Fuel cells: modern alchemy that works

Date: 27/03/03

Technology may lead to a shift from fossil fuels as a major source of energy. But time and economics might ultimately decide the fate of fuel cells, writes Peter Chapman

IT's the 21st-century version of alchemy.

And everyone from George W. Bush to Romano Prodi is talking about it.

You take one of the world's most abundant elements: hydrogen, and turn it into power and heat. All that is left over is a little water, with no nasty C02 emissions, if you put aside the pollution caused by obtaining the hydrogen.

Historically, the finest minds from Leonardo da Vinci to Sir Isaac Newton were thwarted by the innate impossibility of turning base metals into gold.

Their modern-day counterparts could be stalled in their efforts to roll out fuel cells to the masses by more mundane obstacles: time and economics.

That is because fuel cells actually work.

Companies such as US engineering giant United Technologies Corporation have been selling large static fuel cells to provide back-up power for installations such as hospitals for years, cashing in on expertise that helped power the Apollo programme and Space Shuttle missions.

Most experts agree that given enough time and money, the technical limitations of current fuel cells can be overcome to squash them into everything from cars to lap-top computers.

But before you get carried away, a reality check is needed, says Buford Lewis, head of fuel cell research at the world's biggest petroleum company, Exxon Mobil.

"I think we use two key words in describing fuel cells," he explains. "One is "promise" and the other is "challenge". Various people will approach it focusing more or less on one word or the other. That is the way I boil it down."

"What is the promise? The promise is that these things take hydrogen, combine it with oxygen and make electricity. The only in-use emission is water and some heat and no carbon dioxide emissions.

"What is the challenge? You have what I describe as a multi-linked chain to get from today to the full promise.

"First you have the fuel source. Hydrogen is not a basic energy stock, rather like electricity. It has to be made from something else.

"Link number two in the chain is, once you have that energy source, how are you going to produce it technically and economically?

"Third link, how are you going to distribute it to the end consumer?

"Fourth link, how are going to store it, and dispense it to the end consumer? That storage can mean storing it on board, if it is for transportation.

"And the last link is the end user."

Next, says Lewis, are the daunting figures showing how much fuel cell energy currently costs.

"If you throw out some of the numbers from some of the President's [George W. Bush] speeches and various European commissioners - the end use costs ten times as much for a fuel cell power train as it does for an internal combustion engine."

It costs "maybe four times more" than gasoline to produce the fuel on a large scale, he adds. "If you look at distribution, there is no real infrastructure there today, so the cost of replacing the existing petroleum infrastructure would run to trillions of dollars." It's at this point, says Lewis, "where some people say 'it's going to be darned difficult to get there'".

"These people say there are clearly other things that we should be focusing on in terms of vehicles - efficiency improvements, increased use of diesel and even increased use of hybrids [which use a combination of power sources].

"They say these things can have an impact [far sooner than fuel cells], so let's focus on the low-hanging fruit rather than the long-term challenge.

"On the other side, people see the promise and have approached the challenge as opportunities. They say "let's get in, do the pre-commercial research and see if we can overcome these current barriers. This thing has enough promise".

"It's a very simple explanation but you can take what is coming out now and put it into these two camps.

"The practical people say we have a very slim chance, given this multi-linked chain, and then there are people who look at what technology can do over a space of time."

The next crucial question, says Lewis, is how much time?

"We are clearly talking about something that's got to transpire over decades," he suggests, adding that we are still in the "early decades".

Despite the pitfalls, Lewis is clearly in the "promise" camp.

Progress has already been immense: especially in technology "stacking" large numbers of fuel cells together, even if the industry has failed to match the semiconductor industry's "Moore's Law", which predicts that chips double in capacity every year and a half.

Oil companies such as Exxon Mobil need to invest in fuel cells, he insists, because it's their job to deliver fuel to customers "irrespective of what those fuels are". If hydrogen is the fuel of the future, then the oil companies must be in on it.

How will customers get their hydrogen? Lewis feels the most promising way is to transform it into a liquid. That way it can be easily stored, transported and delivered to final customers in the same way as their current fuels.

Costs, too, would be manageable.

But carbon dioxide would be the inevitable by-product if the hydrogen comes from hydrocarbons such as natural gas - the most likely short-term source. Other sources are wind, light or even nuclear - but that could be ruled out by environmentalists.

The US government wants to target the estimated 300 years of remaining global coal supplies as a hydrogen source - but, again, the problem of catching the CO2 given off during production needs to be tackled.

"It is a fact of life," admits Lewis.

The EU has recently pledged to spend more of its scarce research euro on fuel cells and is cooperating with the US on joint research and development (R&D).

Surprisingly, experts say this money, combined with the individual efforts of member states, is enough.

Any more money and the limited number of specialists and scientific research labs would struggle to spend it, claims Lewis.

Instead, Darcy Nicolle, EU lobbyist for United Technologies Corporation (UTC), says the priority for Europe is not to spend more on research - but to establish the right rules and regulations to encourage firms to put products on the market.

Until then, rhetoric from EU leaders and Commission President Romano Prodi will not help to bring fuel cells out of the labs and into the European marketplace, he says.

A case in point is a draft directive on cogeneration, a process which converts a single fuel source - fossil fuels, or industrial or agricultural waste - into heat and electricity, issued last summer by the Commission. The directive calls for users of stationary fuel cells, from households to hospitals, to be able to hook them up to national power grids to offload unwanted power.

But Nicolle says electricity firms donot like this interference in their business and are lobbying MEPs to reduce the amount of power they would have to buy in.

That, he argues, would reduce the incentive to invest in expensive fuel cells.

Like Exxon Mobil, UTC has plants all over Europe, despite its US roots, and claims it is eager to take part in European fuel cell efforts.

"We need a good fuel cell policy or hydrogen policy or both, but at the moment we don't have it. All the politicians are saying 'we love this' but, when you say what have you done to encourage fuel cells - apart from R&D money - they say 'ho-hum'."

In the meantime, everyone needs a little patience, if the fuel cell future takes a little longer than expected to take off.

Adds Nicolle: "Internal combustion people criticise the fuel cells. But the internal combustion lobby have had 100 years to get it right.

"They had races from London to Brighton and, if the Rolls Royce only broke down twice, it was doing well. You have to put the basics in place, otherwise you are just talking about it and it will always be the technology of tomorrow."

Technology may lead to a shift from fossil fuels as a major source of energy. But time and economics might ultimately decide the fate of fuel cells.