Stacking Up

This article reviews that efficiency on a small scale and a means of curbing emissions make fuel cells an investment for the future. The Connecticut Clean Energy Fund put up the $1.25 million to purchase the fuel cell-power plant from a local company, Fuel Cell Energy Inc., in Danbury. The motive for funding fuel cells goes beyond boosting for local industry, though. As pressures mount on available resources and the environment, fuel cell systems can play a major role in the future of stationary and mobile power generation. Many adherents believe that fuel cell systems promise to provide benefits in a variety of applications. Systems based on PEM and direct methanol technology promise to make power more portable and convenient, and proton exchange membrane (PEM) technology also promises to provide a more efficient, cleaner technology for the automotive industry. PEM, phosphoric acid, molten carbonate, and solid oxide fuel cells are likely to be applied in cogeneration applications that use the exhaust heat.

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Conversion of Syngas From Biomass in Solid Oxide Fuel Cells

ASME 2006 Fourth International Conference on Fuel Cell Science, Engineering and Technology, Parts A and B ◽

10.1115/fuelcell2006-97089 ◽

2006 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Ju¨rgen Karl ◽

Nadine Frank ◽

Sotiris Karellas ◽

Mathilde Saule ◽

Ulrich Hohenwarter

Keyword(s):

Fuel Cells ◽

Fuel Cell ◽

Liquid Metal ◽

Waste Heat ◽

Heat Pipes ◽

Economic Feasibility ◽

Small Scale ◽

Cell Systems ◽

Exhaust Heat ◽

Integrated Gasification

Conversion of biomass in syngas by means of indirect gasification offers the option to improve the economic situation of any fuel cell systems due to lower costs for feedstock and higher power revenues in many European countries. The coupling of an indirect gasification of biomass and residues with highly efficient SOFC systems is therefore a promising technology for reaching economic feasibility of small decentralized combined heat and power production (CHP). The predicted efficiency of common high temperature fuel cell systems with integrated gasification of solid feedstock is usually significantly lower than the efficiency of fuel cells operated with hydrogen or methane. Additional system components like the gasifier, as well as the gas cleaning reduce this efficiency. Hence common fuel cell systems with integrated gasification of biomass will hardly reach electrical efficiencies above 30 percent. An extraordinary efficient combination is achieved in case that the fuel cells waste heat is used in an indirect gasification system. A simple combination of a SOFC and an allothermal gasifier enables then electrical efficiencies above 50%. But this systems requires an innovative cooling concept for the fuel cell stack. Another significant question is the influence of impurities on the fuel cells degradation. The European Research Project ‘BioCellus’ focuses on both questions — the influence of the biogenious syngas on the fuel cells and an innovative cooling concept based on liquid metal heat pipes. First experiments showed that in particular higher hydrocarbons — the so-called tars — do not have an significant influence on the performance of SOFC membranes. The innovative concept of the TopCycle comprises to heat an indirect gasifier with the exhaust heat of the fuel cell by means of liquid metal heat pipes. Internal cooling of the stack and the recirculation of waste heat increases the system efficiency significantly. This concept promises electrical efficiencies of above 50 percent even for small-scale systems without any combined processes.

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Advances in the Research and Development of Fuel Cells in China

2nd International Conference on Fuel Cell Science, Engineering and Technology ◽

10.1115/fuelcell2004-2470 ◽

2004 ◽

Author(s):

Chong-Fang Ma ◽

Hang Guo ◽

Fang Ye ◽

Jian Yu

Keyword(s):

Fuel Cells ◽

Fuel Cell ◽

Research And Development ◽

Proton Exchange Membrane ◽

High Efficiency ◽

Direct Methanol Fuel Cells ◽

Proton Exchange ◽

Molten Carbonate ◽

Direct Methanol ◽

The Government

As a clean, high efficiency power generation technology, fuel cell is a promising choice of next generation power device. Widely application of fuel cells will make a contribution to save fuels and reduce atmospheric pollution. In recent years, fuel cells science, technology and engineering have attracted great interest in China. There are more and more Chinese scientists and engineers embark upon fuel cell projects. The government also encourages academic institutions and companies to enter into this area. Research and development of fuel cells are growing rapidly in China. There are many chances and challenges in fuel cells’ research and development. The state of the art of research and development of fuel cells in China was overviewed in this paper. The types of fuel cells addressed in this paper included alkaline fuel cells, phosphoric acid fuel cells, molten carbonate fuel cells, solid oxide fuel cells, proton exchange membrane fuel cells and direct methanol fuel cells.

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Rodzaje ogniw paliwowych i ich potencjalne kierunki wykorzystania

Nafta-Gaz ◽

10.18668/ng.2021.05.06 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 77 (5) ◽

pp. 332-339

Author(s):

Urszula Żyjewska ◽

Keyword(s):

Fuel Cells ◽

Fuel Cell ◽

Power Systems ◽

Proton Exchange Membrane ◽

Technical Specification ◽

Proton Exchange ◽

Molten Carbonate Fuel Cell ◽

Motor Vehicles ◽

Molten Carbonate ◽

Exchange Membrane

Fuel cells are not a new technology, but they are gaining in popularity and are being intensively developed. The article presents and characterizes various types of fuel cells that are currently of interest to research and development centers dealing with environmental protection issues. These include: alkaline fuel cell (AFC), phosphoric acid fuel cell (PAFC), solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC), molten carbonate fuel cell (MCFC), proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC), including direct methanol fuel cell (DMFC). The operating parameters of the previously mentioned fuel cells were compared. The principle of operation of a fuel cell was described. The growing interest in devices using hydrogen as a fuel also results from the development of Power to Gas technology (P2G). Furthermore, the article presents the potential directions of development and use of fuel cells in various fields and sectors of the economy. Fuel cells can be used in transport. The characteristic of motor vehicles fleet by fuel type in usage in the European Union was presented. The technical specification of commercially available passenger cars using fuel cells with proton exchange membrane was presented. The possibility of using fuel cells in public transport (buses, trains) was discussed. The possibilities of operation of fuel cells in combined heat and power systems (CHP) were presented. Usage of fuel cell technology in large cogeneration units and micro systems was considered. One of the presented cogeneration systems is a combination of fuel cells with a gas turbine. Another possibility of using fuel cells is energy storage systems (EES). Interesting way of using fuel cells can also be Power to Power systems, which were briefly characterized.

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Design and development of a laboratory for the study of PEMFC system for marine applications

E3S Web of Conferences ◽

10.1051/e3sconf/201911302020 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 113 ◽

pp. 02020

Author(s):

Gerardo Borgogna ◽

Enrico Speranza ◽

Thomas Lamberti ◽

Alberto Nicola Traverso ◽

Loredana Magistri ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Fuel Cells ◽

Fuel Cell ◽

Power Systems ◽

Alternative Fuels ◽

Large Scale ◽

Proton Exchange Membrane ◽

Proton Exchange ◽

Scale Production ◽

Cell Systems ◽

Marine Applications

Climate change is driving the introduction of strict emission limits in the shipping sector favoring the introduction of alternative fuels, among which hydrogen. While the storage energy density of this energy vector is a key challenge that makes way to a variety of different solutions, from fossil fuel reformers to sodium borohydride systems, fuel cell systems are generally considered among the future ideal energy converters. Nevertheless very few fuel cell marine applications are available worldwide, none of them is related to a ship application, mainly because of the high power requirements. Fuel cells are relatively new in the shipping sector, up to now no civil industrial system has been commercialized yet while military applications rely only on the U212 submarine of the Italian and German Navy. The lack of favorable niche markets coupled with the strong conservative and traditional design principles held back the investment for optimized marine systems. For this reason, present and past projects made use of conveniently adapted automotive technologies into pilot demos, with particular focus on Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cell (PEMFC). However, ships requirements are largely different from automotive ones, not only for the power size that are in the range of MWs instead of kWs. On the other side, in order to take advantage of large scale production as well as of the modularity of fuel cell technology, the integrations of automotive or stationary based fuel cell subsystems, already available on the market, inside a dedicate modular marine system seems to be the solution pursued by many shipbuilders and contemplated by regulatory authorities. In hybrid system configurations, fuel cells are considered in combinations with batteries, another important technology under development, in order to take advantage of the superior energy performances of fuel cell systems and the highly power discharge dynamics of batteries. The need of fuel cell power systems for ships is pushing towards the creation of knowledge that requires laboratories able to challenge the abovementioned issues in order to give answers to shipbuilders and at a lower level also to rule makers.

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Highly proton conductive membranes based on carboxylated cellulose nanofibres and their performance in proton exchange membrane fuel cells

10.26434/chemrxiv.7851461.v3 ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

Valentina Guccini ◽

Annika Carlson ◽

Shun Yu ◽

Göran Lindbergh ◽

Rakel Wreland Lindström ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Fuel Cells ◽

Fuel Cell ◽

Surface Charge ◽

Proton Exchange Membrane ◽

Membrane Surface ◽

Proton Exchange ◽

Membrane Thickness ◽

Fuel Cell Performance ◽

Cellulose Nanofibres ◽

Exchange Membrane

The performance of thin carboxylated cellulose nanofiber-based (CNF) membranes as proton exchange membranes in fuel cells has been measured in-situ as a function of CNF surface charge density (600 and 1550 µmol g-1), counterion (H+or Na+), membrane thickness and fuel cell relative humidity (RH 55 to 95 %). The structural evolution of the membranes as a function of RH as measured by Small Angle X-ray scattering shows that water channels are formed only above 75 % RH. The amount of absorbed water was shown to depend on the membrane surface charge and counter ions (Na+or H+). The high affinity of CNF for water and the high aspect ratio of the nanofibers, together with a well-defined and homogenous membrane structure, ensures a proton conductivity exceeding 1 mS cm-1at 30 °C between 65 and 95 % RH. This is two orders of magnitude larger than previously reported values for cellulose materials and only one order of magnitude lower than Nafion 212. Moreover, the CNF membranes are characterized by a lower hydrogen crossover than Nafion, despite being ≈ 30 % thinner. Thanks to their environmental compatibility and promising fuel cell performance the CNF membranes should be considered for new generation proton exchange membrane fuel cells.

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Latest Trends and Challenges In Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cell (PEMFC)

The Open Fuels & Energy Science Journal ◽

10.2174/1876973x01710010096 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 10 (1) ◽

pp. 96-105 ◽

Cited By ~ 6

Author(s):

Mohammed Jourdani ◽

Hamid Mounir ◽

Abdellatif El Marjani

Keyword(s):

Fuel Cells ◽

Fuel Cell ◽

Proton Exchange Membrane ◽

Proton Exchange ◽

Total Cost ◽

Cell Efficiency ◽

Technical Advances ◽

Exchange Membrane

Background: During last few years, the proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs) underwent a huge development. Method: The different contributions to the design, the material of all components and the efficiencies are analyzed. Result: Many technical advances are introduced to increase the PEMFC fuel cell efficiency and lifetime for transportation, stationary and portable utilization. Conclusion: By the last years, the total cost of this system is decreasing. However, the remaining challenges that need to be overcome mean that it will be several years before full commercialization can take place.This paper gives an overview of the recent advancements in the development of Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel cells and remaining challenges of PEMFC.

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