Liebherr Begins Customer Testing on L 566 H Hydrogen Wheel Loader
This company says this is the next step in developing the “world’s first prototype large wheel loader with a hydrogen engine.”
machineryasia 
Liebherr is taking the next step in its development of the “world’s first prototype large wheel loader with a hydrogen engine” as it enters the customer testing phase.
The L 566 H will spend two years at the Kanzelstein quarry in Gratkorn, Austria, with Austrian construction company Strabag. Energie Steiermark will supply green hydrogen for a hydrogen filling station at the quarry.
Liebherr estimates that the hydrogen wheel loader should save up to 100 metric tons of CO2 each year, or the equivalent to nearly 10,000 gallons of diesel. “We want to be climate neutral by 2040. The only way to achieve this is by consistently and comprehensively saving CO2, for example, in the operation of construction machinery,” said Strabag CEO Klemens Haselsteiner.
Liebherr manufactures the hydrogen engine used in the machine at its engine plant in Bulle, Switzerland. These engines emit zero greenhouse gases and almost no nitrogen oxides and are efficient to operate.
“The technology also enables large vehicles that are difficult to electrify due to their high energy demand to be operated without CO2,” explains Dr.-Ing. Herbert Pfab, Technical Director of Liebherr-Werk Bischofshofen GmbH.
To mark the start of the project, a special event, which included technical presentations, a quarry tour, and a demonstration of the wheel loader, was held. Leonore Gewessler, minister for climate action, Clemens Haselsteiner, CEO of Strabag, Martin Graf, director of Energie Steiermark, and Jan Liebherr, chairman of the board of directors of Liebherr-International AG, attended.
Gewessler praised the project participants for their decarbonization efforts, saying, “I am pleased to see innovative companies pushing ahead with pilot projects, especially in forms of mobility that are difficult to electrify, such as those in the construction sector. Green hydrogen is an indispensable element of our future energy.”
