The Environmental Engineering Hub

A new source of platinum demand is gaining traction in China as the government throws its financial might behind the development of hydrogen fuel cells for vehicles, potentially creating a market  for 500,000oz of the metal and offsetting declines in antipollution devices in diesel engines. China’s government set out a target of 2-million new electric vehicles (NEV), including hydrogen-powered vehicles on its roads by 2020, a figure that Benny Oeyen, the new head of marketing at Anglo American Platinum and former senior manager in various car companies, extrapolated to use up to 500,000oz of platinum in the systems converting hydrogen into electricity. The question raised by analysts is the offset of platinum used in autocatalyst systems on diesel engines to scrub noxious gases from exhaust systems and whether the new environmentally friendly trucks and buses will cannibalise the long-standing source of platinum demand over the longer term. A visit to majo

The California Energy Commission has voted to approve an $8 million grant for the development of a high-capacity hydrogen fueling station. In a statement Wednesday the Commission said the fueling station, at the Port of Long Beach, would be used to service and promote the expansion of zero-emission fuel cell electric Class 8 drayage trucks. Drayage trucks are used to take freight from ports to warehouses and other locations, the Commission said. The Commission added that the promotion of zero-emission vehicles would help to "reduce greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution at the nation's second busiest container port." The station, according to the Commission, will source its hydrogen "from 100 percent renewable biogas." Hydrogen is becoming an attractive fuel source for many types of transport. A fleet of hydrogen fuel cell buses is currently in operation in the Scottish city of Aberdeen. In September, European railway manufacturer Alst

Norwegian Sintef Ocean and ABB Marine will use two 30kW hydrogen fuel cells, set up in laboratory to model the operation and control of a complete marine power system in a megawatt-scale propulsion plant. "ABB and Sintef Ocean are undertaking groundbreaking research to test the viability of fuel cells as an energy source for main ship propulsion. The new research project seeks to provide the answers required for fuel cell technology to be delivered at the scale needed to power commercial and passenger ships," said a press release. The testing methodology, to be developed at Sintef Ocean’s Trondheim-based laboratory, will use two 30kW fuel cells, set up to model the operation and control of a complete marine power system in a megawatt-scale propulsion plant. ABB’s own software together with Sintef Oceans vessel simulator capabilities will imitate and play back different load profiles and diesel/battery/fuel cell combinations, and tested in a scaled down