Fuel Cell Nation

Navy R&D 100 Award

One of this year's recently-announced 2011 R&D 100 Awards is the Autonomous vehicles, fossil-fuel free. This "Cryo-Force Power-Cell System" (CFPCS) was developed by Sierra Lobo Inc., Milan, Ohio, with funding from the Department of the Navy, Office of Naval Research (ONR), Arlington, Va., and the Naval Undersea Warfare Center (NUWC), Newport, R.I. The Award states that the CFPCS is "...an integrated, closed-loop liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen [-fueled] proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cell system, [and] has been designed to help unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs) transition away from large-battery and fossil fuel technologies. ... The significant technological advancement is the integration of cryogenic pure reactants with a fuel cell system while meeting U.S. Navy specifications of storing 50 kg of oxygen and delivering 0.1 to 100 g/min of oxygen to support a 10 kW fuel cell system."

R&D Magazine describes the CFPCS as "Technology: Closed-loop fuel cell power system." Given that this is not what fuel cell people call a closed-loop system (i.e. one that makes its own fuel and oxidizer, A.K.A. a regenerative fuel cell), but merely a fuel cell system that stores it's exhaust (similar to a closed circuit rebreather SCUBA diving system), I thought I'd check for any other product details that needed clarification.

The untitled picture on the left is shown in the R&D Magazine article as if it is a photograph of the new 10 kw Sierra Lobo CFPCS installed in a UUV test bed. Having never heard that the Navy demonstrated a complete cryogenic reactants-based 10 kW PEM fuel cell system in a UUV form factor, I thought I'd look to see what Sierra Lobo has reported. Well, the picture on the right is Sierra Lobo's 1 kWe brassboard test system as it appears on their Unmanned Underwater Vehicle Power Systems page. I had to use Google to find Sierra Lobo's version of the UUV demonstration, and found their YouTube video:

 

I'm confused why Sierra Lobo has not updated their Web site to include a photograph of their UUV brassboard, or a link to their YouTube video!

Hydrogen and Professional Bicycling

During my recent TV viewing of the USA Pro Cycling Challenge, I had a good look at the jerseys of the Garmin-Cervélo team. (Full Disclosure: I own a Cervélo R3 that I love!) I noticed that one of the sponsors was Tata! Tata, in the form of Tata International's Tata Consultancy Services. I believe that this is the first time a company with a fuel cell tie-in has sponsored a professional bike team! (Tata also sponsored the Cervélo Test Team in 2010 before it was combined with Garmin's team.)

Tata's involvement in fuel cells is two-fold:

In the November 22, 2007 Times of India article Tata-ISRO team up to launch hydrogen-powered vehicle, we learn that Tata teamed with the Indian Space Research Organisation on a pilot project to see whether hydrogen can be used to fuel automobiles. Unfortunately, this project apparently got canceled, because I can't find any subsequent announcements by either Tata or ISRO of a hydrogen-powered demonstration vehicle.

October 07, 2010, in Sun Catalytix Corporation completes $9.5-million Series B funding round, Tata announced that it lead the latest round of Sun's funding. Sun Catalytix is a startup spun out from the MIT research lab of Professor Daniel Nocera, commercializing novel electrolyzer technology. In January, 2010, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) selected Sun Catalytix as one of only 37 recipients from over 3600 applicants for ARPA-E's first-round of funding for transformational energy technologies.

Among their conglomerate's activities, Tata also manufactures bicycles and components.

I wonder when the first company specializing in renewable energy will sponsor a pro sports team?

Electrolysis Explosions in California

By LA Fire Department Photo

On August 9, 2011, an apparent hydrogen/oxygen explosion occurred at the alternative energy firm Rainbow of Hope in the Sylmar section of Los Angeles. Timothy A. Larson, 42, an L.A. firefighter who was on disability leave due to an existing injury, was one of the two inventors critically injured in the blast, as they were thrown into an alley by the force of the explosion. Larson apparently lost an arm an a leg in the blast. In the hospital, William A. Stehl, 68, was induced into a coma with extensive shrapnel wounds in his face.

This latest accident occurred 14 months after Larson's brother (28-year-old Tyson Larson) was killed in a June, 2010 explosion at Realm Industries, in Simi Valley, their father's predecessor alternative fuel business. In 2008, there was an explosion at Realm Industries when it was located in a different building. The 2008 blast was smaller, and there were no serious injuries.

The father, Timothy A. Larson, was among the numerous investors in a New York company formed in 2001 by Stehl, (photo at left by the Adirondack Daily Enterprise) who was indicted in 2010 in New York on charges of bilking more than 300 investors out of $7 million. Stehl claimed he developed an economical process to create energy from water, and allegedly promised his investors guaranteed returns. When the business, BGX Technologies (formerly known as Rainbow Technologies), went under, Timothy A. Larson bought its equipment and had it shipped to California so he could set up Realm Industries with his sons.

Somehow Stehl (and Tyson Larson) got a patent issued for this "technology":

U.S. Patent 7,793,621, Alternative Fuel Engine.

Neither this patent, nor the predecessor patent application, mentions "Brown's Gas" (or "HHO Gas"), which is actually what they were producing. In brief, Brown's gas is produced by simultaneously capturing the two product gases of water electrolysis, hydrogen and oxygen, in a single, unstable product stream. They instead claim they were "modifying the bond angles of water." The slightest spark (or an errant piece of catalyst) will cause an explosion in the product gas mixture, as the hydrogen and oxygen violently recombine back into water. I have no idea why anybody would willingly produce such an unstable gas mixture, and especially why they might try to store it. It seems that Cal/OSHA believes that Stehl and the Larsons were trying to compress and store their hydrogen/oxygen gas mixture at pressure in a pair of 8-foot diameter pressure vessels! Of course, a pressurized hydrogen/oxygen mixture has even more explosive energy than an atmospheric pressure hydrogen/oxygen gas mixture.

One final note: notice how the name of one of Stehl's companies, "BGX", seems to be an acronym for "Brown's Gas"?

Fuel Cell Patent Infringement

At Sustainable Business Oregon I came across Fuel cell company IdaTech files patent lawsuit, the patent infringement case against its former chief technical officer (David Edlund) and his new company (E1, LLC [or Element One]). More details are available in this press release: IdaTech Files Patent Infringement Lawsuit Against Element One and David Edlund.

 I thought I'd fact check IdaTech's claim that their patent portfolio included "83 active U.S. patents." Well, a quick check at the US PTO found 87 issued patents, so "83 active" sounds OK.

But I noticed that one on the list of 87 was a Design patent: D623,103 - Vehicle fender flare (see below.)

I really don't know why a fuel cell company is patenting designs for automotive fender flares, but it's not my money!

The second thing I thought I'd check is how frequently fuel cell companies sue each other. This IdaTech lawsuit seems to be the first that I've ever noticed. I only found found two other cases on Google:

• In 2002 Lynntech Inc. lost a multimillion dollar lawsuit against Hydrogenics Corporation. Lynntech  accused Hydrogenics of infringing two United States patents relating to fuel cell testing. The court ruling establishes that Hydrogenics did not infringe either of the asserted Lynntech patents.
• In 2008 Relion, Inc. withdrew their patent infringement case against Hydra Fuel Cell Corporation in a patent case involving hot swappable fuel cell technology.

 So it looks like not only is fuel cell technology an emerging market, but so is fuel cell patent litigation!

Improved Membrane Water Transport

Robert Moore and Louis Madsen's groups at Virgina Tech claim to have done something quite interesting: increase the diffusivity of water in DuPont's Nafion^TM, the 50-year old membrane that is at the core of much current hydrogen fuel cell and electrolyzer work!

How did they do this? By stretching the Nafion^TM, using a draw ratio of up to 4:1.

Apparently, their data show that the water-conducting channels within the membrane become aligned during the stretching process. (See Figure 4 below.) In Figure 4.a, random water channels exist in the as-received membrane. In Figure 4.b, there is some alignment in the draw direction (blue arrow). Finally, in the at a 4:1 draw ratio shown in Figure 4.c, there is significant water channel alignment. Similar to nematic liquid crystals, the stretching does not change the water channel alignment or connectivity; this leads to anisotropic water transport.

Li et al Figure 4

The anisotropic nature of the water transport behavior is evident in the following Figure 2:

Li et al Figure 2

In the left figure, Figure 2.a, you can see how the diffusivity of water in the draw, or X direction (D_xx) is markedly higher than the diffusivity in the transverse directions (D_yy and D_zz). This relationship holds for all draw ratios tested, between 1:1 (as-received membrane) and 4:1.

Their data in Figure 2.a have been arithmetically averaged and plotted in Figure 2.b. This figure shows that the average water diffusivity curves for all the drawn membranes collapse to match that of the isotropic, as-received membrane.

What are the practical applications of this? Well, it may be possible to align membrane water passageways in the through-plane direction through the use of electric or magnetic field alignment methods used on liquid crystals, liquid crystal polymers and block copolymers. The resultant aligned membrane would have increased through-plane water (and proton) transport, resulting in improved PEM device (e.g. fuel cell) operation.

The complete paper is available at:

Jing Li, Jong Keun Park, Robert B. Moore & Louis A. Madsen; "Linear coupling of alignment with transport in a polymer electrolyte membrane," Nature Materials | Letter, 10(7):507-11; Jun 19, 2011.

DOE Webinar Recording: Top 5 Fuel Cell States

In my recent post DOE Webinar: Top 5 Fuel Cell States, I mention that the webinar recorded June 21, 2011 will be made available on-line.

Here is the recorded webinar. (It is in WMV format, so it's better to open it in Internet Explorer than in Firefox.)

In case you miss it during the hour-long presentation, the top 5 states are:

• California
• Connecticut
• New York
• South Carolina
• Ohio

(As an aside, just like the the May 23, 2011 webinar titled "Hydrogen Production by PEM Electrolysis—Spotlight on Giner and Proton," this webinar also had audio problems. Not sure if bad audio is an ongoing problem at gotomeeting.com, but neither webinar escaped audio problems!)

DOE Webinar: Top 5 Fuel Cell States

 
Looks like the U.S. DOE is getting into the Internet age! Coming shortly on the heels of the Webinar "Hydrogen Production by PEM Electrolysis—Spotlight on Giner and Proton", here is "DOE and Partners to Host Webinar June 21: Top Five Fuel Cell States – Why Local Policies Mean Green Growth". The Webinar is Tuesday, June 21, 2011 from 12:00 to 1:00 PM EDT.

 This webinar is with the Technology Transition Corporation and the Clean Energy States Alliance, and will discuss state policies and business development details. It is designed to supply information to companies thinking of buying a fuel cell energy system, as well as states that are interested in expanding their fuel cell incentives.

Hopefully these DOE efforts will enable and expansion of domestic fuel cell activities!

US DOE Electrolyzer Webinar Presentations

DOE has finally posted the slide presentations and audio from the May 23, 2011 Webinar titled "Hydrogen Production by PEM Electrolysis—Spotlight on Giner and Proton."

 

Overview presentation slides, Eric Miller, U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).

 

Monjid Hamdan's presentation slides, Giner Electrochemical Systems, LLC.

 

Katherine Ayers' presentation slides, Proton Energy Systems.

 

And (please excuse the audio) the webinar recording: (WMV 94 MB).

Hydrogen in Massachusetts

Everybody knows about the major hydrogen/fuel cell goings on in California. And many people know of the millions of dollars that the state of Connecticut is putting into fuel cells. However, Massachusetts has some hydrogen/fuel cell organizations as well!

The Northeast Electrochemical Energy Storage Cluster is a network of commercial, academic and government members striving to accelerate the development and implementation of hydrogen production and fuel cell technologies.

The Massachusetts Hydrogen Coalition, Inc. is a non-profit that is expanding hydrogen, fuel cell and related industries in Massachusetts by increasing resource availability, expanding visibility, and creating marketing and partnering opportunities.

The Massachusetts Clean Energy Center is the first state agency in the nation dedicated solely to facilitating the development of the clean energy industry. Besides hydrogen and fuel cells, they support solar, wind, and other green energy technologies.

Now we just need surcharges on energy utility company bills (like California's and Connecticut's) that get used to promote renewable hydrogen and fuel cells!

US DOE Electrolyzer Webinar

Its not much advanced warning, but today the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) announced it is putting on a webinar on Monday, May 23, 2011, from 12:00 – 1:30 p.m. (EDT) titled "Hydrogen Production by PEM Electrolysis—Spotlight on Giner and Proton." The webinar will include a discussion of the importance of electrolysis for renewable hydrogen production with zero carbon footprint (provided you use solar, wind, etc. to generate the electric power.) (The webinar was originally supposed to be at 1:00 p.m., but the DOE personnel had another meeting crop up.)

 Monjid Hamdan of Giner Electrochemical Systems (GES) will be one of the two industry-based presenters at the webinar. I've seen his slides; it should be a good presentation for all, as it involves an emphasis on the technology, and its not just a sales job for GES' commercial products.

One final note: DOE calls it Polymer Electrolyte Membrane (PEM) electrolysis, while old-school electrochemists prefer to call it Proton Exchange Membrane (PEM) electrolysis. Same difference — its all good!