Diesel-Fueled Fuel Cell Making Big Advances

Diesel Fuel News, Sept 17, 2001 by Jack Peckham

Meantime, in other big news on the conventional-fuel (including diesel fuel) fuel-cell power front:

U.S. Department of Energy and five industry partners announced they're teaming up on a $500 million, 10-year R&D "Solid State Energy Conversion Alliance" (SECA) project. The aim is to slash SOFC costs to 10% of today's commercial fuel-cell cost.

If all projects proceed as planned, DOE would put up $271 million, while industry would match with $226 million, over the decade. Project partners include:

# Honeywell, which aims to design 3- to 10-kW SOFCs for power-gen, capable of using conventional fuels. DOE will put up $74 million and Honeywell, $59 million.

# Siemens Westinghouse, to build 7- to 10-kW units for residential combined heat and power, along with 3- to 10-kW auxiliary power units (APU) for vehicle applications. Partners in this project include Ford Motor, Eaton, and Trane. DOE will put up $47.8 million, while the Siemens team will put up $32 million.

# Delphi Automotive and Battelle, developing 5-kW systems for diesel truck and automotive APU's (see Diesel Fuel News 6/5/2000, p4), using conventional liquid fuels. DOE would put up $75 million, while the Delphi/Battelle partners would put up $61 million.

# Cummins Power and McDermott Technology, to produce 10-kW stationary and mobile fuel cells that would replace reciprocating engines of the same size. This project would accelerate McDermott's existing SOFC work and tap Cummins Power's systems integration experience for distributed power. DOE would put up $74 million and Cummins/McDermott, $91.5 million.