New Jersey Grants $13M to Hydrogen Drayage Truck Port Pilot
New Jersey is putting $13 million toward a near-term pilot program that will test hydrogen-powered drayage trucks moving cargo at the Port Newark Container Terminal.
The state funding is going to Rutgers, which will run the effort as a practical experiment focused on day-to-day port freight movement. The goal is to see whether hydrogen trucks can handle the kind of short-haul container work drayage drivers do around terminals.
For drivers and fleets that work the New Jersey port complex, drayage is a high-activity part of the freight network. Equipment choices at ports can affect how trucks operate on the ground, from how loads are moved in and out to what kind of support infrastructure is needed to keep trucks running.
The pilot matters because it places hydrogen-powered drayage trucks into a real port environment instead of limiting the technology to controlled demonstrations. By funding Rutgers to test the concept at Port Newark, the state is backing a hands-on evaluation of how hydrogen trucks perform in the kind of stop-and-go, appointment-driven work that defines port drayage.