Development of Fuel-Cell Hybrid Bus

In order to improve air quality and to reduce urban noise, Toyota Motor Corporation has developed a fuel cell hybrid bus, FCHV-BUS2, in cooperation with HINO Motors, Ltd. The FCHV-BUS2 is based on a HINO low floor city bus model, and powered by a hydrogen fuel cell hybrid system. Hydrogen is stored in high pressure tanks on the bus roof.

Based on the Toyota fuel cell hybrid technology for passenger cars, this fuel cell hybrid bus is equipped with two fuel cell stacks, two traction motors and four secondary batteries, making its vehicle efficiency approximately 1.7 times better than the diesel engine powered bus. The vehicle efficiency is boosted by charging the secondary batteries with regenerated energy while deceleration and by stopping the fuel cell stack(s) power generation during low fuel cell power modes.