To help spread the word about advanced technology vehicles, the U.S. Department of Energy’s Fuel Cell Technologies Program is showcasing alternative fuel vehicles at this year’s A Taste of Colorado. 

Featured at the event will be a hydrogen-powered internal combustion engine 12-passenger shuttle bus built by the Ford Motor Company. DOE recently funded the leases for 12 hydrogen-powered internal combustion engine shuttle buses, which are being placed at facilities across the country to demonstrate market-ready advanced technology vehicles.   NREL has one of the leased buses, which it currently uses at the campus in Golden for tours of the site. 

Information and educational materials about alternative fuels and advanced vehicles will be available at the booth.

WHAT:           Display of advanced technology vehicles including a 12-passenger  Hydrogen-powered shuttle bus.

WHO:              U.S. Department of Energy’s Fuel Cell Technologies Program & NREL

WHEN:           September 3-6, 2010 at A Taste of Colorado

WHERE:         On Broadway, across from the Denver Post Building.

NREL is the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) primary national laboratory for renewable energy and energy efficiency research and development. NREL is operated for DOE by The Alliance for Sustainable Energy, LLC.

Singapore– In the first Shell Eco-marathon to take place in Asia, University Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) took the first place by achieving an impressive 599km per liter of petrol equivalent, in an extreme energy-efficient electric vehicle design that hybridized Horizon’s hydrogen fuel cells with a powerful ultra-capacitor. Horizon’s fuel cells also powered Thailand’s first ever hydrogen participation (King Mongtut Institute of Technology) to 3rd place for the Asia region.

The first Asian Shell Eco-marathon included 81 teams from 10 Asian countries and was heldat the Formula One Circuit in Sepang, Malaysia on July 7-10, 2010. Shell Eco-marathons have been held for more than 25 years, bringing together high schools, universities, and engineering schools from different countries to create and race the most energy-efficient vehicles. With annual events in the Americas, Europe and now Asia, winning teams are rewarded for traveling the furthest distance using the least amount of energy, as fuel or fuel equivalent.

This year’s leading teams are now looking forward further developing and optimizing their power systems for next year’s race while Horizon Fuel Cell continues its development of higher performance, highly efficient fuel cell technologies. The company’s evolving hydrogen fuel cell technologies offers an attractive technological alternative that brings winning results to Eco-marathon competitors: ultra-light fuel cells with limited peripherals, increasing simplicity, reducing weight, and improving overall vehicle efficiency.

Crown Equipment Corporation, one of the world’s leading forklift manufacturers, has qualified 20 of its electric forklift models to operate with various fuel cells. The company now offers 29 qualified combinations of fuel cell packs and trucks. With this accomplishment, Crown has taken a significant step forward for the industry in certifying the performance, efficiency and safety standards of counterbalanced, stockpicker, reach, tow and pallet trucks powered by fuel cells. Many of these forklifts are already in use at customer locations throughout the world.

In 2009, Crown was the first lift truck manufacturer to introduce a fuel cell qualification program. The program approves Crown electric forklifts for use with fuel cell packs and provides certifications to customers. To qualify a fuel cell pack and truck combination, Crown’s engineers first review key performance metrics for a battery-powered truck, such as traction, plugging, and lift and travel speeds. They then replace the battery with a fuel cell power pack and measure the same indicators. Through both modeling and application testing, the research team determines specific design modifications needed to ensure the fuel cell-powered forklift matched the performance, efficiency and safety standards to which the truck was initially designed.

“This accomplishment further demonstrates Crown’s leadership position in the strategic deployment of fuel cell-powered forklifts,” said Eric Jensen, Crown’s manager of new technology, research and development. “We’ve been steadfast in our position that deployment of a fuel cell forklift fleet must be carefully evaluated and tested for appropriate use in a warehouse. This research-based approach means that our customers can confidently know they have the right truck for their chosen fuel cell, allowing them to meet their performance, safety and environmental sustainability goals.”
Crown continues to work closely with a variety of fuel cell manufacturers and customers to qualify trucks as new fuel cell pack models are introduced and fuel cell technology continues to advance. The company is also moving forward with the next phase of its fuel cell research program, which focuses on increasing levels of fuel cell integration with the truck.

“Forklifts are a key early market for fuel cells,” said Lisa Callaghan Jerram, senior market analyst for Fuel Cell Today, a leading analyst firm providing market-based research on the fuel cell industry. “Based on our market research, we have found strong growth in this sector in the past three years.”

Crown conducts its fuel cell testing at a 25,000-square-foot research facility near Dayton, Ohio, that is dedicated solely to this purpose. The company’s fuel cell initiative is a critical component of its commitment to environmental sustainability throughout its business. A copy of the 2010 Crown ecologic Report highlighting the company’s sustainability initiatives and accomplishments can be downloaded here.

About Crown Equipment Corporation
Crown is one of the world’s largest lift truck manufacturers. Crown’s award-winning line of lift trucks maintains a reputation for exceptional product design, engineering and manufacturing. From the smallest hand pallet truck to the highest lifting turret truck, Crown seeks to provide users with safe, efficient and ergonomic lift trucks that lower total cost of ownership and maximize uptime. Headquartered in New Bremen, Ohio, Crown manufactures lift trucks that are sold throughout the world.

Crown Equipment acknowledges the contribution of the State of Ohio, Department of Development and the Third Frontier Commission which provided the funding in support of the qualification of lift trucks for battery replacement fuel cell projects.

Within five years, local researchers could deliver a way to replace conventional batteries with inexpensive, lightweight and environmentally friendly alternatives.

University of Massachusetts Amherst polymer scientist and associate professor Bryan Coughlin is collaborating with scientists from other universities as part of a five-year, $7.5 million study funded by the U.S. Army Research Office to reduce the weight and the environmental impact of battery packs carried by armed forces.

The multi-university research project is expected to culminate with a viable alternative to current battery packs, which can weigh up to 40 pounds, used for powering gadgets soldiers use for communication, night vision, navigation and other tasks. “When soldiers go out on a mission, they carry incredibly heavy and incredibly awkward batteries that have to be charged before they go out,” Coughlin said. “Having a single power source that is lightweight, durable and refillable with something like methanol would be a huge advantage.”

The recycling issue is especially problematic for the armed forces. “The military isn’t fighting wars near recycling facilities,” Coughlin said. “So our military needs a more environmentally friendly battery that can be recharged with renewable energy sources.”

Replacing traditional batteries with fuel cells could be the answer; fuel cells run on renewable energy sources such as methanol or hydrogen, and can be contained in small, lightweight packaging. But today’s fuel cells aren’t widely available or financially practical because they require expensive precious metal catalysts such as palladium and platinum.

Coughlin, who earned his Ph.D. in chemistry at the California Institute of Technology and holds more than 20 U.S. patents, is part of a team working to make fuel cells without using precious metal catalysts. Coughlin’s work on the project is focused on developing novel polymer membranes for use in fuel cells.

The theory behind the research is conceptually similar to that of existing proton exchange membrane fuel cells, but the mode of operation and transport is different, Coughlin said. “The catalysts we are using are more readily available – silver, iron and cobalt – earth abundant materials, which lower costs, and are easier to use than proton exchange membranes,” he said.

The current research will combine computational and theoretical testing. The lead institution for this initiative is the Colorado School of Mines. Other partners include scientists at the University of Chicago who are contributing theory and computational studies and researchers at the University of California-Riverside who will conduct membrane evaluation and testing.

Mobile telecoms coverage in remote rural areas could be set to explode with the launch of field trials of a new hi-tech power plant that utilises the latest in hydrogen fuel-cell technology.

The technology uses ordinary ammonia to extract hydrogen as a fuel source to efficiently power cell phone towers that have no access to main grid electricity. The science could revolutionise the alternative energy solutions market in the telecommunications industry worldwide.

Currently, it is estimated that 130,000 remote area towers are going up each year globally, at a growing rate of more than 6 per cent. This US$9.2-billion market is concentrated in Africa, Asia, the Middle East, Eastern Europe, and South America.

According to auditing and business advisory firm Ernst & Young, the telecoms market in Africa alone is forecast to grow faster than any other region.

In its recent study, ‘Africa Connected, A Telecommunications Growth Story’, Ernst & Young said the telecommunications market in Africa was becoming increasingly competitive and that as competition increased, operational efficiency will take on greater importance for telecommunications operators.

The latest hydrogen-from-ammonia fuel technology currently undergoing field tests is holding out the promise of 25 per cent savings and total equipment cost recovery within two years.

Conducted by UK-based Diverse Energy and leading South African industrial gases company African Oxygen Limited (Afrox), the first field trials are taking place in a remote area of Namibia in 2010.

Robert Carlton-Shields, Afrox Business Manager, special products and chemicals says, “Coverage in remote areas is very patchy and not cost effective at present due to the need to power telecom towers using diesel generators, with all the inherent logistical and environmental emission issues on top.

“What we are trialling with Diverse Energy is their PowerCube® proprietary ammonia cracker integrated system, which produces hydrogen for fuel cells. This compact energy source will replace polluting diesel generators, delivering higher efficiency and lower fuel and maintenance costs, while offering a 25 per cent reduction in total cost of ownership over its five-year life, with a two-year return on investment.”

And with the ammonia readily available from Afrox in most sub-Saharan countries, the “source-to-sink” calculations show an 80 per cent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions compared to diesel generators, together with elimination of noise and local pollution.

“Ammonia is a cheap fuel with high power density,” says Afrox chemicals product manager Jaco Coetzee. “So hydrogen from ammonia dissociation would be the preferred option for small plants like PowerCube®. Millions of tons of ammonia are produced and distributed worldwide every year and the procedures for safe handling have long been since developed and proven, making ammonia as a fuel source for use in rural areas perfect for Africa.”

Recognition of the PowerCube® technology is growing rapidly, testament to which was it being named as the winner the prestigious 2009 UK Government Innovation Award for the “Next Big Thing”. This led directly to the current Afrox / Diverse Energy field trials being part-funded by the UK Government’s Technology Strategy Board.

The provision of cell phone communications is seen as an important enabler for new business development in rural regions and as capable of providing a boost to poverty reduction measures. By lowering the total cost of ownership of rural off-grid cell phone towers, such expansion programmes can be accelerated, says Carlton-Shields.

Having completed tests with Motorola in the UK, a trial in Africa has been initiated with three telecoms operators in three different climatic zones involving 25 PowerCubes® to prove its capabilities in Africa.

“These telecoms operators have the chance to trial the system at a cost no higher than our forward projected sales price, allowing operators to get substantial first mover advantage and experience the benefits of the PowerCube® without having to fund the full cost of a trial,” says Dr. Alastair Livesey, operations director at Diverse Energy.

“Its adoption will bring many benefits when compared with diesel and solar panel power, which have value on the black market. Potential thieves would have difficulty selling the ammonia tanks, and wouldn’t be able to siphon from the tanks as they could with diesel. Between 15 and 22 per cent of diesel in Africa is lost to theft in this way.”

The PowerCube® has by-products of about one litre an hour of highly purified water, which can be used for medical purposes, and 30 kilograms of fertiliser every three months. Livesey says those quantities are too small for operators to sell, so they can be used to help local rural communities instead.

“This is a low cost, environmentally-friendly solution for power in rural areas without access to electricity,” says Afrox’s Carlton-Shields. “It will significantly expand Afrox’s customer base and lower the cost of ammonia in the emerging markets in Africa, where it is traditionally used in fertiliser and refrigeration.

“This project will revolutionise the telecoms industry in Africa and marks the start of Afrox becoming an alternate fuels company as well as a supplier of specialist gases, chemicals and welding equipment.”

In the quest for efficient, cost-effective and commercially viable fuel cells, researchers at Cornell’s Energy Materials Center have discovered a catalyst — platinum nanoparticles — that could make fuel cells more stable, longer lasting, and more resistant to carbon monoxide poisoning.

The research, led by Héctor D. Abruña, the E.M. Chamot Professor of Chemistry and Chemical Biology and director of the Energy Materials Center at Cornell, and Francis J. DiSalvo, the John Newman Professor of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, appeared online recently in the Journal of the American Chemical Society.

Hydrogen fuel cells offer an appealing alternative to gasoline-burning cars: They have the potential to power vehicles for long distances using hydrogen as fuel, they can be rapidly refuled, mitigate carbon dioxide production and emit only water vapor.

But they also require very pure hydrogen to work. That means that conventional fuels must be stripped of their carbon monoxide (CO) — a process that is too expensive and energy intensive to make fuel cells commercially viable.

Fuel cells work by electrochemically decomposing fuel instead of burning it, converting chemical energy directly into electricity. In proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cells, an anode and cathode are separated by a membrane that blocks electrons but allows protons to pass through. At the anode, a catalyst oxidizes hydrogen, generating electrons and protons. The protons pass through the membrane while the electrons create an electric current. At the cathode, electrons reunite with protons and oxygen from the air to form water.

Abruna

Platinum and platinum/ruthenium alloys are often used as catalysts in PEM fuel cells, but both elements are rare, expensive and easily rendered ineffective by exposure to even low levels of CO.

To create a catalyst that can tolerate more CO, Abruña, DiSalvo and colleagues deposited platinum nanoparticles on a support material they developed of titanium oxide (with added tungsten to increase its electrical conductivity).

Tests show that the new material works with fuel that contains as much as 2 percent CO, losing only 5 percent efficiency compared with a 30 percent drop in efficiency for conventional platinum catalysts. The material is also more stable and less expensive than pure platinum.

With the new catalyst, “you can use much less-clean hydrogen, and that’s more cost-effective because petroleum has a very high content of carbon monoxide,” Abruña said. Otherwise, to reduce the CO content, “you need to scrape off the carbon monoxide, and it’s very expensive to do that.”

The researchers are now preparing to put the catalyst to the test in real fuel cells. “So far, indications are very good,” Abruña said.

In preliminary experiments comparing the new material’s performance with pure platinum, he added, the platinum cell was readily poisoned by CO and conked out early. “But ours was still running like a champ.”

The research was supported by the U.S. Department of Energy through the Energy Materials Center at Cornell, an Energy Frontier Research Center funded by the Office of Science at the Department of Energy.

ANN ARBOR, MICH. – Adaptive Materials, the leader in portable power with its solid oxide fuel cells, recently ranked #3118 on Inc. Magazine’s “Inc. 5000” list.  The company ranked #69 in the Inc. ranking of energy companies.  The annual Inc. 5000 is an exclusive ranking of the nation’s fastest-growing private companies.

“Even in a down economy, Adaptive Materials continues to grow,” said Michelle Crumm, chief business officer.  “The consistent growth experienced by Adaptive Materials is a sign of market need; lightweight, portable power from readily-available fuels is the future of alternative energy.”

Adaptive Materials’ 65 percent three-year growth helped the company make the Inc. 5000 list.  The company was also part of the Inc. 5000 in 2007, 2008 and 2009.

According to Inc. Magazine, the Inc. 5000 list represents the most comprehensive look at the most important segment of the economy—America’s independent-minded entrepreneurs. Music website Pandora, convenience store chain 7-Eleven, Brooklyn Brewery, and Radio Flyer, maker of the iconic children’s red wagon, are among the prominent brands featured on this year’s list.

Complete results of the Inc. 5000, including company profiles and an interactive database that can be sorted by industry, region, and other criteria, can be found on www.inc.com.  A profile on Adaptive Materials can be found on http://www.inc.com/inc5000/profile/adaptive-materials.

About Adaptive Materials, Inc.

Based in Ann Arbor, Mich., Adaptive Materials, Inc. is the first company to develop, demonstrate and deliver a portable, affordable, and fuel flexible solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) system.  The company offers 50 and 250-watt fuel cell systems that are powered by globally available and energy dense propane, butane and LPG.  Adaptive Materials’ fuel cell system provides portable power to the United States Armed Forces as well as industries including leisure, remote monitoring, and medical devices.  For more information, visit www.adaptivematerials.com.

The ZERO-HYTECHPARK project has already an own website where find all the information about its objetives, actions, and latest news. At http://www.zerohytechpark.eu the users will know in detail how the project pretend to reach a zero emissions building using renewable energy and hydrogen technologies.

The aim of the ZERO-HYTECHPARK project, part of the European LIFE+ programme on the environment, is to achieve more sustainable technology parks, a task for which it has a budget of 1.3 million euros, 50% of which is financed by the European Union for four years (from 1 January 2010 to 31 December 2013).

The Foundation for the Development of New Hydrogen Technologies in Aragon coordinates this initiative with the participation of technology parks in Huesca, Andalusia and Vizcaya, which are project partners. ZERO-HYTECHPARK aims to put measures in place to achieve total sustainability in these areas via optimum energy management by means of systems based on hydrogen technologies and renewable energies.

The Life+ Programme is the only European Union financial instrument exclusively dedicated to the environment for the 2007-2013 period, whose general objective is to contribute to the application, updating and development of European policy and legislation concerning the environment and its integration with other policies.