Alkali fuel cell developer AFC Energy has successfully completed the field test of its non-platinum electrodes at an AkzoNobel plant in Germany. Meanwhile, AIM-quoted AFC is also building up capacity at its Surrey facility so that it can satisfy future demand for its electrodes.
The fuel cell system uses waste hydrogen from chlorine manufacturing. AFC delivered a 3.5kW version to AkzoNobel at Bitterfeld in Germany in April of this year: in June, the system produced its first electricity. The test also demonstrated the ability to use the electricity produced for AkzoNobel’s on-site grid as well as remote monitoring of fuel cell performance.
An upgrade to AFC’s Surrey facility will cut the time taken to develop electrodes and give the company the ability to manufacture approximately 1,000 electrodes a day. A 50kW system will be ready for trials in the first quarter of 2011. Dr Richard Dawson has been recruited from Ceres Power to work on the system.
During the summer, AFC signed a letter of intent with INEOS ChlorVinyls to develop a hydrogen fuel cell project for its site in Runcorn, Cheshire.
AFC’s fuel cell technology also has other applications. Waste2Tricity, which uses AFC’s technology for its system that converts municipal waste to energy, has signed a joint venture agreement with Thornton New Energy. The two companies plan to use the technology to convert previously unmineable coal reserves under the Firth of Forth, Scotland into electricity through a combination of fuel cells and underground coal gasification.
When Waste2Tricity completes a funding round for its own operations, it is expected to pay AFC an initial licence fee of £1 million. AFC had £2.55 million in cash at the end of April 2009.
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