An international mining company has announced that it will launch the world’s largest electric truck, at one of its platinum mines in South Africa.
The truck, called Fuel Cell Electric, weighs about 290 tons to be approximately 6 times heavier than the world’s second largest electric vehicle, the “eDumper“ and weighs 45 tons, used to transport lime and marble around a mining facility in Switzerland.
Fuel Cell Electric is designed with a hybrid engine that uses a lithium-ion battery and hydrogen fuel cells, which replace conventional diesel engine vehicles commonly used in mines.
The truck will have a combined energy store of 1,000 kWh, and the only by-product of waste produced by the engine is water, which is produced only when powered by hydrogen fuel.
The truck can also recover small amounts of kinetic energy from the braking system, to charge the lithium-ion battery, according to a report published in the magazine Popular Mechanics. It will be used later this year at the Mughalaquina Mine, one of South Africa‘s largest platinum reserves, with more than 310,000 ounces of platinum extracted annually.
The mine is managed by Anglo American, an international mining group that produces 40% of the world’s platinum, as well as diamonds, copper, nickel, iron ore and coal.
The company has publicly promised to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions by 30% by 2030 and believes that the company’s increased use of electric vehicles can help it achieve this goal.
And for Fuel Cell Electric, the company has partnered with Williams Advanced Engineering, a London-based company involved in a variety of energy efficiency and vehicle projects.
Williams also designed batteries for electric racing cars, which compete in the FIA Extreme E race track, and used this technology as a starting point for the Fuel Cell Electric truck.
Source: Daily Mail
