A Chicago-based engineering firm has partnered with General Motors to work on a project that could solve a massive puzzle for transportation and beyond.
According to Interesting Engineering, the two companies are using Department of Energy funding to work on durable hydrogen fuel cells to be used in heavy shipping vehicles like trucks or in the energy industry.
Gary Ong, CEO and founder of Celadyne Systems, told Interesting Engineering that they would need to "quintuple" the output of current hydrogen cell systems in order to match the output of current diesel motors.
Hydrogen fuel cells work by allowing hydrogen and oxygen to combine and harnessing the energy from their joining to power the vehicle. They do this by passing the ions through a proton exchange membrane, or PEM, as the news outlet explained.
The problem is that when hydrogen crosses the PEM, the membrane loses durability, and when an engine is asked for a higher output, more and more hydrogen crosses the membrane, causing it to lose its durability and effectiveness more quickly. Because it's tough to keep gases separate while allowing them to combine when needed, there's always been a level of side reactions involved in the process, as Interesting Engineering indicated, which further erodes the effectiveness of the membrane.
Celadyne's design uses membrane-electrode assemblies (explained here by Fuel Cell Store) with selective transport layers (explained by Science Direct) to keep the hydrogen and oxygen ions and gases separate while still allowing the protons to move around and combine when the time is right.
Ong told Interesting Engineering that their research has produced durability that is four times better than current hydrogen cell engines on the market.
The Environmental Protection Agency reported that medium- and heavy-duty vehicles were responsible for 23% of the transportation sector's planet-warming gas pollution in 2022. Replacing those mostly diesel vehicles with hydrogen cell engines would go an incredibly long way toward reducing our collective carbon footprint.
Hydrogen energy is in a boom right now, as companies search for potential solutions to replacing dirty energy engines. The first hydrogen-powered passenger ferry started service in San Francisco this summer, while a plane with a hydrogen cell engine recently completed a 500-mile journey. Even the shipping industry has jumped on the bandwagon, unveiling the first hydrogen-powered crane at the Port of Los Angeles.
For his part, Ong is optimistic about the future of hydrogen power.
"At Celadyne, we firmly believe that if you can unlock hydrogen, you can change the world," he said in a press release. "We are dedicated to bringing our hydrogen solutions to the world's major industries and players, propelling hydrogen toward mass market adoption for the sake of the planet."
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