Should Hydrogen-Powered Trucks Pay A Lower Charge In The Silvertown And Blackwall Tunnels?
London has a lot of heavy diesel trucks, which include.
Cement mixer trucks.
Large eight-wheeler trucks transporting aggregate, building materials and construction spoil to and from construction sites.
Council refuse trucks.
Skip trucks.
Supermarket delivery trucks.
They are large polluters and the only way they will be made zero-carbon, will be to use hydrogen.
In Cummins Agrees To Integrate Its Hydrogen ICE Technology Into Terex® Advance Trucks, I write about how Cummins and Terex are going to be building hydrogen-powered cement mixers.
This picture shows the baby of the range, which could be ideal for a smaller country like the UK.
Note how it is the other way round to traditional cement mixer trucks.
As companies are now selling low-carbon concrete in the UK, I suspect, it won’t be long before they will be delivering it in a hydrogen-powered zero-carbon truck.
If hydrogen-powered trucks could be given an economic boost, by lowering their charges for the Silvertown And Blackwall Tunnels, this might increase their uptake by owners of large trucks, which would in turn reduce pollution.
But this would need the election of a London Mayor, who had a hydrogen policy other than ignore it and hope it goes away.
The Anonymous Widower 
Although the congestion and ULEZ charges are ostensively to reduce congestion and pollution, but really a tax, river crossing tolls are a charge to repay the cost of building the crossing, and all vehicles should pay them because of the time and money saved by using them. Of course you don’t have to pay and can always go the long way around.
Tolling both tunnels is to ensure that traffic does not divert to the still free one.
Regards
Mark
mclayton@btinternet.com mclayton@btinternet.com
PS Web site not taking comments again 😦
Comment by Mark Clayton | October 23, 2023 |