NEWS

March 2013 Fuel Cells Bulletin5

The landfill gas cleanup will be performed by prime contractor Quadrogen Power Systems, and the cleaned landfill gas will be used by the Direct FuelCell® molten carbonate fuel cell power plant to generate multiple revenue streams, including ultra-clean electricity, usable high-quality heat, and renewable hydrogen. Hot water will be supplied to Village Farms, a leading hydroponic greenhouse operator, while the ‘green’ hydrogen will also be exported for vehicle fuelling or industrial applications.

‘Cleaning landfill gas before it is used by the fuel cells represents unique challenges of removing impurities that can impact fuel cell performance, as well as removing harmful organic chemicals which do not affect the fuel cells but can’t be released to the atmosphere,’ says Alakh Prasad, president and CEO of Quadrogen. The company builds and installs modular, high-performance biogas cleanup solutions capable of purifying renewable fuels from any source, such as landfill, digester, or syngas.

‘This project provides our first opportunity to demonstrate the application of our Direct FuelCell technology with renewable landfill gas, in addition to advancing our hydrogen co-production technology,’ says Tony Leo, VP of application engineering & advanced technology development for FuelCell Energy. ‘Our partner in this project, Quadrogen Power Systems, has developed an effective cleanup technology, as demonstrated by the high performance of their equipment at an existing hydrogen co-production fuel cell installation in California that is providing ultra-clean electricity and hydrogen for vehicle fuelling from renewable biogas generated by a wastewater treatment plant’ [FCB, August 2011, p1].

The project will also feature FuelCell Energy’s solid-state electrochemical hydrogen separation and compression (EHSC) technology [FCB, November 2011, p11], which efficiently and cost-effectively purifies and compresses hydrogen for industrial uses or vehicle fuelling.

The landfill for the City of Vancouver has an advanced gas collection system. Some of the gas is flared, wasting a potential fuel source and generating pollutants. A successful project demonstration could lead to additional projects at this landfill as well as other landfills.

Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada is providing a repayable contribution through the federal Canadian Agricultural Adaptation Program, delivered by the Investment Agriculture Foundation of BC. Other project partners include Sustainable Development Technology Canada (SDTC), National Research Council of Canada (NRC), and BC Bioenergy Network.

The use of biogas is attracting increasing interest for fuel cell applications; BC-based

Ballard Power Systems has just sold a ClearGen™ distributed generation PEM fuel cell system – running on gasified timber by-product feedstock – to an Indian reservation in northern California [see item above].

FuelCell Energy, Danbury, Connecticut, USA. Tel: +1 203 825 6000, www.fuelcellenergy.com

Quadrogen Power Systems, Vancouver, BC, Canada. Tel: +1 604 221 7170, www.quadrogen.com

Village Farms International: www.villagefarms.com

Investment Agriculture Foundation of BC: www.iafbc.ca

SFC Energy’s EFOY Pro powers wind measurement systems

In Germany, GWU-Umwelttechnik GmbH has selected the proven EFOY

Pro fuel cell generator from SFC Energy as the power source for its LIDAR wind measurement trailer. LIDAR is used for assessing wind fields in the atmosphere at various heights and points in time, such as for wind farm planning.

LIDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) systems emit laser beams at regular intervals, to determine wind speed and direction profiles at heights of 200–300 m above the ground. In this application, modern LIDAR systems are replacing the previously used wind masts, since they provide better data, are easily set up and dismantled, and are not recognisable at first glance.

The GWU trailer is used for transporting, storing, and operating the Windcube v2 Doppler LIDAR wind measurement system from market leader Leosphere in France. It will now be powered by an EFOY Pro 2200 XT direct methanol fuel cell unit.

Doppler wind LIDAR measuring systems usually remain in one location for up to 12 months. The EFOY Pro fuel cell generator ensures a reliable, uninterrupted supply of power for such operation and, in winter, also heating of the systems. The EFOY Pro operates in hybrid mode with a solar module in a power pack developed by Leosphere, GWU-Umwelttechnik GmbH, and system integrator and SFC partner udomi. The fuel cell generator enables autonomous operation of the system for months on end without any user intervention, significantly lowering operating and logistical costs.

An EFOY Pro fuel cell generator has enabled the undisturbed video observation of a pair of white-tailed eagles over their recent breeding

I N B R I E F

Arcola fuel cell developer kit is hit at uniUK-based Arcola Energy (www.arcolaenergy.com), in partnership with Horizon Fuel Cell Technologies (www.horizonfuelcell.com) and MIT Fab Labs, launched the Hydrogen Maker Developer Kit™ (H2MDK) last summer [FCB, June 2012, p12]. The H2MDK – powered by a 1.5, 12 or 30 W Horizon PEM fuel cell in combination with the popular Arduino microelectronics developer platform – allows researchers, commercial product developers, inventors, and hobbyists to build customised fuel cell systems to fit their individual applications.

Recent UK customers include the universities of Oxford and Salford, as well as Imperial College in London. International sales include the Republic Polytechnic in Singapore, and a customised 5 × 200 W system for the Université de technologie Belfort-Montbéliard in France.

Hannover hydrogen energy storage focusOne of the central topics of the Group Exhibit Hydrogen + Fuel Cells (www.h2fc-fair.com) at this year’s Hannover Messe (8–12 April) is the storage of renewable energy from wind and solar in the form of hydrogen. Several innovative ‘Power-to-Gas’ concepts will be on show at the German trade fair.

More than 130 companies and research institutions from 20 countries will join the Group Exhibit. The exhibitors will showcase the entire spectrum of hydrogen technology, from hydrogen generation to its use in stationary and mobile fuel cell applications.

There will also be fuel cell electric vehicles from Daimler, GM/Opel, Toyota, and Honda available for a test-drive. Linde will refuel them with hydrogen three times a day, while ITM Power will generate hydrogen on the spot to refuel a a hydrogen bus for transporting visitors.

Call for papers for US Fuel Cell SeminarAbstracts are now being invited for the 2013 Fuel Cell Seminar & Energy Exposition (www.fuelcellseminar.com), taking place 21–24 October in Columbus, Ohio. Abstracts must be submitted online by Monday 20 May.

Prospective presenters are invited to submit abstracts in four main topic areas: motive and automotive, stationary power and energy production, business to business enterprise solutions, and education.

The key areas within motive and automotive are OEMs, materials handling, hydrogen fuelling storage and generation, and R&D. For stationary power and energy production, abstracts are sought on applications, OEMs, fuels, and R&D. The key B2B areas are telecoms, military, APUs, and portables. And for education, papers should be on fuel cell and hydrogen degrees and college curriculum development, school curricula, and public outreach.

PORTABLE & MICRO

NEWS

March 2013 Fuel Cells Bulletin11

platinum group metal (PGM)-based catalysts. In addition, Oorja and HySA Catalysis will cooperate on joint technology development with the aim of reducing costs and improving performance and durability.

‘The activities planned aim to address goals such human capital development, job creation, developing the South African fuel cell supply chain, joint technology development, and a move towards PGM beneficiation through leapfrogging South Africa into commercialisation of fuel cells with global sales opportunities,’ says Dr Sharon Blair, key programme manager for portable power at HySA Catalysis.

Oorja is a leading developer and manufacturer of direct methanol fuel cells, that are being used by several customers across the US as onboard battery chargers for materials handling equipment, such as Baldor Specialty Foods in New York City [FCB, December 2011, p2].

The OorjaPac family of DMFC products operates on widely available and low-cost liquid methanol fuel. The fuel cell installed on the equipment provides the additional benefit of minimal infrastructure requirement – avoiding the need for any hydrogen infrastructure – making it attractive for both existing and new facilities with a very quick payback [see the Oorja feature in FCB, March 2012].

Contact: Dr Sharon Blair, Key Programme Manager – Portable Power, HySA Catalysis, Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Cape Town, Rondebosch, South Africa. Tel: +27 21 650 5559, Email: sharon.blair@uct.ac.za, Web: www.hysacatalysis.uct.ac.za

Oorja Protonics, Fremont, California, USA. Tel: +1 510 371 4340. www.oorjafuelcells.com

Euro-Canadian modelling team to design better fuel cells

A consortium of European and Canadian scientists in 11

organisations, called PUMA MIND, aims to advance the state of knowledge in designing new tools for PEM fuel cells, to bring them closer to technical and economic viability.

Increasing the durability of their materials is one of the key problems that need to be solved before fuel cells can become fully commercial. PEMFCs are very complex nonlinear systems, and the project aims to apply powerful mathematical models in order to improve their durability and efficiency, and reduce the cost and development time. The mathematical

models will be used for command and control and offer predictive capabilities, so it is crucial that they are robust. The novel mathematical models will then be experimentally tested, to ensure their applicability on commercially attainable components and catalysts.

This ambitious project is supported by the 7th Framework Programme of the European Commission in the context of the Fuel Cells and Hydrogen Joint Undertaking (FCH JU). It has a budget of E4.1 million (US$5.3 million) over three years. The consortium is coordinated by the French CEA Atomic Energy and Alternative Energies Commission, and also comprises the CNRS Laboratory of Reactivity and Chemistry of Solids (LRCS) and the École Normale Supérieure de Lyon (ENSL) in France, the DLR German Aerospace Center and Offenburg University of Applied Sciences (HSO) in Germany, the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) and automotive design company Idiada Automotive Technology SA in Spain, the University of Salerno (UNISA) in Italy, the European JRC Institute for Energy and Transport in Belgium, innovation management specialist Vodera Ltd in the UK, and Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, Canada.

This project claims to be the first to tackle the lack of understanding of cell operation as a multiscale system, from the material to the system level. The approach comprises building up a diagnostic and control-dedicated physical model with prediction capabilities. This will enable better targeting of experimental characterisations in representative conditions of the end-user application, and a reduced number of experiments (and thus cost) currently needed to build up classical empirical models with limited prediction capabilities.

The team will develop new operating strategies that reduce performance degradation, and also strategies to improve the stability of the materials and components. And integration of the modelling efforts will be done with the development of a modelling platform for more efficient communication and coordination, which should lead to a better impact of the use of modelling on PEMFC optimisation in engineering practice.

The project has plans for the dissemination and exploitation of its results. This includes technology roadmapping, the establishment of a PUMA MIND Interest Group, and a workshop programme to inform practitioners and researchers who are likely to become early adopters of the technologies. The project will also feed directly into education, with knowledge and technical skills built throughout the project incorporated into a range of courses, and influencing the university curricula of the academic partners.

PUMA MIND project: www.pumamind.eu

I N B R I E F

ITM Power sells first HPac unit in JapanUK-based ITM Power (www.itm-power.com) has sold the first reference plant based on its HPac electrolyser platform to an unnamed Japanese company. ITM – which offers a range of units based on its high-efficiency PEM electrolysis technology – is now selling products more actively in Japan.

ITM Power designs and manufactures hydrogen energy systems for energy storage and clean fuel production [see the ITM features in FCB, January and July 2012]. The company also now offers a full turnkey solution to the materials handling sector [FCB, February 2013, p3].

DOE invests for lower-cost hydrogen fuelThe US Department of Energy has announced a $1 million investment to analyse and evaluate potential cost-competitive pathways for producing and transporting hydrogen fuel. The project – led by Strategic Analysis Inc (www.sainc.com) in Arlington, Virginia – will identify cost-effective and efficient materials and processes to produce hydrogen from renewable energy sources. This investment supports the broader goal of the DOE Fuel Cell Technologies Office (www.eere.energy.gov/hydrogenandfuelcells) to achieve $2 to $4 per gallon gasoline equivalent of hydrogen fuel by 2020.

The project will conduct thorough cost analyses of hydrogen pathways to identify the most economical hydrogen production and delivery methods, and highlight the remaining R&D challenges. Strategic Analysis will examine a range of hydrogen production pathways, including electrolysis from the electrical grid and renewable energy sources, converting biofuels to hydrogen, biomass gasification, solar thermochemical hydrogen, photoelectrochemical, and biological hydrogen.

European ene.field demo adds momentumThe ene.field project (www.enefield.eu), the largest demonstration of micro fuel cell combined heat and power (FC-CHP) systems in Europe, recently met in Berlin for its second project meeting.

The ene.field initiative, which will place up to 1000 micro FC-CHP units in homes across Europe, is working closely with the German Callux demonstration of domestic fuel cell heating systems. Partners in the ene.field team are working with Callux participants to learn how to meet some of the early challenges, and to exchange lessons learned.

The ene.field project consortium also discussed progress on identifying an opportunity for industry stakeholders – in particular utilities – to get involved in the project. The partners will also take their project to the upcoming Hannover Messe [see In Brief item on p5], where they will meet the micro FC-CHP stakeholder group to discuss the project in more detail.

RESEARCH