Hand Dryer tech for fuel cells

You’ve seen what Dyson did for the vacuum cleaner. But in recent times, the company behind the 1990s revolution in household appliance technologies has lent its expertise to a research project aimed at boosting hydrogen fuel cell performance.

Dyson’s digital electric motor technology has now found a new purpose, as part of a cost-effective way of helping boost the efficiency of hydrogen fuel cells.

Led by clean power specialist Intelligent Energy, the research team also includes automotive engineering giant Ricardo and testing consultancy TRW Conekt, along with Dyson.

The group says its first prototype has shown an increase in power density of more 30 per cent, with the added bonus of improved cold-start reliability.

Since its inception in 2009, the project’s express purpose has been to raise the performance, reliability and durability bar for fuel cell systems with a view to what the team describes as “production intent” fuel cell systems for passenger and light commercial vehicles.

From the outset, the aim was to keep costs down and speed up development by modifying existing components rather than working from a clean sheet.

Intelligent Energy already supplies fuel cell packages to PSA Peugeot-Citroën and to the experimental fuel cell taxi fleet rolled out in London in mid-2012.

Using one of the company’s existing systems, extensive modifications worked up during the three-year project have seen that unit’s power output rise from 30kW to 40kW with no increases in weight or volume.

To achieve that, the group needed to substantially boost the performance of the compressor delivering air to the fuel cell stack.

Dyson’s digital electric motor – “digital” because it’s controlled by digital pulses via a circuit board and capacitors rather than electro-mechanical means – is small but potent.

The motor’s compactness meant that with relatively little modification on either side it could be made to fit into Intelligent Energy’s existing stack shell – crucial in containing development costs in a £2.8 million ($A4.2m) project drawing 50 per cent of its funding from a UK Technology Strategy Board grant.

With the addition of a new, purpose-built coolant module developed specifically for the project, cold start performance showed consistent improvement at temperatures as low as -20 degrees C – an important additional breakthrough in the context of the European winter.