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The search for a fuel cell car

Going to work in 2030. A commuter gets into a car and turned the key. There is a slight noise target = "_blank"> Car Parts pumps and compressors. The dashboard comes to life. The engine is not running, even if up that the driver presses the accelerator. Then, the vehicle moves into the heavy traffic.

Looking a bit like their predecessors of the twentieth century, cars are moving so slowly that the hiss of tires is louder than the hum of their motors. No smoke belching exhaust pipes, just bits of pure water vapor. No Smog spoils views of the mountains. The environment is friendly transport happened.

This journey began in 1975 when cacti in Arizona countries Geoffrey Ballard, a geophysicist 43-years in Canada, has pushed its way through a small cement block motel neglected a short walk from the Mexican border. He was looking for a laboratory at low prices to continue his dream of finding an alternative to gasoline engine combustion.

He bought the motel at $ 1,400 and burned mattresses dirty, but the building was still stank, so he persuaded the local fire department to come for a training exercise. Watch the pipes blowing proper place, Ballard thought the world of overconsumption of fossil fuels. Reducing it would be hard, but he had always been stubborn.

In the energy crisis 1973, he was called to Washington to focus research in energy conservation. His wife, Shelagh, and their three school-age son remained in Arizona. For six months he has supervised studies of almost anything that does not depend on oil, coal or gasoline. But disillusionment soon put in. Only ideas that have promised results within a few years would be funded. On a home visit in early 1974, he said he Shelagh Arizona wanted to return and resume his quest for a better energy technology.

Ballard thought battery electric cars have been the best alternative energy. A big problem was the weight of lead in storage batteries. Could lithium, lightest metal, is replaced? He had a friend, Ralph Schwartz, eccentric engineer who had worked with lithium and sulfur dioxide.

Needing electrochemist, they went to see Prater at the University of Texas at El Paso. Prater said he had no experience with batteries. "I need someone who knows about batteries," said Ballard. "They know what does not. I want someone willing to try things that others may not. "

In six months Prater managed to isolate a key element lithium dithionite. They mixed in a bowl with solvents, added copper strips and charged with electricity. Then they hooked a light bulb flashlight – and it shone! Prater was ecstatic. However, a battery in practice, take money to develop.

At that time knowledge has been rehabilitated a submarine in Vancouver for oil exploration. Needing a set of tools, he hunted Ballard was hired as a consultant and soon agreed to fund a lithium battery.

That's when Ballard and Schwartz bought the dilapidated motel in Arizona and began to perform experiments. On weekends, Prater has flown in from El Paso, landing two seats Piper in a field adjacent. Living on pizza and beer, they worked to exhaustion, take a nap on the patio furniture, then to return to the chemistry.

After two years, Schwartz bowed. Ballard was still committed to alternative energy, but he felt the attraction and Shelagh Canada. Prater had met and married a woman from Vancouver. So they moved to the warehouse submarine in Vancouver.

funder of the project were removed from the financial statement. But his cousin, Horace Koessler, was money. It has a seaplane and I wanted a companion for a tour of the Arctic. "You have one month to persuade me to invest in the project of the battery," he said. Desperate for funding, followed Ballard a flight.

Their trip was a disaster. engine problems and deteriorating weather conditions forced them landing on a remote pond, and for three days they sat in torrential rain. Radio calls unhelpful. Finally, Ballard hung a tarp over the engine, located the problem, sat up a link from the carburetor and I home. Koessler made $ 200,000.

Then, a smoke detector company injected money. By maintaining a jovial great engineer named Paul Howard had joined Ballard. Late one Friday in 1979, he took a phone call. Company smoke detector had filed for bankruptcy, meaning that Ballard was now in receivership.

This weekend, Prater, and Howard Ballard agreed to form a new company. Ballard was the eldest of 11 years, with experience and excellent business contacts, but they offered equal partnerships. "There are a lot of responsibility for everybody," he said. They rented a small office and called themselves Ballard Research.

For the next four years, they scrambled to pay the bills, primarily the sale of lithium disposable. The rechargeable version worked, but each charge was lower than the previous one, like a watch spring flow. Then appears an attractive alternative.

In 1983, the Canadian military wanted a fuel cell proton exchange membrane (PEM) for the quiet power. A fuel cell is like a battery, but better. It does not require charging overnight. It reverses the familiar scientific experiment in which secondary electricity is put in water to produce hydrogen and oxygen. In a PEM cell, a plastic membrane coated polymer between two platinum plate electrodes. The hydrogen flows on one side, the oxygen in the air on the other. They combine to form water and generate electricity without combustion and emissions of evil.

"A fuel cell is an electrochemical" Prater told colleagues. "It is our right of the fairway." Ballard has won the contract and hired a technical team. Engineer David Watkins set up the laboratory. Danny Epp, a sailor who had worked on the submarine, did most of the building overnight. Ken Dircks has tests. They bought a sample of a membrane expensive DuPont developed for the space program of the United States. But their budget is so tight that Epp scrounged material bins. When he needed to make grooves on the plates of the electrode to channel gas, he asked a company that sells trophies to lend an engraving machine. In three years, they had the most powerful cell PEM for its weight and size in the world. Watkins set up a presentation at a international conference in Phoenix. Few people had heard of Ballard Research, but scientists have found impressive results. Soon they were visiting the laboratory.

In 1987, the entrepreneur Michael Brown read an article on fuel cells in his dentist's surgery. Weeks later he received a tip about Ballard. Excited by the fuel cell promise, he persuaded the Development Bank of Canada to join his cabinet, Ventures West, a union that has raised $ 880,000.

Progress continued. Ballard's team replaced the membrane with a DuPont Dow Chemical and left to run. To their astonishment, it generated four times the previous regime. As they watched, a Cable inch thick electric was so hot that the son of copper started to melt and fuse. They were screaming and jumping around. With this second, stimulate drastic power, electric cars suddenly seemed possible.

In 1998, Ballard Research needed additional financing. Brown and his partners have decided that, before they commit more money, the founders of the company had put in new direction with business skills more.

Brown presented them Firoz Rasul, an engineer of 36 years who had been vice president of marketing for MDI Mobile Data. By recognizing their limits in the world of megabusiness, Ballard Rasul founders gave an equal share of stocks and make him president. Rasul and Brown wrote a new business plan and raise five million dollars.

To refine and commercialize fuel cells would mean a huge growth and at least ten years without the net. The employees have increased from 37 in 1989 to over 450 today. The company, now called Ballard Power Systems, switched seats. To increase the need for hundreds of millions of dollars, they had to set annual targets for more power, reliability improved, reducing costs – and respond. And they did.

A key step, led by Alfred polymer specialist Steck, membrane was cheaper in the heart of the fuel cell. The novel mixture of plastic polymers, the group of Steck staggered to form films, dry in a "clean room" and put in cells. The first membranes and not breaking after 300-500 hours, not good enough for a commercial vehicle. The "third generation" membrane, however, never stopped running. When it passed 1000 hours, they broke a bottle of champagne. At 5000 hours, another bottle. 10,000 hours. More champagne. When Steck had a shelf of empty bottles, Ballard Power Systems has its own sustainable, affordable membrane.

In mid-1990 Ballard wanted to put the cell in a small bus to show it could actually turn the wheels. He had played tennis with the BC Energy Minister Jack Davis, who said: "Give me a green photo-op for the Premier, and I will finance. "The province has provided $ 2.7 million cost $ 4.1 million.

They unveiled the project in June 1993 outside Science World in Vancouver. Premier Mike Harcourt was waiting with Ballard and the media. Suddenly, Paul Howard, who was in charge, got a walkie-talkie bus. 'The compressor has stopped. "A small bolt – is not part of the cell, but crucial – broke.

After a stunned moment horror, Howard has orchestrated a charade comic opera. Six workers Ballard, hidden from view, has pushed the bus to silently rolled a slight slope toward the podium. Harcourt gave a speech, then said: "Now we'll go for a ride. "But the crowd milled around. Reporters asked Howard a question after another. He kept talking. There were too many people to move from the bus safely, so that the ruse worked. Harcourt left for another appointment. "Come back this afternoon for a ride," said Howard. In the meantime, the problem has been resolved.

Government and the engine company officials began to visit for testing. Vancouver and Chicago have even put in order for city buses. Meanwhile, California has passed laws requiring that ten percent of all cars sold from 2003 be zero emission vehicles. Other states have followed suit, creating a potential market for cell cars fuel.

The German Daimler-Benz, the first major automaker to experiment with a cell from Ballard in the late 1980, took the initiative. In 1996, he released a mini-van powered by Ballard. In a series of agreements multi-million-dollar, Daimler-Benz bought a 20 per cent of Ballard in 1997, while Ford has acquired a 15 per cent the following year. The three companies have formed two new companies common to the manufacture of batteries and fuel market and drive trains for electric vehicles.

"The starting gun in the race to produce the first fuel cell car was fired, "said Juergen Hubbert, head of Daimler Automotive Division. "A new era in transportation is emerging. "

"It's an incredible jump," said David Scott, professor of mechanical engineering at the University Victoria Canada. "The fuel cell will have an impact on transport comparable to that of the chip on communications."

Ballard to be just follow the invitation to speak at universities. He informed the students: "Do not be patient. All things do not come to those who wait. Dare to be pressed to change things the better. "

About the Author

Jedd Sullivan is an automobile writer specializing in automobile and car accessories products and has written authoritative articles on the Automotive industry. He also works as a Market Analyst for one of the leading discount auto parts retailers in the country today.

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