August 13, 2021. The California Energy Commission has approved a 4-million grant to Equilon Enterprises LLC (dba Shell Oil Products US) to develop and demonstrate the first multi-modal hydrogen refueling station in California. The multi-modal hydrogen refueling station will serve hydrogen-fuel-cell-powered on-road heavy-duty vehicles and locomotives at the Port of West Sacramento and will support the Sierra Northern Hydrogen Locomotive Project resulting from the same solicitation and previously awarded.
High-throughput clusters, such as marine ports, concentrate harmful criteria pollutants such as diesel particulate matter and oxides of nitrogen. Locomotives and marine vessels emit approximately 90% of diesel particulate matter and 24% of statewide NOx. With a multi-modal hydrogen refueling station at a high-throughput cluster—such as a marine port—high utilization of hydrogen fuel could be achieved by supplying diverse and complementary applications, including on-road vehicles, locomotives, marine vessels, and cargo handling equipment.
However, these applications need the hydrogen refueling station to be in place in order to come to market, and they also need an affordable cost of hydrogen to be competitive with diesel for long-term operation and increased adoption.
Thus, the project is intended to demonstrate the safe operation of a large-scale hydrogen fueling station in support of the deployment of heavy-duty on-road and off-road zero-emission vehicles.