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The H2Accelerate TRUCKS project — funded by the European Union and led by Volvo, Scania, and Hyundai Hydrogen Mobility — began deploying in 2026 a fleet of 125 hydrogen fuel cell trucks distributed among at least six European countries, with five new refueling stations inaugurated in strategic logistics hubs: Mulhouse, Duisburg, Antwerp, Rotterdam, and Berlin, in a project representing the largest coordinated deployment of heavy hydrogen trucks ever undertaken.
How a fuel cell truck works and why it is different from a battery electric truck
Confusion is common: hydrogen truck and electric truck are not the same thing. The battery truck stores electricity in batteries that weigh several tons and take hours to charge. The hydrogen fuel cell truck carries high-pressure H2 tanks, which feed a cell that converts hydrogen into electricity on-demand. Refueling takes 15 to 20 minutes — similar to diesel.
For long-distance transport — which is the use of the 125 H2Accelerate trucks — the fuel cell has a clear advantage over the battery in weight and refueling time. A 44-ton truck carrying a battery loses payload; a hydrogen truck maintains load capacity while emitting only water vapor through the exhaust.
The downside is cost and infrastructure. Green hydrogen — produced by electrolysis with renewable energy — is still significantly more expensive than diesel. The five new H2Accelerate stations in 2026 are part of the effort to build the minimum infrastructure that makes commercial routes viable. Without a refueling station every 300-400 km, no carrier takes the risk.
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Why these five specific cities
Antwerp, Rotterdam, Duisburg, Mulhouse, and Berlin were not chosen by chance. They are the central nodes of Europe’s busiest logistics corridor — the axis that connects the world’s largest ports with Europe’s industrial interior.
Antwerp and Rotterdam are the two largest container ports in Europe. Duisburg is the largest inland river port in the world. Together, these three points process a huge fraction of everything that enters and leaves the European continent. A truck leaving the port of Antwerp with Asian containers and heading to a factory in Berlin is exactly the type of operation H2Accelerate wants to capture.
The logic is network-based: each refueling station installed in a logistics hub makes all routes passing through it viable for hydrogen trucks. With Antwerp and Rotterdam connected, the routes between them and any destination with an intermediate H2 station become operable. The network grows in value exponentially — the same network effect of any refueling infrastructure.
Who are the manufacturers and what they deliver in 2026
Volvo leads the consortium with its FM and FH hydrogen family, which have been in testing with customers since 2025 and enter commercial deployment in 2026. Scania contributes with its version of a fuel cell truck. Hyundai Hydrogen Mobility, Hyundai’s European arm, has been operating hydrogen trucks since 2020 in Switzerland, with real operational experience.
Hyliko, a French retrofit company, converts existing diesel trucks to hydrogen — which extends the project’s reach to carriers that do not want or cannot buy new trucks. Retrofit is a transition solution that accelerates adoption without requiring the immediate replacement of the entire fleet.
Mercedes-Benz plans to deploy 100 GenH2 trucks with fleet customers by the end of 2026. Daimler Truck and KEYOU are working on a hydrogen combustion engine version — different from the fuel cell, but also without CO₂ emissions — with commercial launch planned for 2027.
Brazil in this equation: ethanol, hydrogen, and the race for the truck of the future
Brazil has the most dominant combustion truck in the world. More than 90% of Brazilian trucks run on diesel or ethanol, and the fleet is one of the largest in the southern hemisphere. The transition to low-emission trucks is inevitable — but which technology?
Brazil has a specific advantage in ethanol: it already has a distribution network, an adapted fleet, and production at scale. The hydrated ethanol truck, with much lower CO₂ emissions than diesel, is a viable option today, without waiting for hydrogen infrastructure.
Green hydrogen is a medium-term promise: Brazil has enormous potential for green H2 generation from wind and solar in the Northeast, with competitive costs that could make the country a hydrogen exporter to Europe — including for the stations that will refuel the 125 H2Accelerate trucks.
The cost dimension of hydrogen is the elephant in the room that H2Accelerate needs to solve. In 2026, the cost of green hydrogen at European stations is around €10-14 per kilogram — while the energy equivalent in diesel costs about €3-4 per kilogram of H2 equivalent. In terms of cost per ton-kilometer, the hydrogen truck is still 2 to 3 times more expensive than the diesel equivalent. What will close this gap is scale and regulation: the more refueling stations, the more trucks can use the network; the more trucks, the more demand for H2, enabling larger electrolyzers that reduce production costs. The cost trajectory of green hydrogen follows the same pattern as photovoltaic solar in the 2010s: unlikely until it becomes inevitable. H2Accelerate is the bet that the next five years of accelerated deployment will bring green hydrogen to cost parity with diesel before the combustion truck fleet needs to be replaced.
If Europe is already putting 125 hydrogen trucks on the road and Brazil exports soy in diesel trucks that congest highways, where will Brazil be when Europe starts charging a carbon tariff on what it imports?
