IRVINE, California, Aug. 3, 2023/PRNewswire/ — FirstElement Fuel Inc. (“FEF” or “the Company”), a world leader in building and operating hydrogen refueling stations and hydrogen supply chains, will hold its 10th anniversary this month at its Irvine, California, headquarters.
The company’s goal remains the same as it was when it was founded in 2013: To foster widespread adoption of fuel cell vehicles, improve driving economy, reduce harmful emissions, and change the automotive industry and the world.
Hydrogen-powered vehicles have the ability to transform modern transportation by eliminating tailpipe emissions, dramatically reducing carbon emissions, and more than doubling driving efficiency compared to traditional combustion vehicles. Currently, FEF is a world leader in the design, development and operation of retail hydrogen service stations, with 85 dispensers located in a network of 40 stations throughout California. FEF’s service stations operate under the company’s True Zero brand, which is synonymous with leading performance and availability for hydrogen-powered cars and trucks. The company continues to expand its California hydrogen network to serve light, medium and heavy duty vehicles with the support of grants from California state and regional agencies.
Over the past 10 years, FEF has received public funds from the California Energy Commission, the South Coast Air Quality Management District, the Bay Area Air Quality Management District, and the Sacramento Municipal Air Quality Management. Private financing has been provided by Mitsui
“Since our company’s inception 10 years ago, automakers have brought fantastic hydrogen cars and trucks to market, and we see the vehicles ready for prime time,” said Joel Ewanick, CEO and founder of FEF. “Our job is to create a network of stations to support the commercial deployment of these vehicles as an alternative to those powered by gasoline and diesel. We fight every day to achieve this. We believe that what we are creating in California will serve as a framework that can be exported to all United States and the rest of the world, helping us accomplish our mission.”
FEF is the first and only company in the world to have demonstrated the feasibility of commercial-scale hydrogen refuelling, i.e. the ability to refuel multiple cars simultaneously in less than 5 minutes, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, without staff need. The company has implemented its own design to develop hydrogen refueling stations that can refuel four cars simultaneously, and has demonstrated hydrogen refueling of multiple models of heavy-duty trucks at the standard of 70 MPa.
FEF is also building, under its True Zero brand, the largest heavy truck station in the world, with the capacity to refuel heavy, medium and light vehicles. The station is part of a public-private partnership in which Hyundai Motor Company will supply 30 XCIENT Fuel Cells, the largest deployment of hydrogen-powered Class 8 vehicles in the US. The project, dubbed NorCAL ZERO, was jointly funded by the California Energy Commission (CEC) and the California Air Resources Board (CARB) and is managed by the Center for Transportation and the Environment (CTE). FirstElement has designed the station, currently under construction, with a unique architecture to produce a capacity of 18,000 kilograms per day and make it the first station in the world to deploy rapid-fill protocols and components capable of filling a truck with 80 kilograms of hydrogen in less than 10 minutes.
FirstElement’s top fuel records in its first ten years
*Zero emission vehicle
California State policy has for decades supported the transition to hydrogen in the transportation sector as part of its zero emission vehicle strategy, placing the State in a leadership position for hydrogen-related development. And more recently, the use of hydrogen to replace conventional fossil fuels in the transport and energy sectors has been embraced globally as critical to combating global warming, reducing harmful air pollutants and improving energy security. For example, the bipartisan United States legislation on the Cut Inflation Act represents a significant commitment to the development of clean hydrogen as a replacement for traditional fossil fuel energy. Japan, the European Union and South Korea have also committed to developing hydrogen as a transportation fuel.
In addition to FEF’s global leadership in hydrogen station construction and operation, the company has also become a leader in technology development related to the design and application of hydrogen station and hydrogen supply chain technologies. In addition to extensive in-house knowledge, the company currently has 10 patents granted or pending for technologies that, to cite a few examples, have allowed several vehicles to refuel simultaneously from a single piece of equipment, have automated the discharge of hydrogen during deliveries to improve safety and efficiency, and have reduced refueling times for hydrogen-powered heavy-duty trucks.
Along with FEF’s business expansion, the company continues to innovate solutions to reduce the cost gap between hydrogen refueling stations and conventional stations, as well as to improve reliability and, ultimately, the customer experience.
“We realize that hydrogen still has some hurdles, and cost is one of them,” Ewanick said. “But at the same time we’ve made all of our hydrogen 100% carbon free and there are imminent state and federal energy policies that will help level costs with polluting petroleum-derived fuels. We see this as nothing more than a hurdle in the future.” path towards building the hydrogen grid.Any company is only as good as the dedication of the people who form the essence of the organization, and at FirstElement our excellent team approaches each problem methodically, never getting discouraged and knowing that we cannot stop for what is at stake: clean air, energy security and winning the war against climate change”.
“We are determined and persistent in our mission to encourage the adoption of hydrogen vehicles and create a replacement for diesel and gasoline. People want choice and we will continue to fight every day to give consumers the choice to use hydrogen vehicles. We want to thank our customers who have been with us, encouraging us to keep going. Our mission has not changed from the beginning. We will continue working to build more stations and supply hydrogen. Now we are focused on reducing the price of hydrogen at the pump: We listen to our customers and we will fight for you, that is the FirstElement Fuel promise.”
About FirstElement Fuel Inc. FirstElement Fuel Inc is a California-based company established in 2013 to supply safe and reliable retail hydrogen to fuel cell electric vehicle customers. The company is the developer, owner and operator of the True Zero brand of retail hydrogen stations, which currently represents the largest network of hydrogen stations in the world. Learn more about FirstElement at: https://www.firstelementfuel.com/
Learn more about FirstElement Fuel Inc. at FirstElementFuel.com
Learn more about our True Zero Network at truezero.com
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