A General Hydrogen Hydricity pack on a forklift.

Komatsu distributor Material Handling Resources LLC (MHR) is collaborating with General Hydrogen Corporation to provide fuel cell battery replacement technology for a forklift customer.

MHR supplied a Komatsu FB25SHG-6 with General Hydrogen's Hydricity packs to an unidentified major customer of MHR and General Hydrogen. "It is on demo and [at low fuel pressure] getting nine to 10 hours [of] run time and [a] five-minute refuel," Joe Tracey, MHR sales manager, said. Use of a permanent fuel station and filling tanks to higher pressures should allow run times up to 18 hours, said Tony Troutt, General Hydrogen vice president of business development.

Tracey said MHR's discussions with the customer began in January and the demonstration started in March. The sit-down forklift has a 5,000lb (2,250kg) lifting capacity.

Greg Asadourian, general manager of Nashville-based MHR, said: "We found General Hydrogen was to demo one of its fuel cells and made arrangements to provide one of our new units as the vehicle. Testing is still underway. The results are favourable and the customer is still evaluating."