Direct Alcohol Fuel Cells - past the hydrogen economy?
Forget the hydrogen economy, here's the alcohol economy. As is well known, the much hyped hydrogen economy suffers under a series of infrastructural problems that will be difficult to overcome. Production, storage, and distribution of the gas are all problematic because of safety problems, difficulty of use, and the requirement of building an entirely new infrastructure.
Fuel cells -- often associated with H2 -- remain an efficient technology for the production of electricity for direct applications, though. So if we can use other fuels than hydrogen, there might still be a novel energy delivery route using those cells.
In this context, the work on Direct Alcohol Fuel Cells (DAFC's) that use ethanol (or any other alcohol) is promising and has seen recent advances. Acta Nanotech, an Italian company, has developed catalysts that do not require any platinum - a major cost in fuel cells. The catalysts are made from base metals, including cobalt, nickel and iron, which are affordable and abundant. This means that pricing forecasts can be stable and the price of the catalyst can fall when fuel cells are launched on an industrial scale.
This is a breakthrough, since the resulting cells perform well with both hydrogen and methanol, and more complex hydrocarbons including ethanol and ethylene glycol. Ethanol is perfect for consumer and transport applications because it is cheap, safe, practical and already widely used in consumer supply chains. Ethylene glycol is ideal for demanding applications. With its low freezing point and high boiling point, fuel evaporation is minimized and it is practical for use in a wider range of temperature environments.
So an economy based on these direct alcohol fuel cells would be more realistic than one based on hydrogen.
-DAFC's have a fuel-to-electricity conversion efficiency of 50%
-Ethanol from tropical crops can bring us a long way. Sugar cane, cassava and sorghum are major candidates, but some sugar palms (Borassus flabellifer) and starch palms (Metroxylon sagu) are more promising with yields of up to 90 barrels of ethanol per year per hectare.
-There are no real problems with storing and distributing the ethanol.
Fuel cells -- often associated with H2 -- remain an efficient technology for the production of electricity for direct applications, though. So if we can use other fuels than hydrogen, there might still be a novel energy delivery route using those cells.
In this context, the work on Direct Alcohol Fuel Cells (DAFC's) that use ethanol (or any other alcohol) is promising and has seen recent advances. Acta Nanotech, an Italian company, has developed catalysts that do not require any platinum - a major cost in fuel cells. The catalysts are made from base metals, including cobalt, nickel and iron, which are affordable and abundant. This means that pricing forecasts can be stable and the price of the catalyst can fall when fuel cells are launched on an industrial scale.
This is a breakthrough, since the resulting cells perform well with both hydrogen and methanol, and more complex hydrocarbons including ethanol and ethylene glycol. Ethanol is perfect for consumer and transport applications because it is cheap, safe, practical and already widely used in consumer supply chains. Ethylene glycol is ideal for demanding applications. With its low freezing point and high boiling point, fuel evaporation is minimized and it is practical for use in a wider range of temperature environments.
So an economy based on these direct alcohol fuel cells would be more realistic than one based on hydrogen.
-DAFC's have a fuel-to-electricity conversion efficiency of 50%
-Ethanol from tropical crops can bring us a long way. Sugar cane, cassava and sorghum are major candidates, but some sugar palms (Borassus flabellifer) and starch palms (Metroxylon sagu) are more promising with yields of up to 90 barrels of ethanol per year per hectare.
-There are no real problems with storing and distributing the ethanol.
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