There’s no word on what’s up at Harvard, but Yale lift trucks are now going to be powered by hydrogen fuel cell and moving the products of Central Grocers. The Central Grocers distribution center is now being constructed in Joliet, Illinois, without any aid from the Governor 😉 and will use 220 Yale lift trucks powered by Plug Power GenDrive hydrogen fuel cells.
The hydrogen fuel cells will replace typical lead acid batteries commonly used in lift trucks and forklifts. Air Products will supply the centralized hydrogen fueling stations that will have its fuel stored as cryogenic liquid hydrogen and later turn this into compressed hydrogen gas.
Air Products and Plug Power are no strangers when it comes to working together as over a year ago I had talked about these two companies pairing up 20 hydrogen fuel cell forklifts that would be replacing battery power vehicles.
In October 2007, I also talked about how Wal-Mart was jumping into the hydrogen forklift game by testing these vehicles plus pallet trucks in one of their facilities. The advantages of going with hydrogen forklifts, lift trucks, pallet trucks and other vehicle used to move products around is that they will reduce a company’s carbon footprint.
Hydrogen lift trucks will also eliminate the need for companies to invest in a broad electrical charging infrastructure and open up floor space. The H2 lift trucks can also be refueled in a couple of minutes rather than being out of commission for hours as their electric counterparts sit idly awaiting recharging.
Yale has been around since 1844, when the young Linus Yale first sketched out his plans for the revolutionary forklift that was refined in the later parts of the 1800’s.