Fuel cells seem poised to become tomorrow's ideal energy conversion device.
 

 
Developments in regulation (liberalisation for utilities and networks, strict
 

 
rules for environment protection) will make the use of fuel cells attractive,
 

 
if not necessary. At the same time developments in technology have enabled them
 

 
to become performing, reliable and maybe economic.

The large car manufacturers are now committed Emission standards are becoming
 

 
increasingly strict in the USA and Europe, and many other countries may follow
 

 
suit, in particular in Asia. As a means of complying with these standards fuel
 

 
cells have become a critical issue, and most large car manufacturers have embarked
 

 
on large-scale R&D programmes to develop fuel cell cars and to bring them onto
 

 
the market by 2003-2005.

The manufacturers have grouped together to do this. Daimler Chrysler formed
 

 
a partnership with Ford, Mazda and the Canadian fuel cell manufacturer Ballard.
 

 
Toyota and General Motors have teamed up, probably using Toyota's in-house developed
 

 
fuel cell technology. These two groups, with their associated companies such
 

 
as Volvo, Jaguar, Mitsubishi, or Fiat, Subaru, Isuzu, respectively represent
 

 
30% and 26% of the world car production. They have committed themselves to bringing
 

 
commercial fuel cell vehicles onto the market in 2004, with investment programmes
 

 
of about a billion $ each.

Honda appears still to be going it alone, and is also announcing a fuel cell
 

 
car for 2004 with in-house fuel cell technology. Renault has acquired fuel cell
 

 
development work with Nissan, but has not yet clearly announced their strategy
 

 
in this field.

In Europe Volkswagen and PSA are involved in European projects (like FEVER
 

 
or CAPRI) with the Italian fuel cell manufacturer De Nora, but they have not
 

 
announced a commercial vehicle yet. BMW is working on a fuel cell ``APU`` (auxiliary
 

 
power unit) that would provide the energy increasingly needed in cars for non-traction
 

 
purposes. Delphi is also working on fuel cell APUs.

The last chance for electric cars?

Everyone seems to have given up battery vehicles as a lost cause. They failed
 

 
to come up with adequate range, speed, recharge time, and cost. The ZEV (Zero
 

 
Emission Vehicle) imposed by Californian legislation is probably a stillborn
 

 
concept. In any case the concept only really transferred the emissions problem
 

 
from the vehicle to the electric generating station.

Hybrid vehicles seem more promising. They combine an optimised ICE (internal
 

 
combustion engine) with batteries, a design that enables significant reductions
 

 
in emissions, without affecting range or speed, and avoiding the battery charging
 

 
challenge.

Fuel cells can replace the ICE in such a hybrid configuration, enabling a further
 

 
significant reduction in emissions. Fuel cells are a clean technology, up to
 

 
a point… Fuel cells were used as energy sources in all the American manned space
 

 
flights (Apollo, Gemini, Orbiter…). In addition to electricity, they provided
 

 
drinking water for the cosmonauts. Unfortunately fuel cell technology used down
 

 
on earth is not quite so pure.

The principle of fuel cells is the opposite of electrolysis, by which an electric
 

 
current dissociates water into oxygen and hydrogen. In fuel cells oxygen and
 

 
hydrogen are combined in the presence of catalysts to form water and an electric
 

 
current. In space applications liquid hydrogen and oxygen were used, with fairly
 

 
large quantities of platinum catalyst.

But applying this technology to vehicles is not so simple. Air is used instead
 

 
of oxygen, but this reduces cell performance, and also creates problems with
 

 
the CO and CO2 in the air. Also using pure hydrogen in a car means solving complex
 

 
storage, distribution and refuelling problems. Moreover hydrogen must first
 

 
be manufactured, which like battery cars only displaces the emission problem
 

 
from the vehicle to the hydrogen plant.

The problem is to find a convenient fuel that can be used in vehicles, and
 

 
then to extract the hydrogen from this fuel with an on-board reformer. The most
 

 
popular choice would be petrol or Diesel, but these fuels are difficult to reform
 

 
and they contain a lot of carbon which must be got rid of. Today methanol, an
 

 
easily reformed liquid fuel, seems to be a widely accepted compromise. But methanol
 

 
production is small (less than 30 million tons world-wide), and the distribution
 

 
network needs to be adapted. And naturally the global efficiency of the system
 

 
diminishes with losses in methanol production and reforming.

Direct methanol fuel cells are being developed, which use methanol without
 

 
reforming it. This would be the ideal solution, but these devices have significantly
 

 
lower performances, which makes them larger and globally less efficient.

Different technologies for different markets?

Fuel cells were invented as long ago as 1839. More than a century and a half
 

 
later they seem ready at last to become commercially viable products. This is
 

 
due to the combined effects of technological developments in materials (membranes,
 

 
ceramics, catalysts…), deregulation of the electricity supply system, and introduction
 

 
of strict emission standards.

Several different fuel cell technologies are being developed. Low or medium
 

 
temperature fuel cells are the most advanced technologies, and have reached
 

 
the commercial or pre-commercial stage. Alkaline fuel cells (AFCs) were the
 

 
favourites for space applications, but today polymer membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs)
 

 
are preferred for mass-market applications such as cars. Phosphoric acid fuel
 

 
cells (PAFCs) are a mature technology well adapted to stationary cogeneration
 

 
applications. Over 300 units have been sold throughout the world, mainly in
 

 
the USA and Japan, at a price of around 3000 $/kW.

High temperature technologies (MCFCs and SOFCs) are more delicate to manage,
 

 
but they can use common fuels such as natural gas and reform them internally.
 

 
They are particularly well adapted to stationary applications in which the heat
 

 
generated can be used in combined cycle or cogeneration. These technologies
 

 
are still in, the experimental stage, but they could appear on the market by
 

 
2001-2003.

There are three market segments for fuel cells. The automotive segment will
 

 
offer a massive market for PEMFCs if fuel cell vehicles prove a commercial success.
 

 
But success in this segment is subject to severe conditions. Cost must not durably
 

 
be higher than ICE vehicles, , which sets a goal of 50 $/kW, compared to present
 

 
costs that are probably nearer to 3000 $/kW. Attaining this goal will require
 

 
production volumes of at least 200 000 fuel cell vehicles a year, which cannot
 

 
realistically be expected before 2007-2008. Moreover reliability must be at
 

 
least the same as that of present vehicles.

The second major market is stationary applications. This would seem to be the
 

 
favourite market for high temperature technologies, but PEMFCs are also aiming
 

 
for this market even though their low operating temperature makes them less
 

 
obviously adapted to cogeneration. Fuel cells in stationary applications would
 

 
not replace the present large electricity generation stations. They would rather
 

 
enable new network architectures privileging distributed generation. Generating
 

 
electricity where it is used has two major advantages. On-site cogeneration
 

 
(combined heat and power generation) gives overall efficiencies of 80%, and
 

 
distributed generation reduces the need for extremely costly transmission and
 

 
distribution networks. The cost objective is higher than in automotive applications,
 

 
around 1000 $/kW. This market does not only concern professional generation,
 

 
but also residential generation. Several players (Plug Power with PEMFCs, Sulzer
 

 
Hexis or Ceramic Fuel Cells with SOFCs) are aiming for the residential market
 

 
with devices providing electricity, heating or cooling for houses.

The third segment is more diverse, and comprises portable applications and
 

 
a number of niche applications. As in space, in such applications convenience
 

 
is the prime factor and not cost. Motorola and Los Alamos National Laboratory
 

 
are working on a methanol fuel cell for mobile phones fuelled for one week by
 

 
a single ink-pen type cartridge. Siemens has equipped the new generation of
 

 
German submarines with PEMFCs to increase their range for submerged missions.
 

 
A number of other niche applications can be listed, such as camping, sailing,
 

 
isolated sites, weather or environment monitoring stations, portable or mobile
 

 
military applications…

A fuel cell industry is emerging A new fuel cell industry is coming into existence.
 

 
It is specially developed in North America, where it was fostered by large government
 

 
R&D programmes. The Canadian Ballard and IFC (a UTC-Toshiba joint venture) are
 

 
dominant in PEMFCs, followed by a number of challengers such as H Power or Plug
 

 
Power. Moreover Du Pont has a virtual monopoly over PEMFC membranes with its
 

 
Nafion membrane. IFC was also the leader in AFCs, whereas in PAFCs ONSI (another
 

 
UTC-Toshiba joint venture) probably holds 80% of the world market. In SOFCs
 

 
Westinghouse is leader, and in MCFCs the Americans MC Power and FuelCell Energy
 

 
are probably first.

In Japan the situation is rather different. Mostly fuel cell development was
 

 
undertaken by the large manufacturers of electrical equipment such as Fuji,
 

 
Hitachi, IHI, Mitsubishi, Toshiba, or by the car manufacturers (Honda, Nissan,
 

 
Toyota…).

In Europe R&D expenditure on fuel cells is significantly lower than in the
 

 
USA or Japan. Work on AFCs was dropped when the European Hermes space shuttle
 

 
programme was abandoned. However ZeTek is now trying to apply this technology
 

 
to vehicles. Siemens developed PEMFCs for German non-nuclear submarines, and
 

 
in Italy De Nora provides PEMFCs, in particular for European programmes such
 

 
as the FEVER fuel cell vehicle. Alstom concluded an agreement with Ballard to
 

 
develop stationary applications for PEMFCs in Europe, with a manufacturing site
 

 
in Dresden (Germany). In SOFCs Siemens has become world leader after acquiring
 

 
Westinghouse, but the technology will be developed in the USA. In Switzerland
 

 
Sulzer Hexis is developing small SOFCs in the kW range for residential applications.
 

 

Today European fuel cell manufacturers do not seem well placed to get into
 

 
the automotive market. Daimler Chrysler has chosen Ballard together with Ford
 

 
(who now owns Volvo and Jaguar). Fiat is now likely to join General Motors using
 

 
Toyota fuel cells. Renault now has in-house fuel cell resources with Nissan.
 

 
Siemens and De Nora will have hard work before them if they want to be in this
 

 
market.