Thirty hydrogen-fueled Toyota cars arrived in Estonia at the beginning of the year, though they have had to wait until mid-September to begin operating as the completion of the required filling station was delayed by almost a year.

This Monday, the station finally opened and the first three hydrogen cars began transporting Bolt taxi customers. Bolt also has a few hundred electric cars, which operate on the streets of Estonia every day.

The Estonian government has allocated €5 million to build a hydrogen production plant, establish two hydrogen filling stations and purchase 30 hydrogen-powered vehicles for use as public transport.

"When compared to electric cars, the advantage is definitely faster charging. It is almost comparable to a conventional car with regular fuel. The driving range is definitely better than that of electric cars. We can see that in the taxi sector, some cars get stuck in winter because the driving range for electric cars is insufficient," said Oscar Rõõm, Bolt's ride services manager.

A green hydrogen-powered car can travel 500-700 kilometers on a single tank of fuel. However, currently, the Väo filling station in Tallinn's Lasnamäe district is the only one in Estonia where it is possible for the vehicles to refuel.

A green hydrogen-powered car can travel 500-700 kilometers on a single tank of fuel. However, currently, the Väo filling station in Tallinn's Lasnamäe district is the only one in Estonia where it is possible for the vehicles to refuel.

Another Alexela hydrogen filling station is due to be completed soon on the capital's Peterburi tee, though these two options alone would not be sufficient to attract people to buy hydrogen-fuelled cars in large numbers.

In the long term, we would naturally like to see more of them, but for the time being, this is enough. We are launching this project in Tallinn. It is quite close by and accessible to drivers, and hopefully this will not be too much of a stumbling block in launching the project. Of course, we would like to see this network improve over time, just as we have seen the electric charging network improve," said Rõõm.

On Monday, Estonia's first and so far only hydrogen filling station was still waiting for customers, who remain in short supply at the moment.

"There have been other hydrogen enthusiasts – people who have hydrogen cars, hydrogen buses, hydrogen trucks – and we have already refueled them at the filling station. The idea behind this pilot project is to bring more hydrogen-powered vehicles onto the market. The capacity of our production facility is significantly greater than the amount needed for these taxis. This allows us to attract even more consumers to the market," said Aivo Lokk, head of business analysis at Utilitas.

Utilitas' hydrogen plant can produce 120,000-130,000 kilograms of hydrogen per year. The company also has containers for transporting hydrogen.

It is still difficult to say when the EU's goal of having special filling stations every 200 kilometers along Estonia's highways in addition to in the cities will be achieved.

"That's quite a tough question to answer. It's a question for the Estonian government. Currently, the issue facing the Ministry of the Environment is whether the initial market failure in this regard, in that there are no filling stations at all – in the form of these two filling stations and possible additional filling stations from supplementary projects – is considered sufficient to eliminate market failures, or whether the Estonian state plans to invest significantly more in these filling stations in the future," said Tanel Oppi, head of support and services at the Environmental Investment Center.

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