Case Study of Particle Technology Application in Automotive Industry:Novel Powder Feeding and Solution Drying DevicesFor Hydrogen Carrying Solid Fuel Based Fuel Cell Cars

摘要

Hydrogen driven fuel cell cars are being developed to meet the transportation needs ofthe future when hydrogen is poised to be a major source of energy. These cars have been widelypublicized and demonstrated at various auto shows all around the world. The next generation ofthe hydrogen driven fuel cell car is being designed by a leading automotive company, whichmixes hydrogen carrying solid fuel with water onboard the vehicle to generate hydrogen. Oncethe hydrogen is generated from this reaction, the resultant solution is dried to recover the waterin an onboard recirculation loop. The dried product is then stored in a disposal container and sentto a chemical plant to be regenerated. Such improvements drastically reduce the total waterrequirement, alkali requirement, as well as transportation costs of fuel. To realize this process, itis important to build a powder mixing and a solution drying device, which conform to thespecifications of the vehicle. Unfortunately, design teams of hydrogen driven fuel cell cars areoften not familiar with solid handling systems and particle technology. More often than not,their academic and professional training is not sufficient in these critical areas. As a result, ourresearch group was approached to design a unique powder handling system for their fuel cell car.Both graduate and undergraduate students were involved in this project as well as the industrialtechnologists. The novelty of the project was an important motivating factor for the academicteam, while the automotive industry was eager to become more familiar with and learn the basicsof particle technology, essential for developing the next generation of fuel cell cars.Consequently, this project benefited not only the automotive industry, but also the faculty andstudents involved. This project is now being incorporated into an elective course as a goodexample of novel applications for particle technology.