Drivers of fuel-cell powered electric cars can fill up at an increasing number of service stations: H2 MOBILITY Deutschland and its shareholders Shell and Air Liquide today jointly opened the first hydrogen (H2) filling facility in Mönchengladbach – the 75th in Germany.
Hydrogen is used to refuel electric vehicles with fuel cells. Its advantages: no noise, no pollutants, but the same ease of use, speed, and range as passenger cars with gasoline or diesel engines. Hydrogen vehicles have ranges of 500 to 750 kilometres, and can be refuelled in just three to five minutes.
German state of Nordrhein-Westfalen tops the list with 17 stations
This further increases the density of the hydrogen supply network in Germany. North Rhine-Westphalia already has a number of operational H2 filling stations, e.g. in Düsseldorf, Cologne, Duisburg and Aachen, and soon also in Bonn and Wesseling. With a total of 17 H2 stations, North Rhine-Westphalia currently tops the list of federal states, followed by Bavaria (16) and Baden-Württemberg (12).
The new facility is located at the Shell petrol station Odenkirchener Straße 160 in the Rheydt district, along the B230 federal highway and close to the A61, A44 and A46 motorways. The filling-station technology comes from the gas and technology company Air Liquide; the station’s owner-developer is the H2 MOBILITY joint venture, which is establishing Germany’s hydrogen infrastructure.
The operation of the dispenser is intuitive for the driver; refuelling is similar to that of conventional vehicles and takes just three to five minutes. The system has a capacity of around 200 kilogrammes of hydrogen – enough to refuel 50 vehicles a day.
Hydrogen-powered e-mobility reduces CO2 emissions
Hydrogen offers a way to expand the range of fuels available to the transport sector in a climate-friendly way – because using hydrogen, especially if it is produced with renewable energy, can significantly reduce climate-damaging CO2 emissions.
The hydrogen station in Mönchengladbach is funded by the European Commission through the Fuel Cells and Hydrogen 2 Joint Undertaking (FCH 2 JU) in the Hydrogen Mobility Europe (H2ME) project.