Friday, July 24, 2009

New Swedish investment in hydrogen fuel converters

BLUEFUELENERGY.COM: As reported in The Engineer Online recently, two Swedish organizations - one government, one private - are investing in fuel cell development to the tune of over US$30 million over the next three years.

Specifically, the Swedish Energy Agency and Volvo are jointly investing SEK200m (£15.7m or US$25.7m) in the development of fuel cells, a move that should hopefully create roughly 100 jobs in the Gothenburg region over the next three years.

What's exciting from a Blue Fuel/DME Standpoint is that fuel converters can produce hydrogen gas from DME as well as biogas, methanol, ethanol, biodiesel, and also from regular diesel or petrol. The PEM fuel cell then converts the hydrogen gas into electricity. Per Wassén, investment director at Volvo Technology Transfer and chairman of Powercell Sweden said that "This is truly a major step in the development of fuel cells.’

To accelerate the introduction of fuel cells into the market, the Volvo Group, through Volvo Technology Transfer, will receive investment from Midroc New Technology and OCAS, as well as from the Swedish Energy Agency.

Powercell Sweden is founded on two patented components: a fuel converter (reformer) and a PEM fuel cell, which is the type of fuel cell most often used in transport applications.

"Thanks to our reformer technology we are now ready to start our production without having to wait for an infrastructure for the distribution of hydrogen gas,"’ said Wassén.

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