Hydrogen-diesel retrofits for yard trucks at plants that already make hydrogen
TL;DR Yardshift fits hydrogen-diesel co-combustion kits to the trucks and tractors that shuttle inside refineries, fertiliser plants and steel works, and sells the hydrogen on contract. The plant pays per kilometre or per tonne of diesel saved. It only works where hydrogen is already on site, and that's the narrow, honest version of the seed.
India already uses about 5 million tonnes of hydrogen a year, mostly in refining and fertiliser making[1]. Those same plants run fleets of diesel trucks, tippers and tractors inside their fences, and the companies behind them have public decarbonisation targets.
New fuel cell trucks are the clean answer, but they're costly and there aren't many. India's first home-grown fuel cell bus, shown in December 2021, ran about 450 km on 30 kg of hydrogen[2], and yet the mission still treats such vehicles as pilots that need viability-gap support[1].
So a plant manager who wants lower emissions this year has nothing to buy that uses the hydrogen sitting right next to the yard.
What it does, in regulatory terms: an engine fuel-system retrofit that needs type approval for any road-registered vehicle, plus PESO approval for on-board and on-site hydrogen storage. No published Indian approval route for hydrogen-diesel retrofit kits was found, so the first step is a test programme with ARAI or ICAT.
The kit adds hydrogen cylinders, injectors and a controller to an existing diesel engine. The engine burns a share of hydrogen alongside diesel, and if the hydrogen runs out then it simply carries on with diesel. Yardshift installs the kits, runs a small dispensing point fed from the plant's own hydrogen, and bills the plant for fuel and service.
The seed pitched modular retrofit kits for fleets in general. I've narrowed it to captive fleets, because hydrogen supply away from industrial sites is thin and expensive. One more honest caveat - hydrogen combustion still makes NOx, so this is lower-carbon and not zero-emission[3].
The plant operator pays, usually from the sustainability or logistics budget. A contractor may own the fleet though, so the contract has to spell out who saves on diesel and who pays for hydrogen. Pricing is per kilometre or a fuel contract, the way one Canadian retrofit firm does it[4]. Indian price points? None published.
The National Green Hydrogen Mission set aside ₹496 Cr for mobility pilots and ₹455 Cr for low-carbon steel pilots[5]. Green hydrogen now has a discovered Indian price, ₹397/kg in June 2025[6]. Refineries and fertiliser plants face minimum green hydrogen consumption trajectories to be set by the mission's Empowered Group[5].
There is no public count of captive yard trucks at Indian refineries, fertiliser plants or steel works. The firm signal is the mission's ₹1,466 Cr pilot budget, of which ₹496 Cr is for mobility[5]. Treat the 5 million tonnes of existing hydrogen use as context. It shows where the fuel is, not how many trucks you can convert[1].
A Canadian firm sells hydrogen-diesel retrofits for heavy trucks with a fuel-as-a-service contract, claiming up to 40% lower emissions per truck after more than 300,000 km of road testing[4]. In India, an engineering-software group's research arm and CSIR built a fuel cell bus[2]. I found no Indian firm retrofitting captive fleets with hydrogen.
The gap is a kit plus fuel deal sized for one plant's yard.
| Difficulty | Hard (71/100) |
| Starting capital | ₹6–11 Cr |
| Time to launch | 24–36 months |
Engine calibration, on-board storage and safety approval are all hard and slow, and every engine model needs its own tuning and testing. Plants are careful buyers with long safety reviews. One leak inside a refinery would end the business, full stop.
Yes, and the approval path is the hardest part of this business.
Building this outside India? The categories above usually have a local equivalent, so check with your own regulator.
Don't trust AI to clear a truck as safe to run. Leak checks and safety sign-off stay with trained people and the plant's safety team.
Want to work out the AI layer for Yardshift? Talk to Yash →
This suits a team with engine calibration and gas-safety experience and an anchor plant ready to co-fund a pilot. If you're a first-time founder or you're hoping to sell kits to road fleets soon then I'd stay away. Prove first that one plant will fund a 10-truck trial and that its safety team will approve the dispensing point.
Plan for roughly ₹6–11 Cr, and 24–36 months before launch because of testing and approvals.
Yes. Road vehicles need CMVR type approval through ARAI or ICAT, and on-board and on-site storage needs PESO approval.
Yes, a Canadian firm already does this. Check local vehicle approval and gas safety rules before you build a kit.
The free Yardshift validation kit has the line-by-line capital breakdown, the effort scoring, the approvals checklist, a 14-day validation sprint with pass/fail targets, a 90-day launch plan, 10 interview questions for plant and fleet managers, and 5 assumptions to test. Download the kit →
Thinking about building Yardshift or something close to it? The make-or-break work is finding an approval path for the kit and an anchor plant to pay for the first trial, and I can help you map out both. If you need a hand, you know where to find me. Talk to Yash →
For illustration only. Names are fictional and ideas hypothetical; sourced facts are real but may be out of date. Nothing here is legal, financial or professional advice, and Yash Khatri is not personally liable for any use of it. Read the full disclaimer.