Overcoming Demand Barriers to Hydrogen Use in Heavy-Duty Trucks and Ports

This paper identifies heavy-duty trucking and ports as promising sectors for hydrogen adoption, with support from demand-side incentives and policies.

Date

Jan. 23, 2026

Authors

Aaron Bergman, Alan Krupnick, Katarina Nehrkorn, and Yuqi Zhu

Publication

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Hydrogen has the potential to serve as a zero-carbon energy carrier as an element of a zero-carbon economy. But the high cost of clean hydrogen and infrastructure needs for scaling, plus the dismantling of policies to promote its production and use, have hampered its spread. Focusing on the heavy-duty trucking and ports sectors, we review the policy landscape here and abroad and the obstacles faced by clean hydrogen in these sectors. We present potential policies for overcoming the demand-side obstacles in these two sectors, with some focus on the nascent Biden administration's Joint Offtake Producer Auction and its contrast with other policy ideas, such as contracts for differences. The discussion is organized around the obstacles of high cost, uptake of fuel cell vehicles and the construction of a refueling network for heavy-duty trucking. Among several suggestions, we find that hydrogen use in heavy-duty trucking requires more coordinated investment due to the need for extensive refueling infrastructure along transportation corridors.

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