Daimler Truck has moved into the second phase of its fuel-cell truck trials, handing Mercedes-Benz GenH2 prototypes to five more logistics partners across Germany.
The programme will run for around a year and is designed to gather the sort of day-to-day operational data that ultimately shapes the production version due next decade.
The new participants - Hornbach, Reber Logistik, Teva Germany (with ratiopharm), Rhenus and DHL Supply Chain - will each operate a GenH2 Truck on regular long-distance routes, giving Daimler Truck a wider spread of use cases than in the first test phase.
The company says the goal is to feed real-world findings directly into engineering development as well as the sales and service processes that need to sit behind a future series-production hydrogen truck.
Broader routes, heavier workloads
Each vehicle will run under normal commercial conditions, covering everything from temperature-controlled pharmaceutical logistics to general cargo and recyclable materials transport.
DHL Supply Chain will pair its GenH2 Truck with a fully electric refrigerated trailer on routes across Baden-Württemberg, Hesse and North Rhine-Westphalia, while Teva Germany will deploy its truck for nationwide pharmaceutical deliveries. Rhenus will use the Duisburg site as a test hub, and Reber Logistik will keep the vehicle within reach of the company’s current refuelling options in Duisburg and Wörth.
The tone across the partner comments is similar: the trials give them hands-on experience with hydrogen operation while allowing Daimler Truck to watch how the vehicles behave against varied payloads, route types and temperature demands.
The GenH2 platform
The GenH2 Truck sits roughly where a modern diesel long-haul tractor unit does - around 40 tonnes GVW and about 25 tonnes payload - but swaps the combustion engine for a 300 kW fuel-cell system supported by a small buffer battery.
Daimler Truck is continuing with liquid hydrogen (sLH2), citing higher energy density and fewer tank-to-tank transport cycles as advantages for long-distance operations.
Refuelling during this phase will again be limited to the sLH2 stations in Wörth am Rhein and the Duisburg area. In the first trial phase, the five prototype vehicles collectively accumulated more than 225,000 km, with consumption figures between 5.6 and 8.0 kg per 100 km depending on load, route and usage pattern.
From trials to limited production
While these trucks continue accumulating mileage, Daimler Truck is already preparing the next generation of fuel-cell vehicles. A small series of 100 GenH2 tractors is due to be built at Wörth from late 2026 and placed directly into customer operations.
The company continues to present its dual-track strategy - batteries for some applications, hydrogen for heavy long-haul - but is blunt about infrastructure progress.
According to the firm, hydrogen refuelling development is moving slower than expected, meaning wider deployment of hydrogen trucks is still some years away. As a result, large-scale industrialisation of fuel-cell systems remains targeted for the early 2030s, with Europe as the initial focus.
