South Korea opens heavy hydrogen-truck testing hub in Wanju

South Korea’s Jeonbuk province has opened a hydrogen mobility research centre in Wanju built to test and help commercialise heavy hydrogen-powered commercial vehicles.

The centrepiece of the roughly 15.3 billion won facility is a 500-kilowatt-class chassis dynamometer capable of handling vehicles weighing up to 40 tonnes, allowing full-size hydrogen trucks and buses to be run and evaluated under controlled, road-simulating conditions.

The centre is intended to give domestic manufacturers and suppliers a place to verify the performance, durability and reliability of hydrogen commercial vehicles before they reach the market, addressing one of the practical bottlenecks in scaling up heavy fuel-cell transport.

The location reflects Jeonbuk’s position as the heart of South Korea’s commercial-vehicle industry, anchored by Hyundai’s Jeonju plant, the country’s main production base for hydrogen trucks and buses, and surrounded by a cluster of firms working on fuel cells, hydrogen storage tanks and related components.

The new proving ground adds to a string of hydrogen facilities the province has established across production, certification and fuel-cell reliability, part of a strategy to build a full hydrogen-vehicle value chain in the region and support national ambitions to expand zero-emission heavy transport.