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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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DOE OSTI2013

U.S. Department of Energy Hydrogen and Fuel Cells Program, 2013 Annual Merit Review and Peer Evaluation Report (Book)

The fiscal year (FY) 2013 U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Hydrogen and Fuel Cells Program Annual Merit Review and Peer Evaluation Meeting (AMR), in conjunction with DOE's Vehicle Technologies Office AMR, was held from May 13-16, 2013, at the Crystal City Marriott and Crystal Gateway Marriott in Arlington, Virginia. This report is a summary of comments by AMR peer reviewers about the hydrogen and fuel cell projects funded by DOE's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE).

08 HYDROGEN↗
DOE OSTI2013

Improved Flow-Field Structures for Direct Methanol Fuel Cells

The direct methanol fuel cell (DMFC) is ideal if high energy-density liquid fuels are required. Liquid fuels have advantages over compressed hydrogen including higher energy density and ease of handling. Although state-of-the-art DMFCs exhibit manageable degradation rates, excessive fuel crossover diminishes system energy and power density. Although use of dilute methanol mitigates crossover, the concomitant lowering of the gross fuel energy density (GFED) demands a complex balance-of-plant (BOP) that includes higher flow rates, external exhaust recirculation, etc. An alternative approach is redesign of the fuel delivery system to accommodate concentrated methanol. NuVant Systems Inc. (NuVant) will maximize the GFED by design and assembly of a DMFC that uses near neat methanol. The approach is to tune the diffusion of highly concentrated methanol (to the anode catalytic layer) to the back-diffusion of water formed at the cathode (i.e. in situ generation of dilute methanol at the anode layer). Crossover will be minimized without compromising the GFED by innovative integration of the anode flow-field and the diffusion layer. The integrated flow-field-diffusion-layers (IFDLs) will widen the current and potential DMFC operating ranges and enable the use of cathodes optimized for hydrogen-air fuel cells.

30 DIRECT ENERGY CONVERSION↗
DOE OSTI2013

Vessel Cold-Ironing Using a Barge Mounted PEM Fuel Cell: Project Scoping and Feasibility.

A barge-mounted hydrogen-fueled proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cell system has the potential to reduce emissions and fossil fuel use of maritime vessels in and around ports. This study determines the technical feasibility of this concept and examines specific options on the U.S. West Coast for deployment practicality and potential for commercialization.The conceptual design of the system is found to be straightforward and technically feasible in several configurations corresponding to various power levels and run times.The most technically viable and commercially attractive deployment options were found to be powering container ships at berth at the Port of Tacoma and/or Seattle, powering tugs at anchorage near the Port of Oakland, and powering refrigerated containers on-board Hawaiian inter-island transport barges. Other attractive demonstration options were found at the Port of Seattle, the Suisun Bay Reserve Fleet, the California Maritime Academy, and an excursion vessel on the Ohio River.

30 DIRECT ENERGY CONVERSION↗
DOE OSTI2014

Multi-Hybrid Power Vehicles with Cost Effective and Durable Polymer Electrolyte Membrane Fuel Cell and Li-ion Battery

Anima Bose, the principal investigator of the project, originally proposed to develop composite membranes to operate PEMFCs at much higher temperatures than 80°C and to alleviate the flooding problems often encountered in Nafion menmbrane containing fuel cells. The PI has successfully created composite membranes by blending small quantities of octasilane-poss (OSP) with Nafion. The composite membranes exhibited temperature tolerance up to 110°C without scarifying cell performance as determined by polarization curves and proton conductivity measurements. These membranes also exhibited superior water management performance as evident from the lack of flooding. Furthermore, these fuel cells performed well under reduced humidities. Structural and thermal analyses revealed that these Nafion-octasilane composite membranes are homogenous at concentrations up to 3 wt% of the OSP and that the siloxane offers additional thermal stability.

25 ENERGY STORAGE↗
DOE OSTI2014

The Development of Nano-Composite Electrodes for Solid Oxide Electrolyzers

Solid oxide fuel cells (SOFC) and electrolyzers (SOE) offer an attractive means for converting between electrical and chemical energy. Because they operate at high temperatures and are usually based on electrolytes that are oxygen-ion conducting ceramics, such as yttria-stabilized zirconia (YSZ), they are equally capable of converting between CO and CO 2 as between H 2 and H 2 O. When operated in the SOFC mode, they are able to operate on hydrocarbon fuels so long as there are no materials within the anode that can catalyze carbon formation. Compared to other types of electrolyzers, SOE can exhibit the highest efficiencies because the theoretical Nernst potential is lower at high temperatures and because the electrode overpotentials in SOE tend to be much lower. Finally, pure H 2 can be produced without an external electrical source by electrolysis of steam at one electrode and oxidation of any fuel at the other electrode through a process known as Natural-Gas Assisted Steam Electrolysis. This final report describes results from studies of novel electrodes for SOE and SOFC prepared by infiltration methods.

08 HYDROGEN↗
DOE OSTI2014

BC Transit Fuel Cell Bus Project: Evaluation Results Report

This report evaluates a fuel cell electric bus demonstration led by British Columbia Transit (BC Transit) in Whistler, Canada. BC Transit is collaborating with the California Air Resources Board and the U.S. Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory to evaluate the buses in revenue service. This evaluation report covers two years of revenue service data on the buses from April 2011 through March 2013.

30 DIRECT ENERGY CONVERSION↗
DOE OSTI2013

Fuel Cell Buses in U.S. Transit Fleets: Current Status 2013

This report is the seventh in an annual series of reports that summarize the progress of fuel cell electric bus (FCEB) development in the United States and discuss the achievements and challenges of introducing fuel cell propulsion in transit. The report also provides a snapshot of current FCEB performance results from August 2012 through July 2013 for five FCEB demonstrations at four transit agencies.

08 HYDROGEN↗
DOE OSTI2013

Cost Study for Manufacturing of Solid Oxide Fuel Cell Power Systems

Solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) power systems can be designed to produce electricity from fossil fuels at extremely high net efficiencies, approaching 70%. However, in order to penetrate commercial markets to an extent that significantly impacts world fuel consumption, their cost will need to be competitive with alternative generating systems, such as gas turbines. This report discusses a cost model developed at PNNL to estimate the manufacturing cost of SOFC power systems sized for ground-based distributed generation. The power system design was developed at PNNL in a study on the feasibility of using SOFC power systems on more electric aircraft to replace the main engine-mounted electrical generators [Whyatt and Chick, 2012]. We chose to study that design because the projected efficiency was high (70%) and the generating capacity was suitable for ground-based distributed generation (270 kW).

30 DIRECT ENERGY CONVERSION↗
DOE OSTI2014

Additional EIPC Study Analysis: Interim Report on Medium Priority Topics

Between 2010 and 2012 the Eastern Interconnection Planning Collaborative (EIPC) conducted a major long-term resource and transmission study of the Eastern Interconnection (EI). With guidance from a stakeholder steering committee (SSC) that included representatives from the Eastern Interconnection States’ Planning Council (EISPC) among others, the project was conducted in two phases. The first was a 2015–2040 analysis that looked at a broad array of possible future scenarios, while the second focused on a more detailed examination of the grid in 2030. The studies provided a wealth of information on possible future generation, demand, and transmission alternatives. However, at the conclusion there were still unresolved questions and issues. The US Department of Energy, which had sponsored the study, asked Oak Ridge National Laboratory researchers and others who worked on the project to conduct an additional study of the data to provide further insights for stakeholders and the industry. This report documents the second part of that follow-on study [an earlier report (Hadley 2013) covered the first part, and a subsequent report will address the last part].

30 DIRECT ENERGY CONVERSION↗
DOE OSTI2013

Structured Emission Thermometry Sensor for Burner Control

The overall objective of the program is to control furnace flames for more efficient operation by applying an appropriate sensor technology in a control loop. In Phase I we measured spectra and multispectral imagery from a test furnace at Eclipse, Inc., in Rockford, IL. The test furnace was run at a variety of operating conditions with an oxy-fuel flame, fueled in some tests by natural gas and in others by propane. Using spatial, spectral, and temporal processing, several properties of the flame became observable, including the locations of principal heat release, the extent of the non-luminous portion of the flame, and the local gas temperature. Among the spectra and imagery recorded, the multi-spectral images showed the most promise as a field-compatible measurement system. In Phase II we developed algorithms, driver software, and hardware for what eventually became two independent prototypes: a sophisticated burner-mounted single line-of-sight spectral sensor and a more-mature version of the multispectral furnace imager from Phase I. The maturity of the furnace imager was advanced through significant automation of acquisition, exposure, data recording, and processing to data products. The single line of sight spectral sensor was developed using insights from the test campaigns and was applied in a practical application in an industrial facility where it was used in a control loop. The active control benefits depend on the final applications engineering but show promise to offer smaller excess-air or excess-oxygen requirements, improved response to changing fuel feed stocks, and tighter control on flame properties, resulting in a more consistent product. This thus reduces waste of fuel due to conservative excess-oxidizer requirements and also waste due to off-specification product quality.

30 DIRECT ENERGY CONVERSION↗
DOE OSTI2013

Water Gas Shift Reaction with A Single Stage Low Temperature Membrane Reactor

Palladium membrane and palladium membrane reactor were developed under this project for hydrogen separation and purification for fuel cell applications. A full-scale membrane reactor was designed, constructed and evaluated for the reformate produced from a commercial scale methanol reformer. In addition, the Pd membrane and module developed from this project was successfully evaluated in the field for hydrogen purification for commercial fuel cell applications.

08 HYDROGEN↗
DOE OSTI2014

GENCO Infrastructure Solutions, Inc. Fuel Cell-Powered Lift Truck Fleet Deployment Projects (Final Technical Report)

The overall objectives of this project were to evaluate the performance, operability and safety of fork lift trucks powered by fuel cells in large distribution centers. This was accomplished by replacing the batteries in over 350 lift trucks with fuel cells at five distribution centers operated by GENCO. The annual cost savings of lift trucks powered by fuel cell power units was between $\$$2,400 and $\$$5,300 per truck compared to battery powered lift trucks, excluding DOE contributions. The greatest savings were in fueling labor costs where a fuel cell powered lift truck could be fueled in a few minutes per day compared to over an hour for battery powered lift trucks which required removal and replacement of batteries. Lift truck operators where generally very satisfied with the performance of the fuel cell power units, primarily because there was no reduction in power over the duration of a shift as experienced with battery powered lift trucks. The operators also appreciated the fast and easy fueling compared to the effort and potential risk of injury associated with switching heavy batteries in and out of lift trucks. There were no safety issues with the fueling or operation of the fuel cells. Although maintenance costs for the fuel cells were higher than for batteries, these costs are expected to decrease significantly in the next generation of fuel cells, making them even more cost effective.

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