Toyota’s New Hydrogen-Powered Pickup Is a Testbed for Sustainable Future Trucks

Japanese car giant Toyota is one of the few automakers pursuing hydrogen propulsion in earnest. Most hydrogen vehicles use a fuel cell to turn the gas into electricity. However, some prototype vehicles in Toyota's lineup use existing combustion engines modified to burn clean hydrogen instead of fossil fuels.  Both use know-how from the second-generation Mirai fuel-cell vehicle in order to manage the packaging on the high-pressure hydrogen tanks. In the case of the Hilux, the vehicle leans on that car's fuel-cell technology as well. The Corolla Cross is the more interesting and complete of the two concepts. In the press release for the vehicle, the automaker states that it "firmly believes it is too early to focus on one single zero-emission solution" in terms of the future of transportation. To back this up, it states that improvements to its hydrogen combustion systems have been rapid and impressive. Its hydrogen-burning engines now produce "dynamic performance on par with a conventional petrol engine." It has also been able to reduce refueling times from around five minutes to just 1.5.