November 4, 2025 - Toyota Builds Overlanding Truck that Can't Go Anywhere

This is the Telemetry Transportation Daily for  November 4, 2025, and I'm Sam Abuelsamid, Vice President of Market Research for Telemetry.  

It's no secret that Toyota remains one of the biggest proponents of hydrogen fuel cell technology for transportation. The automaker has sold more than 27,000 of its fuel cell-powered Mirai sedans since 2014 and has been running a test fleet of fuel cell-powered tractor-trailers at the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles for several years. Despite this and the progress that has been made in reducing the cost of fuel cell systems, there remains a fundamental problem with the technology: a lack of hydrogen fueling infrastructure. At present, there are only 50 fueling stations in the U.S., all in California, with another seven in Canada. Many of those stations are often offline due to mechanical issues or simply a lack of fuel. A recent class action lawsuit has been filed against Toyota by Mirai owners. 

This week at the annual Specialty Equipment Marketing Association show in Las Vegas, Toyota has introduced a number of concept vehicles, including the Tacoma H2-Overlander concept powered by a fuel cell. Toyota touts this off-road pickup as being able to charge a friend's EV through its 15-kW export power port. It features a water recovery system that captures and filters the water exhausted from the fuel cell, which is useful in remote locations where water might be scarce.  

The problem is that lack of hydrogen fueling infrastructure. With only 6 kg of on-board hydrogen storage and a 25-kWh battery, the 547-hp Tacoma is probably going to struggle to go much more than 150-200 miles round trip, not very remote. It's certainly interesting to have a fuel cell-powered overlanding truck, and Toyota's commitment to finding uses for the technology is laudable, including zero-emission camping, but this is almost certainly not the right application anytime in the foreseeable future. 

Thanks for listening.