New Energies, new possibilities

https://fuelcellsworks.com/news/proton-motor-to-supply-fuel-cells-to-frerk-aggregatebau-gmbh/

A fuel cell bus unveiled by Chinese automaker Geely. (Photo courtesy of Geely)

TOKYO/BEIJING/NAGOYA, Japan -- China's push to promote hydrogen fuel cells as the next big thing in the auto industry has led to a slew of ambitious plans to develop the sector as local authorities vie for hundreds of millions of dollars in incentives.

State-owned SAIC Motor, based in Shanghai, recently announced its first medium-term strategy for fuel cells. The automaker aims to roll out at least 10 models and gain the capacity to produce 10,000 vehicles per year by 2025, and will shift to domestic sourcing as it looks to become globally competitive by 2030.

SAIC's announcement represents part of a plan by the Shanghai government, which oversees the automaker, to cultivate the city's fuel cell industry. The municipal government said last month that it aims to have 10,000 fuel cell autos in use by 2023 and build up the sector's output to 100 billion yuan ($14.9 billion).

The Chinese government has subsidized purchases of fuel cell vehicles for some time. A hydrogen-powered bus, for example, can qualify for as much as $100,000 in local and central government incentives in some cases. Yet a total of just 7,200 or so fuel cell vehicles had been sold as of this past July.

The government is shifting its approach, focusing on support for related areas such as parts and hydrogen fueling stations, which are seen as essential for bringing fuel cells into broader use.

Under a new program announced last month, certain municipalities will be designated as "model cities," with each receiving up to 1.7 billion yuan in funding for fuel cell vehicle development over four years.

The cities of Chongqing and Chengdu have already submitted a joint application. Yang Liqiong, deputy director of the Chongqing Economic and Information Technology Commission, told reporters that the city will "establish a hydrogen-power corridor with Chengdu."

Shanghai, Guangzhou and Beijing are also set to apply before the mid-November deadline, according to a source familiar with the situation.

Local authorities plan to supplement central government funding with subsidies of their own to support businesses in the field.

China seeks to make all new autos sold in the country "eco-friendly" by 2035, with "new-energy vehicles" such as electrics and hydrogen-powered cars making up half the total, according to a road map announced Tuesday. The government aims to boost cumulative sales of fuel cell vehicles to 1 million by that year.

These targets will be essential to reaching the country's goal of net zero carbon emissions by 2060.

Fuel cells are seen as especially promising for commercial vehicles such as buses and trucks, as they are lighter and have a longer range than electric batteries.

China also has a ready supply of hydrogen, which is generated as a byproduct of chemical plants and steel mills. Switching to fuel cells from gasoline would help improve energy security for a country that imports 70% of its oil.

The fuel cell push is particularly good news for Toyota Motor, which is a trailblazer in the field and also has many partner companies in Beijing and Guangdong Province, which are seen as likely candidates for the "model city" program.

The government's policies are "very welcome," a Toyota executive said.

Toyota supplies parts for fuel cell vehicles to Chinese partners including FAW Group under a 2019 tie-up. The Japanese company also formed a joint venture this past August with FAW and four other automakers to develop fuel cells for commercial vehicles, which is slated to begin shipping fuel cell systems for Chinese buses and trucks in fiscal 2022.

Toyota supplies cell stacks made in Japan's Aichi Prefecture, where its headquarters are located, aiming to promote fuel cell technology in China while minimizing the risk of technology leaks.

But some in Japan regard China's progress on this front with alarm. Tokyo's strategic hydrogen road map calls for the total number of fuel cell autos in the country to reach 40,000 by 2020, but only about 4,000 had been sold as of the end of fiscal 2019.

While Toyota and compatriot Honda Motor are at the forefront in terms of technology, developing a supply chain will be difficult until fuel cells enter broader use.

"Looking at China's momentum is worrying," an executive in the Toyota group said. "We want to see stronger policies from the Japanese government."

Co-founder and CEO of HyPoint, the company developing zero-carbon emission hydrogen fuel cell systems for aviation and urban air mobility.

getty

"Fuel cells = fool sells," Tesla CEO Elon Musk tweeted on June 10. "Staggeringly dumb," he continued. As CNBC noted, Musk has previously "dismissed hydrogen fuel cells as 'mind-bogglingly stupid.'" He has also "called them 'fool cells,' a 'load of rubbish,' and told Tesla shareholders at an annual meeting years ago that 'success is simply not possible.'"

Clearly, Musk is not a fan of hydrogen fuel cells — at least not for use in cars — which makes sense since he built the Tesla empire on lithium-ion batteries. 

The debate between lithium-ion and hydrogen has raged for decades. Both can be used as clean, zero-emission alternatives to fossil fuels, but while hydrogen fuel cells have been around much longer (indeed, it is what NASA used to put men on the moon in 1969), it was lithium-ion batteries that ultimately proved much easier to commercialize, particularly for use in passenger cars.

Part of that is because hydrogen fuel cells are more complex; they generate energy by creating and harnessing chemical reactions between hydrogen and oxygen while leaving water vapor as the only emission. And while hydrogen is lightweight, incredibly efficient and the most abundant resource in the universe, it currently takes a lot of energy to harness hydrogen.

"Hydrogen is an energy storage mechanism. It's not a source of energy," Musk said at a 2015 press conference. "Electrolysis is extremely inefficient as an energy process. If you took a solar panel and used the energy from that solar panel to just charge your battery pack directly compared to trying to split water, take the hydrogen, dump the oxygen, compress the hydrogen to an extremely high pressure or liquefy it and then put it in a car and run a fuel cell, it is about half the efficiency. It's terrible."

In some ways, Musk is right. For passenger cars, the economics for hydrogen just aren't there yet, nor is the infrastructure. However, he's missing the ways in which hydrogen fuel cells fit into the bigger picture wherein the economics do make sense — greening the electrical grid and zero-emission aviation, trucking, shipping, urban air mobility, space travel and more.

Governments and leaders around the world are rallying behind hydrogen as a key component to their plans for addressing climate change, not just in the transportation sector but across their entire energy grid. Consider that the European Commission announced its Hydrogen Strategy for a climate-neutral Europe in which it said that hydrogen is "an important part of the solution to meet the 2050 climate neutrality goal of the European Green Deal." Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden announced a $2 trillion clean energy plan that includes renewable hydrogen technology innovation. And Boris Johnson announced 335 million pounds ($446 million) in funding to help drive down greenhouse gas emissions, including the development of hydrogen fuel. Those announcements were made just within the last six months.

Meanwhile, at Tesla's Battery Day in September, Musk acknowledged that his vision for lithium-ion batteries is more complicated than he expected, on a longer technological timetable and not scalable enough to solve the world's most pressing climate problems. Yet surprisingly, in spite of an unprecedented surge in international interest, there was no mention of the clearest solution for zero-emission energy that would meet his own climate goals: hydrogen.

The technology for zero-emission hydrogen fuel cells for use in transportation and other industries isn't a pipe dream — it already exists. Though you might not know it, hydrogen-powered trains, trucks, cars, airplanes and ships are already out in the wild. CNBC noted that "there are dozens of fuel cell buses in use or planned in Ohio, Michigan, Illinois and Massachusetts, as well as California" and that "more than 23,000 fuel cell-powered forklifts in operation at warehouses and distribution centers across the U.S. in more than 40 states, including at Amazon and Walmart facilities."

That's just the beginning. The future of urban air mobility (flying cars, air taxis and advanced drones) can only run on hydrogen fuel due to the specific power and energy density that it offers. Carbon-based fuels are simply too heavy, and batteries die too quickly to get small vehicles off the ground. NASA knew that more than 50 years ago, and we're just now commercializing it for more widespread use. Air taxi developers, including Uber Elevate (and hundreds more), are racing to get zero-emission urban air mobility vehicles off the ground by using lithium-ion batteries, hydrogen fuel cells or a combination of both.

In the end, in spite of a relatively slow start, many analysts expect that the hydrogen energy market will take off, driven by both private and public investment around the world. I believe it would behoove Musk — and all of us — if he took another look at hydrogen if for no other reason than to stay true to his mission of combating climate change. Critically, he could help push the hydrogen fuel cell market forward by encouraging responsible development and driving investment.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbestechcouncil/2020/11/02/its-time-for-elon-musk-to-admit-the-significance-of-hydrogen-fuel-cells/

수소연료전지 시스템 전문 기업 에스퓨얼셀이 2kW급 연료전지와 액화수소용기를 채용한 수소 드론을 개발하는데 성공했다.
27일 에스퓨얼셀은 2kW급 수소 드론을 개발했다며 수소 모빌리티 진출에 대한 본격적인 행보를 시작하게 됐다고 의미를 부여했다.
기존 배터리를 채용한 드론은 30분 이내의 짧은 비행시간으로 인해 장거리 및 장시간 임무수행 등에 한계가 있어 활용도가 떨어졌다.
사업 현장에서는 드론에 대한 해당 성능향상과 함께 드론의 범용적 활용 촉진에 걸림돌이 되고 있는 짧은 비행거리를 늘려달라는 내용을 주요골자로 획기적인 기술 개발을 요구하는 의견이 많았다.
이러한 현장의 목소리를 수렴한 에스퓨얼셀은 올해 2월부터 희망기업들을 대상으로 수요조사를 실시해 관련 DB를 구축하고 그 결과를 심층분석, 최종적으로 설계에 반영함으로 드론 이용자의 편의성과 범용성이 제고된 수소 드론을 개발하게 됐다고 강조했다.
에스퓨얼셀이 이번에 개발한 액화 수소연료전지 드론은 비행시간을 비약적으로 늘림으로 현재 배터리 드론으로 불가능 했던 수색, 정찰, 물류 운송, 농업 방재 등의 사업분야에 폭 넓게 활용이 가능할 것으로 기대된다.
이번 수소 드론에 주목되는 점은 수소연료전지 파워팩 개발에도 이용자의 편의성 및 범용성을 높였다는 점이다.
이용자가 상황에 맞게 고압기체수소와 액화수소 연료를 모두 사용할 수 있는 제품개발로 편의성 및 범용성을 높였으며, 수소드론 비행에 사용된 드론과 모터 또한 세계에서 가장 많이 이용되는 제품을 사용하여 시험 비행을 했다.

에스퓨얼셀은 2018년에는 연료전지 업계에서 처음으로 코스닥 상장을 한 수소연료전지 전문기업으로 건물용 연료전지의 기술력을 바탕으로 수소 모빌리티 시장에도 연료전지 파워팩 시스템 개발을 통해 진출을 하고 있다.
이번 수소 드론 개발 성공을 시작으로 지게차, 선박 등의 연료전지 파워팩 개발도 추진하고 있다고 에스퓨얼셀은 설명했다.
향후 수소 연료전지를 기반으로 다양한 응용 분야를 창출하고, 글로벌 시장에서 매출을 확대해 나갈 계획이다.
에스퓨얼셀 관계자는 "현재 진행중인 유상증자를 통해 유입되는 자금을 통해 수소 연료전지 파워팩 시스템의 개발과 원천기술 확보, 상품화에 적극적으로 투자해 시장에 빠르게 진입할 예정"이라고 밝혔다.

German researchers and companies are about to test the world's first emission-free pusher towboat on the rivers and canals between Hamburg and the capital Berlin, reports Stefan Seewald in the Welt am Sonntag. The inland water vessel dubbed Elektra, which runs exclusively on electric engines powered by hydrogen fuel cells and batteries, is due to be finished this autumn, said Gerd Holbach, who developed the boat with a team at Berlin's Technical University. "With this canal push boat, we can demonstrate for the first time this hybrid energy concept," Holbach said. "We have created a blueprint that can also revolutionise the construction of cargo, work, ferry and river cruise ships."

Elektra carries 750 kilograms of hydrogen for the fuel cells. Apart from the electric motors, there is no other type of engine on board. In regional operation, the batteries are currently expected to last for about eight hours or 65 kilometres at a thrust load of 1,400 tons. On a supra-regional voyage, Elektra will be  hybrid-electrically powered by fuel cells and batteries, with an operating time of about 16 hours or about 130 kilometres a day. In order to increase the range, the construction of a corresponding refuelling infrastructure is planned, according to the article.