolfgang Siefert, Jörg Arne Egerter (deputy head of the mobility, air traffic department, Railway system in the Hessian Ministry of Economic Affairs), Lars Jakobsen (Managing Director of Everfuel GmbH). © ICB
The system was built by Everfuel GmbH and is equipped with two dispensers with an operating pressure of 350 bar each. The company will initially supply ICB with hydrogen of an undisclosed origin for at least three years and deliver it with trailers. The capacity is currently one tonne - according to the information, enough to refuel at least 23 fuel cell buses every day. The modular design means that it can be easily expanded to accommodate an increasing number of vehicles.
“With the commissioning we can fully exploit the advantages of this technology,” says ICB Managing Director Martin Hulecki. “Our H2 buses are now refueled directly on site and in less than 15 minutes.” The next vehicles have already been ordered: 18-meter-long articulated buses.
Fleet of 32 hydrogen buses
The Hessian Ministry of Economics has funded the latest use of hydrogen technology in Frankfurt with 1,7 million euros. As early as 2022, 2,4 million euros were invested in the purchase of 13 hydrogen buses, and 2,3 million euros are available for the nine newly ordered articulated buses. The Federal Ministry of Transport, in turn, funded ten H2 solo buses with around three million euros (total investment: 6,5 million euros), which were put into operation at the same time as the opening of the gas station. According to its own information, ICB has one of the “largest hydrogen fleets in the country” with currently 23 vehicles and 2025 vehicles from 32.
“A separate hydrogen filling station for urban bus transport is an investment in the future,” says Tom Reinhold, managing director of Traffiq GmbH, which, as a local local transport company, organizes all bus and train transport for the city of Frankfurt am Main. “The fuel cell buses are – after the battery-electric ones – the second pillar of the concept of decarbonizing our bus transport,” says Reinhold.
Due to their greater range, “fuel cell buses can also be used to operate our long-distance routes with zero local emissions.” Frankfurt has set itself the goal of converting its bus fleet from diesel to alternative drives by the early 2030s and of operating local transport in a climate-neutral manner.
Photos
In 2022, ICB brought hydrogen technology to Frankfurt city transport with the “Hydrogen Urbino 12” from the Polish bus manufacturer Solaris. © ICB
