General Motors Co. and Autocar Industries announced a collaboration to create a range of zero-emissions heavy-duty vehicles powered by GM’s Hydrotec power cubes.
The heavy-duty trucks are expected to go into production in 2026 at the Autocar plant in Birmingham, Alabama, starting with roll-off and dump trucks and cement mixers. Autocar will also eventually produce refuse trucks and terminal tractors using Hydrotec power cubes.
Autocar trucks with GM’s Hydrotec fuel cells will be built to order and sold directly to customers.
GM (NYSE: GM) will supply Autocar with the Hydrotec fuel cells, which can meet the needs of the heaviest-duty vehicles, said Charlie Freese, executive director of GM’s Hydrotec global fuel cell business.
“Together what we will be doing is developing a zero-emission solution for vocational vehicles that are powered by GM’s Hydrotec fuel cell power cubes, which will offer a balanced affordability, durability and efficiency for our customers, combined with GM’s world-class ability to manufacture rugged propulsion systems at scale,” Freese said during a news conference Tuesday. “We believe that we will set a new standard for how vehicles can be truly rugged and capable and also produce zero emissions.”
GM’s Hydrotec power cubes provide 77 kilowatts of power that are designed for heavy-duty commercial vehicles. The Hydrotec power cubes are scalable and can electrify vehicles and applications across a variety of industries, from freight trucking, aerospace and locomotives to power generation, according to GM.
“We think that for extreme towing and heavy payload requirements, where the vehicles travel for more than 500 miles and require rapid refueling, hydrogen fuel cells really find the sweet spot for serving our customer needs,” Freese said.
GM’s Hydrotec fuel cell power cubes will be produced by GM at a facility in Brownstown, Michigan.
Birmingham-based Autocar is a 126-year-old vehicle manufacturer focused on Class 7 and Class 8 trucks for severe-duty vocational applications, such as dump trucks, concrete mixers, waste haulers and yard trucks.
Freese also provided updates on several transportation-related projects GM has been working on with other companies.
“Our partnerships with [Nel Hydrogen U.S.] and Liebherr-Aerospace are progressing very well,” Freese said. “Nel recently announced that they’re building a manufacturing facility here in Michigan close to us to incorporate a lot of the manufacturing and the design know-how that we’re transferring from the Hydrotec system into their global manufacturing systems.”
Freese did not provide an update on GM’s partnership with Navistar to produce Hydrotec fuel cells to be used in trucks for J.B. Hunt.
The partnership with Navistar and J.B. Hunt was announced in January 2021 and aimed to get long-haul fuel cell electric trucks into production by 2024.
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