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Opening of the HyMove filling station

The first public hydrogen filling station in the Netherlands was officially opened in Arnhem on Friday 3 December. Margreet van Gastel, alderman and member of the urban region council, and Petra van Stijn, director of VéBé van Steijn's AVIA filling station, fuelled a Honda FCX Clarity, which had been brought to the Netherlands especially for the occasion. All the hydrogen-powered vehicles that are going to be running in the project were parked there: the HyMove hydrogen bus, 2Switch's Hytruck, businessman Hans van der Woude's Subaru Impreza and a Fiat Doblo. After the official commissioning of the filling station they were handed over to Alderman van Wessem from the Municipality of Arnhem, who is going to be using the hydrogen-powered car as his official vehicle.

Three brief rounds of discussions about hydrogen were held in one of the buildings at the filling station before the official opening. In the first, Marlies Leupen led a discussion about the development and building of the filling station with Petra van Stijn from VéBé van Steijn, Ron de Reuver from AVIA, Jacques Smolenaars from HyGear and Rob van Aerde from KIWA. In the second round, Jan-Fokke Heida, Margreet van Gastel and Michiel van Wessem from the province, the urban region and the municipality gave their reasons for supporting the HyMove project. In the last round, Jip Peper from 2Switch, Tion Peters from the HAN, Ruud Gortworst from Connexxion and Leo Jegen from Honda – all actual users of hydrogen technology – spoke about their experience up to now. The overall impression is that the HyMove project can count on wide support in the region. The regional authorities are prepared to invest and to create the necessary conditions; regional companies such as HyGear, NedStack and the HAN have accumulated a great deal of knowledge about hydrogen technology and there are dozens of organisations that would like to run on hydrogen.

There were no fewer than four items of good news about the HyMove project on 3 December. As well as the opening of the filing station and the handing over of the Fiat Doblo, the Province of Gelderland unveiled a large information panel behind the hydrogen dispenser, informing visitors about running on hydrogen and the operation of the filling station. By setting up the panel, HyMove is explicitly addressing people who visit the filling station.

Finally. a symbolic agreement was signed that afternoon between the Municipality of Arnhem and VéBé van Steijn for the construction of a new futuristic-looking filling station that the latter is going to build in the Kleefse Waard.